Project YOU

  It’s Not Fair! We have all heard children scream these words when they experience an unjust outcome. As rational adults, we acknowledge and accept that life is not fair, but somehow unwittingly get trapped in a cycle of misery and bitterness when things don’t work out ‘fairly’,  in our favor. We doom ourselves to unrelenting frustration when life doesn’t meet our expectations. For example, you are burned by toxic office politics. You are exhausted watching less experienced and less competent team members get ahead. You question the futility of your skills and efforts. Most of us have been sucked into the ‘woe is me’ vortex, at some point or the other.   Your read of the situation ‘may’ be accurate, but ruminating about it incessantly, only adds insult to injury. The unfortunate outcome of replaying the latest  ‘unfairness’ saga repeatedly in our heads leads to chronic misery and bitterness and impacts how we show up every day. The personality that comes throu...

  Does it annoy you when people waste your time? I have to assume the answer is a resounding ‘YES’, especially when you are working on important activities. Have you experienced weeks when you wanted to wrap up an important task, only to have a coworker hijack your plan with impunity for their urgent tasks? This lack of planning on their part was a pet peeve of mine and that raised my sensitivity to the limited time of my colleagues. In fact, year after year, in my annual performance self-assessment, I would include a line about the care and respect I showed for everyone’s time. I wore it as a badge of honor. We experience this lack of respect regularly when we spend more time than we should on comprehending poorly formulated emails, or sit through a meandering meeting with no agenda. Sadly, time is the only thing in life that you can never get back once it’s gone. How are you protecting your most valuable resource? Care to share? I protect the first three hours of my day ...

Have false comparisons and the accompanying judgments brought you down? The operative word here is ‘false’. Comparison is valuable when deciding between ‘similar’ products and we do that often before we order online. Humans, on the other hand, are unique, complex, and multi-dimensional. When we compare ourselves to others, the judgment we make and the conclusions we arrive at are often counterproductive. Often, the data gathered is faulty and the filters we use are skewed toward one outcome, which is to confirm our bias that the other person has it is better than us. At the same time, we ignore our gifts, strengths, virtues, and values. Social media posts with exotic vacation pictures, glamor shots, and recognitions are highlight reels of others. Sadly, we compare that to our everyday. It is easy to fall prey to comparisons and doubt our own competencies and self-worth. As Theodore Roosevelt’s famous quote noted, ‘Comparison is the thief of joy”. Besides stealing your joy, the ...

  I sometimes get mad at myself after a couple of hours of directionless internet surfing. Do you? It is so easy to jump from one interesting link to another. I convince myself that I was CURIOUS to learn more and that can't be all bad. Did surfing the internet lead to learning and retention? Maybe, maybe not. Research tells us that for deep learning to occur, our exploration dig has to be an effortful journey, with confusion and cognitive dissonance thrown in for good measure. That is why failure is a phenomenal teacher. The lessons of failure are rarely forgotten.  We use the phrase ‘connecting the dots’ often in our daily jargon when we recognize that there was a gap in our knowledge and this latest discovery, propelled by curiosity, helped close the gap and connect the dots. An attitude and a mindset that takes us in the direction of inquiry, helps us see patterns in all kinds of situations, which is essential to distilling life’s many truths. To live and experience your b...

  People are quitting their jobs like never before.  The pandemic has given us time and space to reflect and evaluate the quality of our lives. The decision to change jobs may be triggered for various reasons, job satisfaction, meaning and fulfillment, money, and flexibility are a few examples. The idea of reclaiming control and taking ownership of our careers has taken hold for most of us. I quit an executive position with good perks last month because I had this aching sense that I was not living my purpose and calling. My talents and competencies were not being utilized. I tried to proactively create opportunities to live my calling at work but a gnawing feeling of uneasiness was consuming me. The voice inside me cautioned me about the regret that was going to envelop me in a few years for not living my calling, which was using my insights from lived experiences and lifelong learning to positively impact the lives of others. You may be sensing discomfort now. But befor...

I magine you are in a work meeting and hear a question for which you may have the answer. But you choose to stay quiet because you are not 100% sure if what you know is right. You want to avoid appearing unintelligent because you believe it will reveal a weakness. This scenario spotlights the moment when you were overpowered by your fixed mindset thinking. A person with a growth mindset leaning would have spoken up at that moment. Because what drives them is not the desire to safeguard their current slate of skills, knowledge, and talents but a hunger to expand their capabilities and reach. We have learned from studies that mindsets can be different in different domains for the same individual. For example, a person may have a growth mindset in the kitchen when they are experimenting and cooking up new and novel dishes but on the other side of the spectrum, the same person is fearful of experimentation and expansion at work. Mindsets are not absolute, immovable states and can be shifte...

  Do you blame others for your bad mood, stress levels, and lack of progress at work? Sometimes, but not always, the blame is justified. You may believe that you were deliberately sabotaged. A common instinctive human reaction will be to immerse yourself in the blame game. It may feel good momentarily to tell others about the offender and go into a thinking loop for days. However, if you dwell on it for too long, you rob yourself of peace and happiness. Do you really want unhelpful emotions, like resentment, anger, and hatred to take over your aura and energy? The negative energy you show up with at meetings will leak, even when you want to hide it, and it will be felt by everyone. People will sense it, even on a zoom call. None of us knowingly want to give away the power to control our narrative. The only way we regain control is to stop ruminating about the slight, sabotage, or offense. It is not easy, I know. I have been there. A deliberate choice to snap out of my victimho...