Personal Development Training and Motivational Humor from the Motivational Smart Ass!

I was recently invited to a Baptism and needed to figure out what to wear. I had only been to one Baptism before, and that was in the summer and followed by a Luau (don’t ask) so I couldn’t use the dress code from that event to decide. Trusting my instincts, I decided to go wear slacks and a button down shirt, no tie, no suit.

The morning of the Baptism, one of my friends calls me. He is also not Christian and has not attended too many Baptism before.

“Hey, what are you wearing to this?” he asks.

“Shirt and dress pants, no suit or tie.”

“Oh, ok.”

Then I realize something and ask “Hey, isn’y your girlfriend Christian?”

“Yeah.”

“Wouldn’t she be much better qualified to answer this than you or me?”

“She told me I should ask you.”

Now this is interesting for two reasons:

1) Baptism is a Christian rite. How, in any way, shape, or form am I more qualified than HIS CHRISTIAN GIRLFRIEND to know what people wear to these things?
2) Between the two of us, we have no fewer than 5 close friends who are Christian. Rather than asking any one of them (and then relaying the answer to me), he opts to ask the least qualified person in the city of Philadelphia to answer that question. Truly this is the igorant leading the uninformed.

Seriously, he would have been better off throwing open his window and screaming out to the good citizens of Philadelphia to solicit their opinions on this topic. Like Scrooge at the end of a Christmas Carol. “You there boy, what does one wear to a Baptism?” “Why, a suit of course good sir.” Although in Philly the response would more likely be, “A suit you big dummy, now shut your window and shut up!”

How often do you do this? Not necessarily asking for Baptismal fashion advice, but rather how often do you ask for opinions on people based on how well you know them as opposed to how qualified they are are to give you a knowledgable answer?

Asking friends who are not in your industry for business advice, putting lots of weight on feedback on marketing materials from people who are not in your target market, even taking medical advice from people who’s only medical training is from watching “House” on Fox.

The medical one is the worst. How often do you not get something checked out because a friend of yours who had one similar sympton said, “oh I had that, it turned out to be nothing?” Or the reverse – panicking because someone you know knows a person who knows another person who had symptom vaguely similar to yours and ended up on the emergency room. We are bizzarre, illogical creatures.

There is nothing wrong with getting opinions from friends, colleagues, and family. Just make sure that before you run out and take major action – or decide to take no action at all – that you consider the source. Otherwise you might just end up underdressed for a Baptism (as I did, when everyone else there showed up in a suit and tie. including my friend, who never bothered to call me and let me know!)

You know what’s delicious? Chicken marsala. I love it. About a year ago, I was afflicted with an inexplicably intense craving for chicken marsala (as far as inexplicably intense afflictions go, this one’s not so bad). This sent me on a quest to learn how to cook amazing chicken marsala. I was like Monty Python looking for the Holy Grail, only without the coconut horses and crazy non-sequiters. I found many recipes and have tried quite a few, but unfortunately, none of the recipes come out as the deliciousness that I’ve been hoping for.

Don’t get me wrong. It tastes good enough that I make it frequently, and I even entertain with it, but it’s not super-duper. And I am looking to make me some super-duper marsala. Here’s why I believe mine is not yet super-duper: I have been following recipes.

I can hear you now. “You fool, that’s cray talk! Of course the secret to great cooking success is to follow recipes!”

Hold your horses there, Wolfgang…Following the recipe is a sound strategy, and it seems to make sense, but there’s a challenge. I am not such an experienced cook that I can adjust on the fly. When you really think about it, recipes are just outlines. Little details between the recipe creator’s kitchen and ingredients and mine can lead to big changes. The exact quality of the ingredients, the material of the pots and pans, the temperature ranges of the equipment, etc. all can have an impact. Don’t think so? Then you need to re-watch Jurrassic Park and learn about “chaos theory.” I could explain it myself, but why deprive you the opportunity to watch Jeff Goldblum overact?

When I’m following a recipe, all I know is what’s on the page. I don’t have the underlying skills to make adjustments as I go. Hence the whole “falling short of super-duper” thing. A great cook would be able to use the recipe as a starting point, but then make the needed adjustments to create an awesome marsala.

In the self-improvement industry, there is a lot of talk about “modelling.” (No, not Heidi Kulm modelling, though I do recall someone telling me I was “hot” enough to do it. Then I woke up, stumbled to the mirror, and snapped back to reality…) Basically, you find someone who is getting the result you want and then do what they do to get the same result. Sounds easy, but it has the same limitations as cooking with a recipe. Little differences between you and the “modellee” can lead to giant differences in what results you get. Trying to copy someone else exactly can be a little “Single White Female”; it’s all fine and good until someone gets a stiletto in the eye…

The key to achieving great results, whether in cooking, business, or any endeavor, really, is to understand the underlying fundamentals of the task you are doing. It’s not enough to follow a script; you have to know what the big picture is and understand why you are doing the things you are doing.

In business, this is most obvious in two cases: people who follow customer service scripts and sales scripts to the letter without really understanding the purpose of those scripts. If you want to deliver great service – or should I say, “super-duper service”? – or flow with the unexpected while selling (or have your people do either), make sure you have a full understanding of what the real goals are and why the script is designed the way it is. The ability to understand the big picture and make adjustments is also what separates great leaders from the rest of the pack.

This is what improvising is all about. One of my main messages in my keynote speech is “planning is important, but improvising is essential.” The plan gets you started; your ability to improvise and flow in the right direction is what makes success inevitable, and it’s your deep understanding of the fundamentals that lets you improvise.

P.S. If you’ve got a super-duper Marsala recipe, please post it (or a link to it) as a comment or email it to avish@avishparashar.com.

It’s that time again, when we, as good Americans, must decide whether to vote or not. No, I am not talking about the Presidential primaries, I am of course talking about American Idol. American Idol (“AI” as the hep-cats who are in-the-know refer to it – er, actually, that’s just how I am going to refer to it so I don’t have to type it out all the way every time) has started it’s 7th season, and yes, I am watching. I resisted for a while, but this will mark the 4th time I have gotten sucked into a season of AI. It’s like a drug. You watch one episode one night out of boredom and then boom! before you know it you’re checking websites to see who the frontrunners are and thinking about what song you would sing if you auditioned (for me it would be “Bust-a-Move” by Young MC, but that’s because I can’t sing for real).

Last night was the first night the audience was allowed to phone in and vote. I have never called in to vote for an AI contestant. In my world, that is the only way to hold on to the last shred of the dignity I gave up the day I programmed AI into my DVR as a “series recording.” That was a tough day. Though to be fair, AI is one of the best shows to watch on DVR because there is so much stuff you can forward over. I can watch a 2 hour episode of AI in about 37 minutes.

So I have never voted, but I have also never complained about how “stupid a result was” or how “someone got robbed.” I figure if I’m not going to do anything about it, I can’t complain.

Not all people share this opinion. I was once in a discussion about a particulary egregious voting result (yes, I realize how pathetic it is that not only do I DVR and watch AI but that I also get into conversations about it). Two other guys were complaining that someone got voted off. I asked them if they called in to vote, and of course they both said “no.”

Call me crazy, but I think if you don’t vote you forfeit the right to complain. It’s like the person who has a job he hates and complains about incessantly but never bothers to look for a new job, or even tries to improve his current one. At that point, it’s time to “you know what” or get off the pot…

In the grand scheme of things, AI is kind of a popcorn show and I suppose if people want to whine and moan, well, who am I to stop them? But how often do we all do this in other, much more relevant areas of our lives? Next time you catch yourself complaining, ask yourself, “am I doing anything to change this situation?” If not, your options are clear: do something about it or shut up.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go prepare for the latest episode of American Idol…

As I prepared to file my 2007 taxes, I realized that I had not entered one of my accounts into Quickbooks. It wasn’t a very active account, but it did have some activity so I needed to file it. I happen to be extremely, shall we say, “motivationally challenged” when it comes to filing. I have a large filing cabinet, but my efficient method of organization involves throwing everything into a “to be filed” box. The box does sit right in front of the cabinet, so I can fool myself into thinking I am doing something right (and I ignore the voice that says, “no Avish, no you are not doing something right.”)

In any case, one year’s worth of bank statements were somewhere in this box. No, I couldn’t just go download them on-line, because this bank only posts the last two months worth of activity online. This, from “America’s most convenient bank” – sure, whatever you say…

My task was clear. I needed to sort through that box, find all the statements, then manually enter them in the computer. This sounded about as much fun to me as watching the movie “Goodburger”… the Director’s Cut version…with Director’s commentary turned on.

So this item made it’s way onto my “to-do” list everyday for about three weeks. I would see it on my list, think about doing it, and ignore it. I would see that box, sitting there in front of my filing cabinet, staring at me as if to say, “ha! you can’t ignore me forever. Sooner or later you’ll have to give me some attention!” And everyday and every night I would expend mental energy thinking about it.

Finally, this week, I did it. I sat down with box while watching an episode of “Law and Order,” and sorted through all the papers. Took me less than one episode. The next day, I sat down with my laptop and all the statements in front of another episode of “Law and Order,” and again, had added all the data before the episode finished.

(Side note: As you may have guessed, I watch a lot of Law and Order re-runs. That may be because TNT shows about 37 Law and Order episodes every day. I think my dream episode would be Lenny Briscoe and Ed Green investigating with Jack McCoy and Jamie Ross prosecuting, and have the case involve Mike Logan on trial for being involved in Claire Kincaid’s death and being defended by Ben Stone with Abby Carmichael in second chair. It would be like an Law & Order All Star Game!)

Anyhow, the total time was less than a couple of hours, and I managed to do it while having fun doing something else. The amount of time and energy I spent procrastinating was waaaaaaaaaay more than that. You wouldn’t spend $1000 to try to make $500 (unless you were like many business owners who don’t understand basic math and accounting, but that’s for another post), but that’s pretty much what you are doing with your life when you procrastinate.

The Lesson: Contrary to what you might be thinking, the lesson here is NOT “stop procrastinating.” Rather, when you catch yourself procrastinating, realize you have two choices: 1) Just do it, or 2) Don’t do it now, but stop thinking about, focusing on it, or beating yourself up over it. Doing anything else is just wasting time…

Everyone hates rejection; it’s one of the main fears that hold people back from doing the things they want and achieving the success they deserve. I hate it too, but I recently hit a new low when I got rejected by myself (or at least by my email system)

I send out an e-zine with a humorous article every two weeks (you can see it and sign up here: www.AvishParashar.com) As a check, I keep myself subscribed to my own list. Last week I sent an article to my list. When I checked my Spam folder a few hours later, I saw my own e-zine in there! My email filter rejected mail from myself! What chance does my e-zine have of getting through to subscribers if it can’t even get to me?

(Of course this does beg the question of whether self-rejection is a form of low-esteem or high-esteem. Are you not good enough for yourself or are you too good for yourself…hmm, that’s kind of like a Zeb Koan, I’ll have to go under a waterfall and meditate on it)

I have to say, there was a weird feeling of sadness and betrayal as I clicked on the “not Spam” option in my email. “Et tu, Gmail?” I realize that taking your email program’s behavior personally is ridiculous, like people who assume their cars break down just to spite them (and you know who you are)

Of course, I’m the guy that feels bad when my microwave beeps at me twice. My microwave is designed to beep when the food is done, and then beep periodically to remind me that there is food in there. This in and of itself seems stupid – when was the last time you put food in the microwave and forgot about it? The microwave beeps, loudly and repeatedly, when it’s done. If you can’t remember that the microwave beeped, you have bigger problems than just forgetting food. But my microwave beeps like 5 seconds after the time ends as a reminder. And it sounds annoyed. Everytime I wait too long and hear the second beep I feel this sense of, “all right already, I heard you!” It’s like an impatient delivery person ringing your doorbell a second time before any human would have had time to answer the door. Inanimate or not, it’s annoying.

So I shouldn’t take it personally, but it’s hard not too. I mean, I spend more time with my email than with most of closest friends (don’t snicker – add up the hours and it’ll be true for you to). Google is supposed to be smart; doesn’t it recognize me when it sees me?

Beyond the recognition betrayal, there’s the whole realization that Gmail doesn’t feel my e-zine is of value and that it’s spam. Now that hurts.

It’s like when you come up with a brilliant idea and you rush to share it with your spouse, or closest friend or colleague, and their first response is to point out why your idea stinks. When you go to your closest friend, you’re looking for support and validation…but I suppose that’s too much to ask from an inanimate web-based email application.

Lesson #1 – if even I can’t get my e-zines, then it’s a fair bet a lot of other people aren’t. So reach people another way – hence this blog (that’s what makes me better than Gmail – I learn and adapt)

Lesson #2 – if I can feel a pang of sadness at a software program’s rejection, then you know it’s a powerful thing. Rejection can and will happen – be willing to accept and face that, and you will be well on your way to success.

Lesson #3 – I am still pretty sure Gmail did this to me on purpose. This is why humans and machines can never peacefully co-exist. If you don’t believe that, watch “The Sarah Connor Chronicles” on Fox…