by Corey Ciocchetti | Be Happy
When people ask you how it’s going, do you respond, “I’m just so busy.” No one ever says this with a joyful heart. It’s always more depressed and monotone. But, wouldn’t we all rather spend more time with loved ones or just relax?
The problem is that we are constantly nagged by the next task? It’s stressful and somewhat disappointing see a to-do list grow and grow. There is always another thing to do, another promotion to seek, another group to join, more homework, different resume building opportunities. Let’s face it, we have become a society of box-checkers.
These observations have led me to two important conclusions:
(1) Very little of this work is being done well. How could it? People can only focus on so many things and stay awake for so many hours each day; and
(2) There doesn’t seem to be a lot of joy in the journey. How could there be? It’s beyond disappointing to accomplish a handful of important tasks just to see more and more appear. It’s discouraging to give a half-hearted effort to projects when you know you could have done better. At some point we want to arrive at a place where our efforts pay off.
This “too-busy” lifestyle reminds me of the higher levels of Tetris where the blocks just keep falling faster and faster until one inevitably crashes to the ground. That sucks because getting to that level required so much hard work. Oh, the stress of Tetris.
In the end, it all adds up to this counterproductive formula:
I will do a ton of stuff relatively poorly while running myself into the ground in the process. And, for all this work, I receive a padded resume with little to back it up in terms of foundational experience, memories, or knowledge.
There is a much, much better way. Read Part I of this two-part series to begin to see the light . . .
by Corey Ciocchetti | Be Happy |
The question I am asked by far the most often at DU or on the road is, “What should I do with my life?”
People of all ages and stages ponder this idea incessantly, desperate for answers. Let’s face it, people desire the fulfillment that comes with discovering their place in the world. Most everyone wants to make some sort of legitimate impact and leave some sort of legacy. If you evaluate the question more deeply, however, people are really asking me three questions:
1. What am I passionate about deep down in my heart?
2. How do I translate that into a successful career and life mission?
3. Will this path allow me to leave a sufficient legacy?
How many times do you think about these things every week? Every day even? Me too. At least I used to, until I discovered my answers. Here’s how.
by Corey Ciocchetti | Be Happy
Here’s a meaningful story to make you think about some important stuff:
Once upon a time, a man found an eagle’s egg and placed it under a brooding hen. The eaglet hatched with the chickens and grew to be like them. He clucked and cackled, scratched the earth for worms, flapped his wings, and managed to a fly few feet in the air.
Years passed. One day, the eagle, now grown old, saw a magnificent bird above him in the sky. It glided in graceful majesty against the powerful wind, with scarcely a movement of its golden wings.
Spellbound, the eagle asked, “Who’s that?”
“That’s the king of the birds, the eagle,” said his neighbor. “He belongs to the sky. We belong to earth – we’re chickens.”
So, the eagle lived as a chicken for that’s what he thought he was.
The moral of this story is profound. Have you ever felt like you were born to do something different than what you see around you? How often do you see people falling in line, doing what they are expected to do or what people in their shoes always do? And, all the while, you want something different from your life! But, you just can’t wrap your mind around it.
Read more to find out how change perspective and break down artificial barriers.
by Corey Ciocchetti | Be Happy
Are you looking for better grades? Do you study really hard and then under-perform on tests / assignments? How often do you finish a class just to see the stuff you learned disappear from your brain two weeks later? As a long-time college professor, it’s easy to identify the problem. Somewhere along the journey, you’ve lost sight of the idea that grades follow knowledge and that being able to think, manipulate and evaluate information accurately requires a different, much more difficult approach. You won’t see your peers doing this and that makes it a competitive advantage for you.
Here are Ten “Pro Tips” I use to help build better, more professional students. Click on each for more information. Do this and your grades will skyrocket. Note: this will take time, this will be harder than your current approach, and your results may be elusive at first. But, there are no shortcuts to any place worth going, Let’s jump in:
by Corey Ciocchetti | Be Happy |
I’m not thankful enough. The truth is . . . people help me all the time. I’m internally grateful, to be sure. But, I don’t express my thankfulness for this help very well or often enough. I’ve come to realize that I have the gratitude part down. I’m missing the thankfulness piece of the equation. Hence, this ethics blog post.
I’ll let you in on a little secret about this forum – these posts are as much for my life as for yours. I’ve already used my post on how to Forgive Like A Kid to do just that in a few really tough situations – fights which have been beating me up. I’ve used the post on living The Good Life to apologize to a few people who deserved a sincere apology from me. And . . . I felt awesome afterwards. This character stuff really does work. Please know that I would never ask you to do anything that I am not willing to do myself.
Which leads me back to today’s topic: thankfulness. As I mentioned. I struggle in this area from time to time. I bet that some of you do too. Giving thanks is often really hard for a lot of us.
Perhaps our pride gets in the way. We want to feel like we accomplished our goals all by ourselves – though our hard work, our determination, and our grit. And many of us have, to a large extent. But, certainly we haven’t done everything in our lives all by ourselves. We’ve all needed help and recevied some. Don’t believe me . . . then ask yourself who changed your diapers 🙂 More on that in a second.
Another reason that being thankful is hard is that our life gets in the way. Like a text message that falls into the pit of our cellphones, we plan on saying, “Thank You,” but forget about it the storm of our busyness.
For me, that ends . . . today! I am going to make a strong commitment here. I will strive to say thank you a lot more often by setting a daily Thank You quota. Let’s call it the “Thank You Challenge.” Will you join me?
by Corey Ciocchetti | Be Happy
Stress is omnipresent. It lurks in every area of our lives. Family members add stress from time to time (okay, maybe more often than that). Friends can be a pain, or distant, or unreliable. Our kids wake up unexpectedly (or perhaps expectedly) at 2:00am. We want better grades or more money or that promotion we feel we deserve. Our kitchens need remodeling. The toilet is clogged. The bills are piling up. Taxes are due. We need to exercise more. We take ourselves too seriously. Traffic is bad. Our plane is delayed. The weather stinks. And, because of all this, we worry and then react poorly. Trust me, I get it. Life is stressful.
If that’s true, you ask, why in the world is this post about returning email for crying out loud! Patience grasshopper. After speaking about stress to audiences for over a decade, I have discovered that it’s best for us to start slowly with any stress-reduction plan. This slow roll makes it more palatable and increases the odds of you actually doing something about your stress level. Biting off too much just adds unnecessary stress. And, though diving into stress-reduction in depth requires a longer post for another day, here is a short thesis statement of my approach.
There are certain things that we should stress over – major stressors, let’s call them. These are things like broken family relationships, a drug or alcohol problem, the inability to stop cheating in romantic relationships or at school, major unhappiness at work or in a career field, and other big life problems. These issues are major stressors and appropriately so. There is little I can do to help you here. Instead, you must dedicate the time and energy it takes to fight your way back into the light. To eliminate this type of stress, you need to literally change your life.
The best way to accomplish life change is to first eliminate or significantly reduce our minor stressors. Minor stressors are things the that trouble us but really shouldn’t. In this category lies: perfectionism, impatience, failure to apologize when merely saying “I’m sorry,” could halt a fight. You know, the little-ish stuff that we could fix by just swallowing a little bit of pride, reacting differently, and accepting that we are humans who mess up and are never perfect. Remedying minor stressors is a prime area where we can saw major points off our stress score.
Today, let’s focus on one minor stressor that is easy to reduce, or even remove, from your life – clogged inboxes. Let’s talk about the email and other messages that clutter our inboxes, then our brains, and, finally, our lives. To get started, here’s my advice: You need to return your emails – all of them – each day.
I’ll show you how . . .
