Dear Melissa,

I know this is an unexpected letter, but I find myself with a lot of lessons to share based on current experiences. I also wanted to give you the invaluable safety tip on car keys provided by a dear friend half way across the country. Many of us are inundated with forwards daily, but I am lucky to have taught my friends and associates to allow me only those that are of genuine value or howlingly funny!

Live and Succeed by Design,
MG

"Be careful the environment you choose for it will shape you: be careful the friends you choose for you will become like them."
~ W. Clement Stone
1902-2002, Author and Business

Get Out of the Fray, Head to the Top

I've attended a couple of personal and business development seminars recently and find the herd mentality fascinating. When you take a room of strangers whether 30 or 600, and lead them by example, they will do all manner of things they would ordinarily never consider. Yes, I am talking about the typical stretching exercises coupled with shoulder massaging of the folks next to you and then hugging of complete strangers. Yes, I do think it went too far when the seminar leader instructed us to go from shoulder rubs to butt massages and many of us did resist (some parts need to be sacred for our private lives!), but others jumped right in. These same individuals are often shy types, not particularly affectionate or touchable, but in a crowd they want to fit in. Leaders never fit in. It is not by doing the ordinary or by doing what everyone else is doing that will make your difference in your life and the world. Instead, it is by stepping out and wailing on the saxophone in your own band (too many beats and different drummers already!)

Which side of the stage do you want to be on? It is kind of like those that watch a lot of TV. I don't because I'm more interested in getting on the other side of the set. As long as you spend your life watching, you'll be far less likely to be the one leading. Yes, I do believe in attending events to study how they are put together, the triggers used, new techniques presented, and nuggets of gold provided. However an intelligent observer gets a very different perspective than a myopic participant. I went to lunch with participants and was fascinated, though not entirely surprised, to realize that while I got all that they did, I also understood the material and methods on a much deeper level as I was keenly observing, instead of blindly participating.

Can you step out of the fray, observe the expertise while absorbing it, and start your climb to the top? This is important whether you are a speaker, team leader, designer, business professional, or family head. Or will you follow any lead provided, do any activity suggested (no matter how bizarre or goofy) just to fit in with the crowd. Follow the flock and you may end up a lamp chop.

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Car Keys Save Lives

Put your car keys beside your bed at night. If you hear a noise outside your home or someone trying to get in your house, just press the panic button for your car. The alarm will be set off, and the horn will continue to sound until either you turn it off or the car battery dies. This tip came from a neighborhood watch coordinator.

Next time you come home for the night and you start to put your keys away, think of this: It's a security alarm system that you probably already have and requires no installation. Test it. It will go off from most everywhere inside your house and will keep honking until your battery runs down or until you reset it with the button on the key fob chain. It works if you park in your driveway or garage.

If your car alarm goes off when someone is trying to break into your house, odds are the burglar or rapist won't stick around... after a few seconds all the neighbors will be looking out their windows to see who is out there and sure enough the criminal won't want that.

And remember to carry your keys while walking to your car in a parking lot. The alarm can work the same way there..... This is something that should really be shared with everyone. Maybe it could save a life or a sexual abuse crime.

This would also be useful for any emergency, such as a heart attack, where you can't reach a phone, but have your keys handy.

If You Don’t Like What You’re Eating, Change Your Cooking!

I have a habit of tinkering with recipes when I cook. I'm not great at following directions, you know your typical entrepreneurial type! I find that by adding a dash of cinnamon to the fried chicken and waffles recipe or capers to an artichoke dip that it makes it mine and adds personality. What are you adding to your own life that makes it delicious and truly palatable?

So many people simple take the ingredients that await them on the shelf of life or what is served up by those in their lives without questioning it. But soon they find they are battling interior indigestion, relationship reflux, health heartburn, and career colon challenges. If your life isn't working, look at what you are putting into it. What ingredients are you using? How are you preparing it? What cooking techniques are you using?

Our lives are the sum total of what we surround ourselves with and who we surround ourselves with. These are our ingredients. Our preparation is in how we bring ourselves to this table, our attitude, our talents, our unique gifts. How we cook it all together will determine if it is palatable and delicious or toxic to us. Sometimes we need to change the ingredients, making new friends, new contacts and connections and allowing the toxic ones out of our lives. Sometimes we need to change our surroundings with a move in our career, a move in our residence, or perhaps just a remodel of either or both. It is also helpful if we are flexible in the cooking of it all and can reach for that secret ingredient, that spice of life as needed.

Why Charlie is Brown

It is all in the semantics, consider mud brown vs. chocolate. Wouldn't you have a library done in Hershey? Or Godiva? Yum. Brown is a wonderful, warm, earthy color that too often gets short shrift by its moniker. Just rename it . . . cinnamon, bark, mahogany, toast, all conjure up inviting images of rooms to curl up in.

It is a hot combination with all manner of aqua blues and turquoise, a great foil for brown. But brown is also capable of a lot more. Try it with corals, sage, golds, and even dusky plums. It is not as hard and edgy as black. And you can make it sophisticated with a laquer finish.

Brown actually indicates dependability and reliability, hence UPS's choice of corporate color, now ubiquitous with their branding. It is a color that brings feelings of comfort and thoughts of home for many. And of course, there is our favorite animated Mr. Dependable, Charlie Brown.