A Secret to Rise Above Microstress

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Robin Dunbar popularized the idea of the Dunbar Number. You’ve probably heard of it. It’s the hypothetical number of people we can manage to maintain at any given stage of life. There are roughly 500 people we might recognize in the grocery store and smile and say hello, 100 we would invite to a wedding, 50 to a party, 12-15 over for a barbeque, 5 we call close, and 1.5 we will confide in. 1.5 because women often have two, and men frequently have one.

It turns out that if we can strengthen the relationships with the 500 more tangential people in our lives, we can build resilience to the micro-stressors in our lives.

You know what stress is. Stress is your partner loses their job, your child gets sick, you get a cancer scare. Or your house burns down. Sorry, that was a bit extreme. But extreme is often what we think when we think of stressful events. We overlook the micro-stresses in our everyday lives.

Microstress is a last minute edit from your client on the project that’s overdue. It’s realizing no one is picking up the boys after soccer practice, and you might have to rush over to transport six kids around town. It’s when your screen sharing app fails in the middle of your presentation. It’s when you can’t find your keys and you’re already late for the interview.

Microstressors are small, often overlooked stress-inducing events or interactions that occur in everyday life. They may seem insignificant on their own, but their cumulative effect can be substantial.

Because here’s what happens next: The 1st degree stressor is you pick up the assortment of kids at practice, and run around town for 40 minutes, yet then discover you don’t have the right ingredients for the meal you planned. You had an enjoyable evening of cooking planned with your family. So this makes you irritable, and you inflict a 2nd degree stressor on your partner with those vibes. The 3rd degree impact is you stay up late to work on the client’s last-minute changes, which disrupts your sleep, so you skip your morning workout. Not to mention the somewhat alarming emails you imposed on your colleagues at 10:30pm. So it goes.

“I’ve been just trying to get through this week for the past two years.”

Where Does Microstress Come From?

Miscommunication, tech glitches, interruptions, decision fatigue, social media notifications, and so on, all provide cumulative micro-stressors throughout the day, which impact you and everyone you interact with later. And these are just the stressors that affect your personal productivity. Rob Cross and Karen Dillon, authors of The Microstress Effect: How Little Things Add Up–and What to Do About It, also identify those kinds of stressors that deplete our emotional reserves such as toxic people or a constant impulse to care for the well-being of others.

And there are the microstressors that challenge your personal identity such as being asked to do tasks that don’t align with your values, or attacks on your personal identity or self-worth. Here’s a diagnostic tool to try to help recognize where it’s coming from.

How Do You Combat Microstress?

When we think about overcoming difficult moments in life, we often think of the personal attributes, or fortitude, people possess. It’s true that mindfulness, intentional breaks, exercise, healthy diet, and adequate sleep are all quite effective at alleviating stress and promoting well-being. Definitely do those things, but also recognize that they are personal, often isolated, and subject to our own willpower, discipline and habits.

But if you ask people the role of others to overcome adversity, you get different answers. It’s not just close friendships that matter, but a variety of relationships, especially those formed around shared interests such as cycling, religion, singing, tennis, or activism. These connections often involve individuals from different professional, socioeconomic, educational, or age backgrounds, enriching our lives with authentic interactions and broadening our perspectives. The activity itself feels like the primary pursuit – your exercise class, book club, or volunteer group – but the hidden benefits of these social interactions are surprisingly powerful.

In their research, Rob Cross and Karen Dillon point to these social groups to provide the strength to “rise above” microstressors in our lives. Specifically these social groups provide empathy, perspective, humor, and help us see a way forward – all in a way that closer ties, such as involved colleagues or family members, might not recognize because of their proximity to the stressful event.

Go join a singing group. Yes, a singing group. Robin Dunbar claims that the combination of endorphin release and speed-to-friendship made singing clubs the most effective means to create a sense of belonging and community. He found similar results with dancing groups and rowers.

So there you go. Put yourself out there.

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We just released a new series of courses on Embracing Curiosity for Career Growth. It includes valuable ideas how to overcome the small obstacles and micro-stresses that slow us down. You can find our catalog of high-impact courses here. And if you want something more tailored, you can learn about our custom work here.

My book Small Acts of Leadership, is a Washington Post bestseller! You can grab a copy here. And if you want to learn to apply some of these ideas and be an effective coach for your team, we wrote a course on that too. It’s called Coaching Skills for Managers.

Shoulda, Coulda, Woulda, and What People Actually Regret

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Here’s a real story, but let’s anonymize him. We’ll call him Joey. So Joey, a local mild-mannered grown-up went to a high school soccer match in Virginia, and sat with friends and colleagues in the stands, on the home side, the side hosting the game.

The game got competitive, the kids got all riled up, the coaches too. At one point his own friends and colleagues got caught up in the moment, and began denigrating and ridiculing the opponent players, talking trash to them from the stands. Joey snapped, and turned to face his friends, heart racing, nearly shouting, he loudly chastised their behavior. He was in the presence of local adults and community leaders actively taking part in ridiculing teenage players in a local soccer game. No, he said, this will not be tolerated.

Joey is not likely to regret that action. Not at all. In the short term, he might have some misgivings about how he reacted – like maybe he was too forceful, to shouty, too something. In the short term, he might worry about how he was viewed by others. But in the long term he will remember that moment with pride. And so will the people there who recollect it. Heck, I was inspired and I wasn’t even there. I heard it secondhand.

What is that thin line between being inspired by someone’s actions, and taking action ourselves? We celebrate when someone else speaks up against a bully, but maybe in that moment we didn’t quite have the nerve ourselves.

“We must take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented. Sometimes we must interfere.”

– Elie Weisel, Nobel laureate, and Holocaust survivor

We don’t tend to regret the actions we take that align with our values. We are much more likely to regret inaction. We are much more likely to regret not living up to our ideal version of ourselves.

We can read about Ghandi’s civil disobedience and be inspired, yet remain quiet ourselves when we witness injustice. It’s not genes, or even necessarily learned behavior that drives us to take action. Although it is true that once you speak your mind to voice your values, you are more likely to do it again. This phenomenon is often referred to as the “foot-in-the-door” effect. When you engage in a small or initial action related to your values, it can lead to a sense of commitment and consistency, making you more inclined to do it again.

When we think of people who take a chance, speak up, and say, or do, something courageous at work, we think of real heavyweight whistleblowers. “Deep Throat” from the Watergate investigation, or Karen Silkwood, who famously revealed plutonium contamination at the Kerr-McGee nuclear facility in Oklahoma. Her story was later adapted into the film “Silkwood” played by Meryl Streep.

Or Terry Bryan. Bryan was a nurse working at Winterbourne View Hospital in the UK when he witnessed appalling abuse of residents with learning difficulties. He tried reporting through the correct channels. He told his boss, then his boss’ boss. When they refused to do anything, he told the oversight regulatory agency called the Care Quality Commission. They didn’t do anything either, so he called the BBC and did an extensive interview describing the abuse and neglect he witnessed. It led to a documentary and exposé. He describes his experience here.

In the documentary, the interviewer asks Terry if he would do it again, if he has any regrets. He said, “It’s about following your conscience,” he says. “How would you live with yourself if you didn’t do it?”

“Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.”

– Steve Jobs

Here’s the thing – we get one shot at this life, and every day we get an opportunity to make a difference. When we consider recent decisions in our short-term memory, it is true that we sometimes cringe at our own actions. We think, “Why did I say that?” “What was I thinking?” “Lordy, I hope I didn’t offend him by telling the truth!”

Yet, research shows that in the long-term the things we are most likely to regret things are the things we didn’t do, not the things we did try.

“In the end, we only regret the chances we didn’t take, the relationships we were afraid to have, and the decisions we waited too long to make.”

― Lewis Carroll

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Our company Mindscaling, just released a new series of courses on Thriving through Emotional Intelligence, and how to make exactly these types of decisions. You can find our catalog of high-impact courses here. And if you want something more tailored, you can learn about our custom work here.

My book Small Acts of Leadership, is a Washington Post bestseller! You can grab a copy here. And if you want to learn to apply some of these ideas and be an effective coach for your team, we wrote a course on that too. It’s called Coaching for Managers available over at UDEMY for Business.

We Can Have Unified Voices in Divided Times

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How does it happen that we can escalate from conversation marked by civil respect to one filled with mockery and derision? How do we bridge the gap between listening and disdain? And once we have demonized others, how do we get back to seeing the good in everyone?

Leading up to World War I, the media in Germany and England reflected a delicate balance of admiration and rivalry. They perceived each other as competitive yet civil rivals, eager to outdo one another in both business and sporting events like sailing races. Though diplomatic tensions simmered, they remained largely respectful.

However, with the outbreak of the war in July 1914, the tone of the media in both nations underwent a dramatic transformation. The English portrayed the Germans as barbaric “Huns,” amplifying stories of alleged atrocities such as spearing infants and hanging clergy. In contrast, German media cast the British as treacherous colonial oppressors, eager to dominate weaker nations. The hardships inflicted upon Germany by the British naval blockade, initiated in August 1914 when British ships began patrolling and mining the North Sea to block supplies from reaching German ports, became a focal point of their reports.

Even the arts became a battlefield of sentiments. The German poet, Ernst Lissauer, penned a song titled “Hymn of Hate Against England.” It rose to such popularity it was nearly as recognized as their national anthem.

Surprisingly, despite the mounting hostility in the media, the general populace in cities like Paris, London, and Berlin harbored a belief that any conflict would be fleeting. They optimistically predicted that the war would conclude before the New Year. After all, their frame of reference was rooted in recent history—conflicts like the Austro-Prussian War of 1866 that lasted just seven weeks, and the more drawn-out Franco-Prussian War of 1870, which spanned less than a year. This sentiment was reflected at kitchen tables across Europe, where parents comforted their soon-to-be-soldier children with assurances of their return by Christmas.

Yet, by Christmas Eve 1914, a swift end seemed impossible. The front line sprawled for five hundred miles from the Belgian coast to the Franco-Swiss border, with over 100,000 soldiers entrenched, sometimes mere meters apart.

On this tense night, Officer Walther Stennes recalled a surprising development:

German and British troops on the Western Front, Christmas Truce of 1914. © IWM

“On Christmas Eve at noon, fire ceased completely – on both fronts. Initially, there was apprehension. But as hours passed, it became clear this wasn’t a prelude to an attack.”

Private Albert Moren of the Second Queen’s Regiment noted,

“It was a beautiful moonlit night…and they sang ‘Silent Night’. I thought, what a beautiful tune.”

Marmaduke Walkinton of the London Regiment shared,

“We began to pop our heads over the side…and then we saw a German standing up, waving his arms, and we didn’t shoot. The understanding gradually grew.”

Those small gestures of trust quickly grew, German Josef Wentzl recollects,

“What I had still believed to be madness several hours ago I could see now with my own eyes. Bavarians and English, until then the greatest of enemies, shook hands, talked and exchanged items.”

They traded gifts, chocolates, cigarettes, and stories with one another, and enjoyed impromptu kickabouts of soccer. In northern France, near the village of Fleurbaix, soldiers from opposing sides gathered in no-man’s land to hold a joint burial service. They stood side by side to bury their fallen comrades. With Germans on one side and the English on the other, officers at the forefront and every head bared in respect, they jointly laid the deceased to rest. Together, they sang, ‘The Lord is my Shepherd’ in English and ‘Der Herr ist mein Hirt’ in German, their voices harmonizing in shared grief.

However, this fleeting moment of shared humanity was not to last. Commanders, uncomfortable with the truce, acted swiftly. George Ashurst, a British soldier, reflected the sentiments of many in the trenches: “The generals behind must’ve seen it…‘Course that started the war again. We hated the sight of the bloody generals.”

The Christmas Truce remains a poignant example of humanity’s potential to transcend even the harshest of divides. In the throes of war, soldiers, mere meters apart, found a shared sense of humanity, if only for a brief moment.

We possess the capacity to truly listen, to assume the best in others, and to recognize our shared humanity. Let’s commit to reaching out, understanding that we are all here together, striving for the best and uplifting one another.

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Our company Mindscaling, is busy building powerful online micro-learning experiences to drive the human change that propels your team. You can find our catalog of high-impact courses here. And if you want something more tailored, you can learn about our custom work here.

My book Small Acts of Leadership, is a Washington Post bestseller! You can grab a copy here. And if you want to learn to apply some of these ideas and be an effective coach for your team, we wrote a course on that too. It’s called Coaching for Managers available over at UDEMY for Business.

We Actually Can’t Stand Cruelty

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Here’s a common scene: The grown-ups are upstairs chatting, maybe having drinks, relaxing, while the kids are playing in the basement, in the yard, elsewhere. The parents are having a moment.

Someone remarks, “Oh, it’s like lord of the flies out there, but they’ll figure it out,” and the adults nod appreciatively. Because yes, kids behave just like the characters in Lord of the Flies, and lacking structure, rules, or social expectations, kids are savages, and life is inherently nasty, brutish, and short.

That trope, borrowed from William Golding’s 1954 book gets repeated everywhere. It makes me crazy to hear it. Golding was a disaffected addict writing horrifying fiction. Don’t believe it. As Peter Conrad writes in his review of Golding’s biography, “Golding called himself a monster. His imagination lodged a horde of demons, buzzing like flies inside his haunted head, and his dreams rehearsed his guilt…” He spent his latter years deeply regretting the novel.

I believe our natural state is to assume best intentions of others, and support and comfort our fellow humans. And even when we are taught to be cruel, are we reluctant. Yes, we can be deeply tribal and protective of our own. But even then, we hesitate to hurt.

Consider that throughout historic battles and wars, military leaders often lament that their soldiers aren’t cold-blooded killers. Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery, one of the most prominent and successful British commanders of the Second World War, wrote home “The trouble with our British boys is that they are not killers by nature.” In the U.S Air Force during WWII, less than 1% of fighter pilots were responsible for 40% of the planes shot down.

One of the most compelling pieces of evidence that we really don’t like hurting one another comes from research about the 1863 Battle of Gettysburg during the Civil War. Of the 27,574 muskets recovered on the battlefield, 90% were still loaded. Since most of the time spent managing a rifle involves priming with gunpowder, loading with a shot, packing with a ramrod, and setting the trigger with a percussion cap, it seems crazy that so many rifles were not discharged. If it takes a second to fire, and minutes to load, most rifles at any given moment on the battlefield would not be ready to shoot, right? What’s going on?

But wait. About 12,000 of those muskets – nearly half of the rifles recovered – were double-loaded. Thousands of rifles were even triple-loaded. But these soldiers were trained and drilled. They knew muskets fired one ball at a time. What’s going on? Well, loading a gun is a perfect excuse not to fire it. And if it was already loaded, well just load it again. Look busy. Do anything except attempt to kill someone.

According to Army psychologist, and Lt. Colonel Dave Grossman, “The obvious conclusion is that most soldiers were not even trying to kill the enemy.”

It’s not danger, per se, that we are avoiding. It is specifically harming others that we simply cannot abide.

We love dangers and thrills. Our society actively seeks out physical danger through activities like rollercoasters, recreational drugs, rock climbing, white water rafting, scuba diving, skydiving, hunting, and countless other exhilarating, and sometimes stupid, behaviors. However, facing aggression and hatred from fellow citizens is an experience of a profoundly different magnitude.

We’ve all encountered hostile aggression, whether on the playground as kids, in strangers’ rudeness, in malicious gossip, or in hostility at work from bosses and peers. In all those cases, we’ve known the stress it causes.

At our core, human beings yearn for connection, understanding, and community with one another. Though cruelty and violence sometimes arise, they are but brief shadows cast against humanity’s inherent pursuit of compassion.

Lead with kindness and compassion. All we have is each other.

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Our company Mindscaling, is busy building powerful online micro-learning experiences to drive the human change that propels your team. You can find our catalog of high-impact courses here. And if you want something more tailored, you can learn about our custom work here.

My book Small Acts of Leadership, is a Washington Post bestseller! You can grab a copy here. And if you want to learn to apply some of these ideas and be an effective coach for your team, we wrote a course on that too. It’s called Coaching for Managers available over at UDEMY for Business.

Parachuting Beavers and Other Oddities of Innovation

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So a couple weeks ago, I boarded a flight to Missoula, Montana. My try-hard intrepid plan was to pedal a gravel bike, loaded with gear, through the captivating Bitterroot Valley, south from Missoula between the Sapphire and Bitterroot mountains three days to meet a week-long rafting and kayaking trip on the Main Salmon River, then cycle on to Boise, ID. I designed this to be about a 12 day adventure—5 days of cycling and 6 days of kayaking in the wilderness of Idaho and Montana.

I rode about 65 miles down the beautiful Bitterroot cycling path, and spent my first night in Darby, Montana, then onwards 55 miles to North Fork, Idaho, an intersection with a general store, campground and a motel. From there, a half-day ride down a 45-mile gravel access road following the Main Salmon River.

My reward at the end of this ride was a group of six experienced guides and 24 adrenaline junkies, all prepped for a six-day adventure on the late June high waters of the Main Salmon River. I left my bike with the outfitters, to be stored in a warehouse waiting for the end of the rafting trip, from where I would ride another two days south to Boise, ID.

Embarking down the river, I thought I knew what to expect: breathtaking views, complete isolation within the vast Frank Church Wilderness, eagles, black bears, beaver, elk, bighorn sheep, ospreys—and even the promise of good food. The heart-stopping Class III and IV rapids during the late June high waters were also expected, yet terrifying from the view in my inflatable kayak.

However, the real revelation of this adventure was the discovery of the human spirit in its most admirable form. The guides are astonishing humans. Each one in their own fabulous way. Caring, giving, inclusive, patient and accommodating, and yet always expecting you have more within you, encouraging you into the next massive rapid. They demonstrated an intimate understanding of their surroundings, possessed exceptional navigational skills, and approached every situation with an unwavering cheerfulness that was contagious.

One such guide, Ian, was a living library of the local history and ecology. During a hike, he narrated an intriguing tale of ecological innovation—the Beaver Re-population Project, a narrative intertwining the past, present, and future of the Chamberlain Basin of the Frank Church Wilderness—it was a tale with threads of innovation, daring, and well, parachutes.

Centuries ago, this region was rife with beavers—furry engineers whose dam-building prowess contributed to the health of the local ecosystems. However, in their quest for fur to satiate Europe’s fashion market, early fur trappers severely depleted these beaver populations, just so they could be worn as hats and coats by wealthy Europeans.

Beavers are instrumental in shaping ecosystems. Their dam building adds structure to waterways, slowing water flow and creating ponds that gradually release water in dry periods. This process enhances groundwater storage, sediment collection, and enrich habitats for waterfowl, amphibians, mammals, and even offer refuge for juvenile fish. Yet, despite their benefits to ecosystems, farmers think of the beaver as their enemy, a destructive pest, who chew at fences, flood cropland, and should be controlled or removed.

Fast forward to the 1940s and 50s, after the devastation of World War II, a surplus of parachutes provided an unconventional solution to the beaver crisis. In a masterstroke of innovative problem-solving, Elmo Heter, a game warden with the Idaho Department of Fish and Game, initiated a beaver relocation program. The reluctant hero of this endeavor was Geronimo, a beaver who was the first to be air-dropped safely into the wilderness.

Geronimo was not only the star of this audacious plan, but also its test subject. The initial wooden boxes failed to contain the beavers during transit, leading to the sight of free-roaming beavers within the plane. The trial-and-error approach, with Geronimo’s cooperation, eventually led to a successful box design.

The program was a resounding success, leading to a healthy increase in the beaver population in the region. They’ve since worked their magic, restoring the ecological balance of the watershed.

Reflecting on this adventure, here’s a lesson: How can we repurpose excess? When life hands you the oddity of parachutes, don’t just stash them away. Take a page from Elmo Heter’s book, harness your creative problem-solving skills, parachute some beavers into the wilderness. You might restore the health of a watershed environment.

Oh, yes at the end of the rafting expedition, I cycled on two more days to Boise, met up with some dear friends, and flew back to Maine.

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Our company Mindscaling, is busy building powerful online micro-learning experiences to drive the human change that propels your team. You can find our catalog of high-impact courses here. And if you want something more tailored, you can learn about our custom work here.

My book Small Acts of Leadership, is a Washington Post bestseller! You can grab a copy here. And if you want to learn to apply some of these ideas and be an effective coach for your team, we wrote a course on that too. It’s called Coaching for Managers available over at UDEMY for Business.

Bring Back the Hang: Creating Meaningful Connections in an Unplanned World

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One of my most enduring college memories is the hang time—hours and hours of unstructured, unobligated hanging out. Our dorms were designed as suites with six (was it seven?) rooms of doubles and singles around a shared lounge and bathroom space. In that lounge, we would play hours of spades, debate history or politics, party, argue over music taste, and even wrestle sometimes.

There was no agenda or invitation list. People came and went, and we invented activities on the spot. One fall day, we decided to throw a “roll in the leaves” party, moving bags and bags of colorful leaves into the lounge area and hallways in the dorm. Afterwards, we had crickets hiding in the dorm for weeks as we tried to clean up.

The essence of the hang is to keep the stakes low. Let everything unfold, speak your mind, share the space. Just be.

Sheila Liming, who teaches writing at Champlain College and recently published a book called Hanging Out: The Radical Power of Killing Time, observes that when she enters a classroom minutes before class, it is almost always silent, with most students looking at their phones. They are talking and interacting, just to other people—sharing moments, jokes, and small confessions with those they know and trust who aren’t in the room.

Whereas initiating a conversation with the person next to you is a bold act of vulnerability. Who knows how they will react? How will you start or end the conversation? It’s much safer to text a confidant privately.

This behavior results in the “displacement effect,” where time spent online displaces in-person interaction and exacerbates loneliness. Loneliness isn’t the only consequence, however. Emotionally, we are quicker to resent, cancel, and block someone online, but not in person. In person, when someone annoys or angers us, we want resolution. We want to convey our feelings and hopefully reach an understanding. But virtually, we can simply turn them off, more easily moving to feelings of contempt.

Sheila Liming defines hanging out as “daring to do not much and daring to do it in the company of other people.” Another way to think of this is spending time with others without imposing too many expectations on what that time should achieve or produce.

A corporate holiday party is not a good hang. Quasi-mandatory company events designed to bring people together and socialize might achieve that goal, but they lack the casualness of a genuine hang. The problem lies in the aesthetics. When we throw a “party” with a specific time, guest list, menu, and theme, we create expectations of vibe, decor, and dress, prompting questions like, “Am I wearing the right thing, saying the right thing? Am I doing this right?”

A good hang does not have a prescribed agenda or set list of obligations. In these environments, social improvisation is the key. It can be challenging and scary, and we might feel out of control.

Dr. Liming often sees first-year students in her office during the initial weeks of school, distraught and upset because they feel unanchored and lost in this new world of college. Their high school friends are elsewhere, and their habits and rituals are disrupted. Suddenly, they are surrounded by unfamiliar people with lots of free time on their hands.

Whenever a new, bewildered first-year student enters her office with anxiety and impostor syndrome, contemplating going home, Dr. Liming has a similar experience coaching them through the change. She reassures them that it will get better, they will adjust, and they will find fun people and things to do. Nine times out of ten, that’s exactly what happens. A month later, they have new friends, are happy, excited.

But the key to working through that transition is sitting with that discomfort. The key is putting down the phone, and allowing the unscripted hangout to happen. In the vulnerable improvisation of the hang, we can find ourselves and each other.

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Our company Mindscaling, is busy building powerful online micro-learning experiences to drive the human change that propels your team. You can find our catalog of high-impact courses here. And if you want something more tailored, you can learn about our custom work here.

My book Small Acts of Leadership, is a Washington Post bestseller! You can grab a copy here. And if you want to learn to apply some of these ideas and be an effective coach for your team, we wrote a course on that too. It’s called Coaching for Managers available over at UDEMY for Business.

What if We Are Actually Hard-Wired for Kindness and Compassion?

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Remember the book, “Lord of the Flies”? You probably read it – or at least heard about it – in high school. The story plays to our darkest fears of human nature. “Lord of the Flies” a fictional story based on the idea of “veneer theory.”

The idea behind veneer theory is that human civilization is like a thin veneer or layer on top of a more primal and savage nature. According to this theory, human beings have an inherent capacity for violence and aggression, and it is only through the rules and norms of civilization that we are able to suppress these tendencies and create a peaceful society.

Published in 1954, “Lord of the Flies” sold slowly at first, until taking off and eventually selling tens of millions of copies. It won a Nobel Prize in 1983. Translated into over 30 languages, the book tells the story of a group of boys who are stranded on a deserted island and the ways in which their society devolves into chaos and violence. “Lord of the Flies” is known for its exploration of human nature and the darker side of humanity.

It was written by William Golding, an Englishman who grew up in a middle-class home and then served in the Royal Navy in World War II, where he witnessed the horrors of war. These experiences had a profound impact on his writing. His works often explored the darker aspects of human nature. Or as Golding put it, ‘Man produces evil as a bee produces honey.’

Yeah, well, Golding was also a reclusive, brooding alcoholic, who once divided his students into opposing gangs and encouraged them to fight each other.

While his fictional narrative certainly grabs your attention, just like a good Halloween movie, the premise doesn’t hold up. It’s just an alarming and exciting story that makes you stop and pay attention. In the British news, that’s called a “marmalade dropper.” As in, “That crazy ass story about Will Smith slapping Chris Rock at the Oscars made me drop my marmalade!”

We’re attracted to conflict, but it’s more unusual than we realize because the media knows we’re triggered by negativity, and feeds the beast within. And now that AI and user algorithms have taken over your feed, they know EXACTLY how to pull your chain, because every click and scroll surrenders that much more control.

What’s that old parable about the internal battle between the good wolf and the bad wolf? The good wolf represents bravery, generosity, and love. The bad wolf represents anger, hatred, and greed. The child asks his wise grandfather, “Which one wins?” and the grandfather replies, “The one you feed.”

Remember, there’s no such thing as a small act of kindness. Every act creates a ripple with no logical end. – Scott Adams

Every day we are actively creating the world together with the stories we tell ourselves and each other. We believe what we choose to see in the world. I choose to see that people are innately good, prone to assuming best intentions, and quick to lend aid and help in times of calamity and adversity. History is full of stories of disaster altruism:

  • On September 11, 2001 immediately after the plane attacks into the burning Twin Towers, thousands of people were descending the emergency exit stairs, knowing that the building was on fire. They cleared the way for firefighters to ascend, and helped each other in an orderly and polite way. One survivor reported, “People would actually say, ‘No, no, you first. I couldn’t believe it, that at this point people would actually say, ‘No, no take my place.’
  • During World War II, people throughout Europe risked their lives to protect and hide Jewish refugees from Nazi persecution. These individuals demonstrated incredible courage and selflessness, often at great personal risk.
  • In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in 2005, many people from across the United States traveled to New Orleans to provide aid and assistance to those affected by the storm. This included volunteers from all walks of life, who donated their time, money, and resources to help others in need.
  • In 2011, following the devastating earthquake and tsunami in Japan, many Japanese citizens organized to provide aid and assistance to those affected by the disaster. This included volunteers who traveled to affected areas to provide medical care and supplies, as well as citizens who opened up their homes to those who had been displaced.

Ok, yes if you look for it you can find hoarding, pillaging and “shortage psychology” too. During the Great Depression in the 1930s, competition for jobs and resources was fierce, with many people struggling to make ends meet. This led to a rise in crime and antisocial behavior, as people competed for limited resources and opportunities.

More recently, during the COVID-19 pandemic, competition for resources such as medical supplies and personal protective equipment (PPE) has been a significant issue. Remember the run on toilet paper? The world shut down on about March 13, 2020 and by March 23, 70% of grocery retailers were out of toilet paper.

Crises can bring out both the best and the worst in people, depending on a wide range of factors, including cultural norms, resource availability, and the nature of the crisis itself. Yet, what if we are actually hard-wired for kindness and compassion?

What if a belief in our innate generosity is exactly the kind of idea that has the power to change our communities, our society, and our nations, for the better?

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Recently I wrote about Mindscaling’s big project to convert Faisal Hoque’s book, LIFT into an interactive learning documentary. You can see previews of that elearning project, and his important new book here. Our company Mindscaling, is busy building powerful online micro-learning experiences to drive the human change that propels your team. You can find our catalog of high-impact courses here. And if you want something more tailored, you can learn about our custom work here.

My book Small Acts of Leadership, is a Washington Post bestseller! You can grab a copy here. And if you want to learn to apply some of these ideas and be an effective coach for your team, we wrote a course on that too. It’s called Coaching for Managers available over at UDEMY for Business.

You Can Only Do Something You Can First Imagine Doing

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When author Neil Gaiman writes, he sits at a desk with a beautiful view of his garden, and allows himself only two choices: write or enjoy the view. That’s it.

“I’m allowed to sit at my desk, I’m allowed to stare out at the world, I’m allowed to do anything I like, as long as it isn’t anything. Not allowed to do a crossword, not allowed to read a book, not allowed to phone a friend, not allowed to make a clay model of something. All I’m allowed to do is absolutely nothing, or write.”

– Neil Gaiman

You might consider this remarkable discipline. Gaiman simply considers it a habitual choice. By creating an environment of simplicity, he can be more productive. It isn’t discipline per se, but rather that he has created a mindset which allows his focus and productivity to dominate the moment. Once we create the space for focus, the work can take on a life of its own. While writing The Color Purple, author Alice Walker said her characters would often speak with her, and even critique her writing.

We all understand that sometimes the real magic of creativity can happen in the shower, on a walk, while exercising, or in moments when you take a break from the project and allow the ideas to marinate, and give your mind the room to muse. While taking a break is important, we have to take a break from actually doing something meaningful, often difficult, work in order for those breakthroughs to happen. It starts with making the effort.

I’ve started taking guitar lessons again. Trust me when I tell you I’m a garden-variety mediocre player. But I’ve been playing for years and enjoy it. When I was younger I would often find an instructor and take lessons for a couple months to pick up something new and interesting, and some of those melodic phrases and tricks I learned years ago stick with me today. And while I can certainly learn new songs, I haven’t really progressed in my understanding of the guitar. I sound pretty much the same as I did ten years ago.

So I picked a four-month course on guitar music theory, and I’ve been plugging away at it every day. Each lesson is only about 45 minutes, and includes theory and practice. My instructor Molly, is teaching me how to see interconnected scales up and down the guitar, and – if this all pans out – I should be able to apply my creativity to the structure Molly is teaching, to create melodic expressions in any key. We’ll see if I learn to shred.

At the moment, the lessons are hard because I’m learning new patterns, novel phrases, and awkward finger positions. I’m constantly rewinding the video and yelling, “Molly, what are you doing?!” Honestly, I sound worse at the moment. But of course, that’s the dip in which things get hard, before they get better.

The interesting thing about taking time for mindful practice is that the lessons stay with me throughout the day. Like The Queen’s Gambit, I begin to see guitar patterns on the ceiling while making a sandwich. Last night, before bed, I was practicing in my mind.

Anything you can imagine, you can create. – Oprah Winfrey

Consistent studies have demonstrated that visualizing practice in our mind is very nearly as effective as actual practicing in real life. In a well-known experiment about shooting basketballs, Australian researcher Alan Richardson divided about 90 students into three groups. With the first group he asked them to ignore basketball and come back at the end of the month.

He asked the second group to come into the gym 5 days a week and practice their free throws for twenty minutes, and the third group he asked to come into the gym 5 days a week and for twenty minutes and imagine shooting free throws – to stand at the free throw line and visualize each attempt, to develop a pre-shot routine, “see” and “feel” the ball bouncing, and then leaving their hand arcing to the basket. If they missed, they had to visualize an adjustment. They were also asked to be constantly striving to improve.

At the end of the month all three groups had to come into the gym and shoot 100 free throws. Group 1 didn’t improve. Group 2  – the real practicing group – got 24% better, and group 3  – the visualizing group – got 23% better.

Visualization help us reach physical goals, but helps us reduce stress as well. It is commonly used among healthcare professionals as an effective stress management tool. Studies have shown that novice surgeons who participate in imagery training reduced self-reported stress. The same goes for police officers, professional presenters. Heck, even acrobatic skiers.

Imagine healthy challenges. Then get after it.

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Recently I wrote about Mindscaling’s big project to convert Faisal Hoque’s book, LIFT into an interactive learning documentary. You can see previews of that elearning project, and his important new book here. Our company Mindscaling, is busy building powerful online micro-learning experiences to drive the human change that propels your team. You can find our catalog of high-impact courses here. And if you want something more tailored, you can learn about our custom work here.

My book Small Acts of Leadership, is a Washington Post bestseller! You can grab a copy here. And if you want to learn to apply some of these ideas and be an effective coach for your team, we wrote a course on that too. It’s called Coaching for Managers available over at UDEMY for Business.

Overcome Adversity Without Fighting It

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Hello and welcome back to my newsletter! Last time I was thinking about how the world is moving fast enough as it is, and we should stop telling each other how incredible busy we are. After all, we become the stories we tell ourselves. Be careful what you wish for, and all that.

This week I’m thinking about Faisal Hoque’s new book, LIFT. We recently finished a big project with him to create a learning documentary about his new bestseller LIFT. The book is about the rapidity of change, misinformation, and what we can do, each and every day, to make sense of the world, to uplift each other and transform our families, communities, and world into a more positive, and vibrant future. Here are some previews of the learning documentary course we made for him.

If this all sounds a bit optimistic to you, read on. Here is a recent interview with Faisal on how he finds that optimism, and what the path forward might look like. Take. this to heart – we need all the positive collaborative and vision we can get these days.

Shawn: Hello Faisal, and thank you for your new book. In my mind, it’s a blueprint for how all of us can confront the uncertainty and chaos around us, and make sense of the world in a positive way. How did you start on this journey to understanding adversity and overcoming it?

Faisal: It is our human nature that when we face adversity, we fight. It’s our very nature is to get ready for a battle when we are confronted. But accepting the battle means that you have to accept your current situation. And you have to prepare accordingly, because most of the current situation is not actually in your control.

One great learning I have had is from a book by Randy Pausch called “The Last Lecture“. Randy Pausch was a Carnegie Mellon professor and he gave his last lecture after he found out that he had cancer. And what he said is that it is his ability to accept the battle, and his ability to look at things from a negative point of view, and prepare for the challenges that he’s going to be facing that actually made him optimistic.

It’s the plan of action in the face of adversity, that allowed him to be prepared for the challenges that he would be facing. So when all hell breaks loose, it’s that mentality of being prepared which allowed him to deal with his adversity.

When all hell breaks loose, it’s that mentality of preparation which allows us to deal with adversity.

And because of that mental approach, he lived a very fulfilling life to the last day of his life, precisely because he accepted his battle that he was going to die from cancer, with the recognition that whatever he did, in the time he had remaining he was determined to share this message of making a difference with realistic optimism and determination. And he inspired millions with his message in “The Last Lecture”.

So it’s an example and a learning of how you accept a very bad situation and yet come out of it without thinking of the outcome, but instead focusing on what you can do on a daily basis, the kind of changes we can make daily to make a lasting impact, while dealing with adversity.

So you live and lead the best of your life when you have plans in place. Overcoming adversity is not fighting the adversity. It is accepting the adversity and working towards a plan that allows us to overcome the challenges that we are facing.

It starts with acceptance, not with fighting.

Shawn: That’s a powerful message about personal transformation, and making a dent in the world. But what about our collective efforts, and enlisting whole communities to join a particular mission or objective?

Faisal: The best thing we can do about controlling anything is controlling our mind. Our mind manifests what we see and how we react and what we do. So what happens is that when a collective group of people thinks positively, the chance of their collective success is a lot higher than it’ll be otherwise, right?

So this way of guiding your energy kind of helps you, how you behave, how you take actions and how you react to things. Every reaction that you have from your thought process makes things better or makes things worse, right?

Guiding our energy in a positive way, in a calm way is the path forward to deal with any kind of change, and to enroll others in our vision and mission. This takes a sense of fluidity to deal with changing circumstances, and it takes calm persistence.

Guiding our energy in a positive way, in a calm way, is the path forward to deal with any kind of change.

Let’s use water as a metaphor. Water is very soft and very fluid and it wears out all the rocks in the river and it somehow weaves in and out of whatever the obstacle that’s in front of that rolling fluid water.

So if you look from that as a metaphorical point of view, if we’re fluid and we’re flexible, we can kind of like weave through ups and downs of life and ups and downs of changes. And that flexibility allows us not just lead ourselves but also lead other people in a flexible and in an adaptive manner.

When we are flexible and we are taking a softer approach and we are not reactive, we are more adapting to situations. That calmness allows us to be more resilient because when you’re calm, you think better. So that energy that we are reflecting inside and out is what makes the difference in the enduring power of our social influence.

Here is a short teaser from the learning documentary series we built for the book. Learn more here.

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Our company Mindscaling, is busy building powerful online micro-learning experiences to drive the human change that propels your team. You can find our catalog of high-impact courses here. And if you want something more tailored, you can learn about our custom work here.

My book Small Acts of Leadership, is a Washington Post bestseller! You can grab a copy now.

And if you want to learn to apply some of these ideas and be an effective coach for your team, we wrote a course on that too. It’s called Coaching for Managers available over at UDEMY for Business.

Let’s Stop Telling Each Other How Busy We Are

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“If you’re racing to the next moment, what happens to the moment you’re in?”
– Nanette Mathews

Do you remember what you did last Tuesday? Where were you? Who did you talk to? Did anything memorable happen? Sometimes our days blend into one another. It can often feel like the clock is spinning furiously. Days come and go, and what do we remember? What happened to the time?

Did you know the word “time” is the most used noun in the english language? We are obsessed with time, and cherish those languid moments that seem to go on and on. It’s quite easy to recollect your family camping trip, or the time you learned to surf while on vacation. Novel experiences feel elastic in our minds.

Deep conversations can also be like travel, if you let them. Think of a conversation as an opportunity to venture into new experiences. This also explains why often your best conversation partner is the person who knows how to ask good questions. They know how to get you to explore ideas in more meaningful ways.

If our days become more routine, and our habits more ingrained, we experience less novelty. As a result, we often seek out experiences and interactions that reinforce what we know. And what we do, and experience, can start to feel like same ‘ol, same ‘ol. And the reason it feels like same ‘ol is because we’re not creating new memories. We’re having the same conversations, seeing the same sights, enduring the same meetings.

“I like cancelled plans. And empty bookstores. I like rainy days and thunderstorms. And quiet coffee shops. I like messy beds and over-worn pajamas. Most of all, I like the small joys that a simple life brings.”

Several years ago, a couple friends and I took our teenage kids cycling across America. After only a few days into our two month journey, time started to elongate such that each moment, each conversation was expansive, indelible. And why? Because literally everything we were experiencing was new. We were recreating those childhood experiences of novelty.

To slow down time, try to build novelty into your day. Talk to someone new, cook something unusual, take the dogs walking someplace different. Researchers have found that we remember familiar experiences as shorter, and unfamiliar experiences as longer.

“Unless people experience major changes that break the routine in their lives and provide them with anchors to retrieve from memory, life can become one short, timeless sequence of routine inaction.”
– Avni-Babad and Ritov

Another activity that will slow time, is to dig into a meaningful project. Pick a project in your life and lean into it – your painting, your running, your writing, your French lessons, whatever. When we begin to make meaningful progress in something that is important to us, we get closer and closer to that elusive Flow State when time slows down, and things start to feel fluid and easy.

Most of all, breathe.

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Our company Mindscaling, is busy building powerful online micro-learning experiences to drive the human change that propels your team. You can find our catalog of high-impact courses here. And if you want something more tailored, you can learn about our custom work here.

My book Small Acts of Leadership, is a Washington Post bestseller! You can grab a copy now.

And if you want to learn to apply some of these ideas and be an effective coach for your team, we wrote a course on that too. It’s called Coaching for Managers available over at UDEMY for Business.