The Role of a Lifetime

If you spend anytime on the internet now you have probably come across any number of popular memes. These self propagating pieces of information have the ability to spread quickly on the internet mainly because of the connectedness of this medium. Examples of memes are the jokes or stories that quickly get passed from person to person. One recent example of a meme is the one where you are asked to answer a series of questions and then tag another person. The questions are thought provoking and so for reference sake I am pointing you to one site HERE where you can take a look.

My thoughts today don’t deal with the meme itself. However, the thoughts I have began for me after I read and responded to a meme. The meme asks you to consider a number of questions. The questions range from philosophical to practical. Questions such as if you could live forever what would you do? Or the practical questions like if you were a painter? The meme does not constrain your answers in any way as they are open questions. Thinking this through I began to see the questions as an examination of the roles we hope to play in life. With the meme you are answering questions about roles that you do not possess. I thought that I would take a different approach.

One of the key considerations in Finding Your V.O.I.C.E. is determining your personal Objectives. Your objectives define for you where you want to go. In defining your objectives you create a personal mission statement that maps the journey. One key component of that map is a definition of the roles you play.

It might sound odd to say that we play different roles in our lives. Maybe you have never thought of it this way but in fact each of us plays several roles at different times. Have you ever heard yourself saying when speaking of a close friend “she is like a sister to me?” When making such a statement you are describing a role in your life. The statement describes the way in which you relate to a person that is not actually your sister. We have other roles in our lives. For many of us those roles include wife, husband, father, mother, friend, boyfriend, or girlfriend. The list goes on and on. Each of these roles requires you to perform in a certain way. In your role as a father you would behave differently than you would in your role as a friend.

Sometimes we give little thought to the roles in our lives. Some roles are thrust upon us without our agreement. Other roles we create for ourselves. Yet in each case we must make certain that we are taking the time to define those roles for ourselves. When you define yourself as a friend what does that mean? How will you perform in that role? Maybe your role is leader. What characteristics do you need to demonstrate to effectively play that role? If your role is mother, are you playing the part well? Have you been clear about how this role relates to the other roles in your life?

It is very important that we take the time to define all of the roles that we play in our lives. At times we may find that we have more roles than we can handle. Or you may find that you have not been living up to one of the roles you accepted. All of our roles require time. Take a look at your past couple of weeks. Have you put in meaningful time in your roles? If you have not are going to change your schedule to make sure that you are living up to the role you accepted?

I have often heard that some actors get to play the role of a lifetime. Or you hear that an actor is playing the part that they were born to play. I am not yet sure if I agree with those statements when I hear them. However, I do firmly believe that each of us was born for a specific role in life. It is possible that your role is to become someone famous or an important business executive. But it is just as possible that the role of a lifetime that you were born to play is the role of peace maker. Maybe your role is to be a volunteer in a women’s shelter. You could have been cast as a mentor to young men, or as a world class writer. Whatever the role there is one that you and only you were meant to play.

Recently veteran actor Morgan Freeman won an Oscar for his role in the movie Million Dollar Baby. Prior to winning his first Oscar, Freeman played in a number of diverse roles. He has been the President of the United States, a chauffeur, a convict, a pimp and even God. He has played twenty three different roles in films. However in this film Freeman plays the role of an old man who is unashamed of being an old man. Freeman is in his late 60s. Maybe there is a message in that for all of us. Freeman has been a successful and convincing actor for many years. However, the pinnacle of his acting success has come when he embraced a role that very much reflected much about who he is.

I don’t know what role you play in your life. Maybe your most important role has yet to be discovered. Or perhaps you have already been given the chance to play in the role of a lifetime. Whatever the case may be for you when you discover your role I urge you to define it well. Then embrace that role and play it for all that you are worth.

Our most important roles in our lives usually do not come with the recognition awarded by Hollywood. Your reward will be reflected in the lives that you impact. Playing your role well will change someone’s life and if you are lucky it will also change your own. Let’s take it again one more time from the top, only this time play your role with feeling.

Puzzles

I have always had an attraction to puzzles. I find them to be both entertaining and challenging. Over the years I have collected more than a few that have stood the test of time such that I will still pick them up to try to solve them once again. I think that one of the great things about a puzzle is that even after you complete it you can attempt it again and still find it challenging.

As much as I have enjoyed puzzles over the years there is one type of puzzle that I have never really mastered. That is the jigsaw puzzle. My abilities seem to be more in solving puzzles that have patterns or systems involved in their solution. Jigsaw puzzles require a different skill set. I am told that the solution to most of these puzzles can be found by first uncovering the outer edges and working your way in. The outer pieces are relatively easy to identify since they have straight edges. You then have the ability to use this frame to define the limits of your puzzle. There is a certain security that comes when you have an understanding of the boundaries within which you are going to work.

A jigsaw puzzle is a picture that has been cut into hundreds of small and seemingly random pieces. The more pieces you have the more difficult the puzzle. As you work your way through you look for similarities in colors or attempt to identify shapes that appear to go together. The best puzzles will have a number of pieces that are similar in shape but just different enough to require that they be placed only in their unique position. Sometimes you can be working with the right piece but you either need to turn it a certain way or combine it with another piece not yet placed to make it fit correctly. You also learn when working with your puzzle that no matter how hard you try, if you are working with a piece before it is time to place that piece you can spend a lot of time but will not yield any success.

No matter how difficult a puzzle can always be solved. You must be willing to devote enough time, and you must be patient. You can place a puzzle on your work space and devote chunks of time to the solution. If you are lucky enough to have a space that is undisturbed by others, consistent effort is all that it takes to solve the puzzle. In the end you always have a reference point to refer back to because every puzzle relates to a big picture that you can access when necessary.

We often use the term “big picture” to describe something that is not easily apparent. The term suggest that many pieces must come together to get the big picture. We tell people that they need to “think big picture” when we desire that they focus beyond the immediate. The big picture is the vision. It is the end of the journey. When we see the big picture all of the pieces have been put together in their proper places. We can stand back, hands on hips and proudly bask in our accomplishments.

Wouldn’t be great if all we had to do in our lives was to see the big picture? Imagine how easy things would be if we could abandon the small and seemingly insignificant tasks and just look at the big picture. We could see the end results of our efforts, be assured that the goals are achievable, and know that we are headed in the right direction. That would be great, but our reality is that each of us is holding individual pieces of our puzzle.

In our life’s journey we have periods when each piece of the puzzle we touch seems to fall neatly into place. We instantly can see where a piece belongs. During these times we can even see the form of the puzzle and we feel certain that the picture will be completed. At other times we find ourselves studying a piece for long periods. We wonder whether or not the piece we are holding in our hands is the right piece to work with at this time. Sometimes we select piece after piece and examine them only to reject that piece as not being the right piece at the right time. In these periods we don’t see much progress and we wonder if we will ever be able to put the picture together.

I have seen seasons in my own life when I was having trouble with the pieces of my puzzle. At times I have been so distraught that I became convinced that I was working on the wrong puzzle altogether. Those have been times of confusion and frustration. I can recall saying “if I just had this piece then everything would come together.”

When I have worked on puzzles that I have successfully completed I have always experienced periods when I was stumped. My first reaction to those times has been to “try harder.” Yet after trying harder I find that I am still stumped. Ultimately my frustration gets the best of me and I walk away. When I was younger I might even destroy all the work I had done up to that point. As I grew older I would just place the puzzle aside and allow myself to forget about it for a while.

The puzzles in our lives are really not very different from a jigsaw puzzle. We will all reach a point when the pieces just are not coming together. Sometimes people will encourage us to just try harder. Sometimes that may work. But, working hard at something that does not work, does not work. You need to step away from the puzzle. At times just stepping back will cause you to see the big picture and you can continue with your work. At other times you need to leave the puzzle completely and begin again at a later time. However, you should never make the mistakes I made in my youth when I would destroy my work up to that point.

The vision you have for your life or the big picture that you desire to achieve is made up of many small and seemingly random pieces. It is true that at times you might be working in the wrong section of the picture. However, if you follow the guidance of successful puzzle mavens you have already defined the boundaries of your vision. Maybe you need to move to a different section of your puzzle for a time. Perhaps it is time for a complete break just to regain your perspective. Or maybe all you need is a moment to step back, reassess the picture and begin again.

In my life I have had many periods of being stumped. Those are tough times. However, I have learned that immediately following those periods I find myself back in the zone where the pieces just fall into place one after another. I am still working on my puzzle, but I have no doubt that the picture is actually coming into view.

The Biggest Word of All

As a child growing up in Philadelphia one of the early gifts my mother gave to me was the gift of her time. As a single parent with three young children at the time there were few opportunities to spend one on one time with my mom. Yet, I remember with fondness that my mom spent special time with me her oldest child.

Perhaps there is a special relationship between a mother and her first born. This could also have something to do with the fact that I am nearly two years older than my closest sibling and over three years older than the next. I could also attribute the difference to the way that boys were raised in those days as compared to how girls were raised. I think it is safe to say that I don’t know all of the reasons why I had a special relationship with my mom, but I know that I benefited greatly from the time we spent together.

I guess that I was what we might call today a precocious child. I can remember from an early age constantly inserting myself into what was called “grown folks business.” I would engage any and every adult in conversation about subjects that seemed to amaze them. I doubt that this was so much related to my intellect, but because I can remember that early on I talked too much.

My mother took it upon herself to teach me to read before I entered grade school. She elected not to send me to kindergarten which I now suspect is due to her knowledge that I had no skills in painting, drawing, or playing with crayons. What I did love to do was read. This made me antisocial to children my age. My limited skills at the finer points of being a young kid probably added to their distrust of me. But through reading I was able to entertain myself and my young sisters. The time I spent reading also helped me to engage adults as I was fond of reading from a world book and quoting abstract facts that while generally meaningless would always get a raised eyebrow from most adults. Thinking back now I think I just figured out why I became so introverted as a child. I really did not fit in.

When I learned to read the books my mother chose were the Dick and Jane series. The words we all remember from those books are “see Spot run.” These books worked as early readers because of the word repetition. Words like see, come, and run would be repeated over and over in each consecutive sentence. Learning to read using these books created a sense of familiarity with words. The one syllable words could be pronounced easily and did not require much coordination between teeth and tongue. Other than the names of the characters the words in the early Dick and Jane series were three letters long. It was not until you got through the first couple of books that you were introduced to words with more than three letters and two syllables. It was in the Dick and Jane series that I learned what I still refer to as the biggest word of all. That word is “look.”

The word look of course has four letters. Yet, I call this the biggest word of all because it means so much to me. In my early reading look is introduced with the sentence “Look Jane, see Spot run.” This was my first encounter with the power of observation. Dick is telling Jane to pay attention. Later my mom taught me to cross the street in our busy neighborhood. There was my favorite word once again. My mother taught me to “stop, look, and listen.” Once again I was learning the power of observation now engaging one of my other senses. My mother further admonished me that when crossing the street I was to “look both ways” before I crossed, making sure that there was no traffic coming from either direction.

As a father now I teach my children about my favorite word. I have taught them the all important survival skills related to crossing the street. They have learned to look both ways and to stop, look, and listen. But I have built upon my mother’s early lessons. I have learned and have taught my children to look at people. I have learned to look at people when I talk to them. Looking people in the eye gives them a sense that you are interested in what they are saying. I also look at the people around me. I make it a habit to be observant of my world.

The word look is now inserted into my personal mission statement. The words I have written there are “I will look and pay attention. There is so much to see.” This is my reminder that there are so many opportunities in the world that we only need to look to see them. I encourage myself to look for opportunities to enlighten. I look for a chance to help others. I look for teachable moments with the people in my life. I look at my values and character. I remind myself that others are looking and so I must always be the best that I can be.

Look. This is such a simple word that we have tucked it away in our vocabulary. We engage our senses without fully knowing that when we look we must also see. Sometimes when you look you will see injustice. At other times you will look and see a person that could use a kind word or a moment of your time listening. When not looking at people take a look at your checkbook. There you will have a chance to see what things you have been valuing. Perhaps it is time in that case to look in a different direction.

Our world has become so high tech that we have lost the art of looking. When we want to communicate we use Powerpoint to make a presentation. Next time you sit through one of these take a look. The person presenting is not looking at you and you are not looking at them. Instead, everyone is just looking at the screen. Maybe the next time you find yourself in this situation you can yell out “look Jane, see spot run!” Remind the people in the room that real communication, real observation, real meaning is established when we take the time to look at each other. Let’s look each other in the eye. Let’s stop averting our attention. Stop, Look, and Listen.

I Saw What You Did

In my youth Saturday afternoons were spent at the movies. In those days an afternoon at the movies included at least two features plus cartoons. Kids were dropped off there and generally left unattended except perhaps for being with an older sibling. Of course the result was that spit balls would fly, too much candy would be consumed, and the teenagers in the theater owned the back seats of the theater and much of the balcony.

My recollections of those days more than forty years ago include seeing some of the classic adventure stories, westerns, and of course horror movies. I remember the horror movies best. This may be more related to the nights of lost sleep afterward when I became convinced that some creature, monster, or murderer actually lurked in my home. The really good films would cause me to leave the lights on at night for weeks. The only rating for movies in those days was “X” so generally we would go to see all of the movies that came out. When you consider that the price of these films was just twenty-five cents for the matinee, this was the cheapest form of babysitting available for parents at the time.

During the summer of 1965 there was a popular movie titled “I Saw What You Did.” This movie was a campy low budget film about a couple of teenage girls making prank telephone calls. During one of these calls the girls whisper to the person on the other line “I saw what you did, and I know who you are.” This is all done in good fun except that the receiver of this call is a psychopath that has just murdered his wife. Being psychotic of course our killer is now convinced that there are witnesses to his crime. The rest of the movie involves the connection of the girls to the killer, and includes some much overacted scenes by a drunken and sex starved Joan Crawford.

I admit that it is unfathomable today with the advent of telephone features like Caller ID that prank calls would be very entertaining for modern teenagers. Besides, what can compete with on demand movies, five hundred television channels and the ubiquitous Ipod? But I really enjoyed the idea of the movie. The premise is that people respond differently, at times even murderously, when they believe that someone has seen what they did in private. Of course we would not have a movie premise if your private act was not something as heinous as murdering your wife. I guess that given one of two options, contrition or murder, that murder might easily be a popular choice for a psychotic killer.

This perhaps strange stream of consciousness caused me to think about all of the things that we do in private that are not heinous. The things we do when we think that no one is watching. Eating that second donut, smoking after we told everyone that we quit, or telling your family that the doctor said your cholesterol level is now in the acceptable range (OK a bit too personal on that one). What changes would we make in our behaviors if we knew that someone was actually watching everything that we did?

I have come to believe that the majority of the people we know are good and decent folks. Most of us are generally honest and trustworthy. We seek to do the right thing and avoid temptation. Most of us are consistent in our behavior both in public and in private. I think that this aptly describes most of us but does not accurately describe me. The fact is that I often behave differently in private than I do in public. I have taken the extra donut. I have littered secretly, and I am now not afraid to admit that I once passed gas on a crowded elevator (only once!). These are all things that I did when I thought that no one else would know and I could easily create a much longer list without much effort.

I am like most people. Sometimes I don’t uphold my commitments. There are days when the private me and the public me are out of sync. I struggle with times when I don’t want to do what is best for my health, or I give in to an erosion of my value system. I am not perfect. Recognizing my personal imperfections I have built a system that I find useful. I call it my personal accountability system. The system is simple and very effective. When I make a commitment I try to share that commitment with one or more people that I know. Different commitments require different people, but the list of people is not very long. I also write down my important commitments. I place the written copy in a place that is conspicuous. I tell my children about those lists.

My accountability system works because like you I too want to be understood and accepted. The people that help me to remain accountable are both gentle and sometimes not so gentle reminders of what I have said I want to do. My children quickly point out to me that I am eating something that I said I would not. My friends will ask me about my progress on an important goal as a gentle reminder that progress is expected. My exercise partner checks in regularly to ask about my workout and even calls to make sure I am awake at the time that I am supposed to be working out.

We all need a bit of a reminder from time to time to keep us on track. It is also possible that you are much like me and you could use your own personal accountability system. I encourage you to adopt my system and get other people involved in helping you to make your life what you want it to be. We all need people in our lives with whom we can be completely honest. Ask the people that love you to be willing to accept your honesty without being judgmental. Enlisting people in the accomplishment of your goals, and having someone holding you accountable are the key to ensuring your success.

Ask a friend to call you often and remind you that they know who you are and they saw what you did. As long as you have not committed a crime your reaction should be just enough to keep you honest. Going back to those teenage pranks, they do still involve telephones. Now days teens think that it is funny to use camera phones to capture their assaults on innocent people. What a difference forty years makes.

Monday Morning Reflections

There is a somewhat universal sense that Monday is a tough day. I have already had four conversations today and in every one at some point in the conversation we talked about the difficulties of the coming week or just the difficulty of getting through a Monday morning. The fact that Mondays are tough should come as no surprise to us. Most of us begin our week on Monday and we tend to be reflective about what the week may bring and generally, most of us do not approach the beginning of the week with much optimism.

I am no different than the average person in this regard. I find Monday to be oppressive in the sense that on Monday I am forced to deal with the realities of life. Monday has a way of being full of could of, should of and wish I had kinds of thoughts. On Monday my worry meter is usually pegged hard in the red zone as I think through all of the looming disasters. This matter is complicated by the fact that most Mondays my body is tired from the weekend and the way that I allow myself to get out of sync. I eat and sleep differently on the weekend and the effects of that always become obvious to me on Monday morning. This is a pattern of which I am aware but I have yet to change.

I thought that today I would capitalize on our normally reflective mood for Monday morning. Today my writing will be brief as I would much rather you spend your time thinking. You probably have a world of issues that you are facing today but if you have taken the time to read this then you have already decided to take a break. I want you to capitalize on your time here today by committing to undertake a number of activities. Most of the activities require you to answer some questions. These are unscientific questions but are things that I was thinking about yesterday and today.

I started this process last night so I am a bit ahead of you. Read each of the questions listed and spend a few moments reflecting on the answers. Don’t hurry your way through this. Even though I started last night I have only completed three of the activities as I write this. My goal is to complete the list by the end of the day. I think that for you a goal of completing this by tomorrow morning is reasonable. The list follows:

Choose three words that describe you. Ask your closest friend and one family member to do the same. Compare the list.

What is it that you do that makes you unique?

If you could put together your own group of highly talented people for any purpose you wished what would the individual talents of those people be? Would you place yourself in the group? Limit the group to five people.

Have you ever admitted that you have failed at something in your life?

How did you handle that failure?

If you knew that you were going to die within days, what people would you need to talk to and what would you say to them?

At your funeral, there will be four speakers. One will be from your childhood, one from High School, One from your work or social life, and one from your family. What will these people say about you?

What three things do you really want to do with your life that you have yet to do?

Commit to thirty minutes of silence today. No noise and no distractions. Write down your thoughts after the time is up.

After the completion of these exercises, take a moment to pray. In your prayer make no requests but express your reflections on this day.

The purpose of these questions is to raise our consciousness beyond our present and begin to think about the future. When we focus on the end of our lives we can have a clearer sense of direction for the present. Perhaps the issues and problems you face today are critical, but often times they pale in comparison to the rest of our lives.

Maybe we should use Monday to focus on the end rather than the beginning. I hope that after you complete this exercise your focus and your perspective will have shifted moving you in a different direction.