It is an apt time to both reflect on 2018 and focus attention on the coming 2019. It is going to be an interesting year. I profess no prescient ability to predict why, but in my experience every year is interesting, sometimes you just have to look a little harder. Where will 2019 take us? Are we willing to look for the interesting, the important, the compelling?
Should we make resolutions, knowing perhaps we have a propensity to not follow through very consistently? Oscar Wilde was somewhat critical of resolutions, noting: "Good resolutions are simply checks that men draw on a bank where they have no account." Eric Zorn was a bit more encouraging when he said:
Resolutions and our annual New Year focus is about our future. Maybe we should resolve to save more for our retirement? The future is for the young. A few minutes with some actual young people sure does a lot to reassure us that the future may indeed be bright. We need these kids to be focused, and successful, and we need their social security contributions even more. In 2014 and 2015 I wrote about the impending failure of our long-promised retirement. It is in the news yet again. Might lots of really successful young people paying lots of taxes perhaps yet support me in my golden years? But I digress.
A key message I try to emphasize with young folks is the challenge of a changing world. The world will continue to change around us. We cannot prevent that, but we can control how we individually react to the change. A large part of reaction, if it is to be positive, lies in understanding the change, our world, and the effects each have in either anchoring us or carrying us forward. Are we to cling to our past or embrace our future?
In appreciating where we are and focusing on our future, we are all aided by knowing our skills, and our strengths. I am reminded of an interesting line from The Bourne Identity. In it, amnesia has the lead struggling with not remembering his past, and wondering about his present. Our protagonist struggles with his identity. Finally confronting the evil CIA official, Conklin (Chris Cooper), who has plotted against him, Jason Bourne states his understanding of his purpose: "You sent me to kill Wombosi." Conklin corrects his misperception: "Kill Wombosi? We can do that any time we want. I can send Nikki to do that." Nikki (Julia Stiles) is an office worker in the Paris safe house from which Bourne has worked. I have always found the offhand Conklin denigration of Nikki in that line troubling. She should have told him he was a misogynist tool.
In this exchange, the struggling Bourne accepts that killing is not actually the skill that he brings to the table. The skill upon which he had placed primacy turned out not to be that for which others valued him. Is it possible that we each may similarly hold views of ourselves and our value that others do not share? Might our contribution to the communities in which we find ourselves (geographically and theoretically) be more than what we individually perceive?
The professional world involves exchanges, an economic force in which some task or knowledge that one possesses is of value to someone else. There is an exchange of some monetary reward for that corresponding value. It is perpetually an imperfect market in which determining value is a struggle both for appreciating our own skills and for determining what is appropriate for us to pay for the skills of others. We may strive to maximize our reward, but key to that is understanding what value we bring to the exchange. How it is valued, and monetized (years ago, Forbes published an overview of how to ask for a raise. It is enlightening), is another factor, but first, what is that value we bring?
How do we demonstrate worth, and achieve our best, if we do not understand what skill(s) it is we bring to the equation. For example, perhaps anyone could be a judge (even Nikki? I feel sorry for Nikki), but a particular judge "performs the job with _________." The same sentence could be repeated substituting your occupation for "judge." The point is not the title, the task, or the vocation, but how do you deliver that? What do you do, in the performance of the day-to-day that brings real value, value that makes you special?
I think that bit of retrospection is worthwhile as we focus on the next year. How will you deliver value? But, as important is that you are not just a supplier of services, but just as persistently a consumer. Do you suppose that those with whom you work understand and appreciate what value they bring to the economic and professional relationship with you? Here is an easier question, have you taken the time to tell them: "_________ (insert name), have I ever told you that I respect and appreciate the way you _________?" If it is "patience" you find valuable, why not say so, and compliment it? The same might be true for any number of thoughts: persistence, promptness, professionalism, practicality (oh, there are so many adjectives).
For my 2019 New Year, I am going to strive to be conscious of what I bring to my interactions this year. I will try to appreciate what value I bring and how. But, I am also going to be more descriptive in my praise of others. I am going to strive to tell people more than "thank you" or "you are valued," and to add thereto what I perceive as their strengths, contributions, and value. I am hopeful that this will help them better understand their value in the exchange. Perhaps other's better understanding of that value, that skill, that attribute will encourage and motivate them. At a minimum, perhaps it will help them know they are really valued and appreciated.
Perhaps that resolution (and others) may be minimally valuable if you believe the Wilde approach. But, even if it is as Zorn suggests, there is potential for my growth even if this resolution ends in failure. In the end, I will have tried. And, best case, perhaps I grow and encourage others to grow around me. Happy New Year 2019. I hope that the year is all that you wish it to be.
Should we make resolutions, knowing perhaps we have a propensity to not follow through very consistently? Oscar Wilde was somewhat critical of resolutions, noting: "Good resolutions are simply checks that men draw on a bank where they have no account." Eric Zorn was a bit more encouraging when he said:
"Making resolutions is a cleansing ritual of self-assessment and repentance that demands personal honesty and, ultimately, reinforces humility. Breaking them is part of the cycle."So perhaps there is value in making them, even knowing we are not necessarily likely to follow through persistently or consistently? In a recent Twitter exchange, a Tweep (someone that tweets) waxed eloquent on the ubiquitous "better shape" goal: "all I know is the gym is full on 1/2, not as much on 2/2, and back to the regulars on 3/2." Well, what does that tell you if you are there on 3/2 to notice that?
Resolutions and our annual New Year focus is about our future. Maybe we should resolve to save more for our retirement? The future is for the young. A few minutes with some actual young people sure does a lot to reassure us that the future may indeed be bright. We need these kids to be focused, and successful, and we need their social security contributions even more. In 2014 and 2015 I wrote about the impending failure of our long-promised retirement. It is in the news yet again. Might lots of really successful young people paying lots of taxes perhaps yet support me in my golden years? But I digress.
A key message I try to emphasize with young folks is the challenge of a changing world. The world will continue to change around us. We cannot prevent that, but we can control how we individually react to the change. A large part of reaction, if it is to be positive, lies in understanding the change, our world, and the effects each have in either anchoring us or carrying us forward. Are we to cling to our past or embrace our future?
In appreciating where we are and focusing on our future, we are all aided by knowing our skills, and our strengths. I am reminded of an interesting line from The Bourne Identity. In it, amnesia has the lead struggling with not remembering his past, and wondering about his present. Our protagonist struggles with his identity. Finally confronting the evil CIA official, Conklin (Chris Cooper), who has plotted against him, Jason Bourne states his understanding of his purpose: "You sent me to kill Wombosi." Conklin corrects his misperception: "Kill Wombosi? We can do that any time we want. I can send Nikki to do that." Nikki (Julia Stiles) is an office worker in the Paris safe house from which Bourne has worked. I have always found the offhand Conklin denigration of Nikki in that line troubling. She should have told him he was a misogynist tool.
In this exchange, the struggling Bourne accepts that killing is not actually the skill that he brings to the table. The skill upon which he had placed primacy turned out not to be that for which others valued him. Is it possible that we each may similarly hold views of ourselves and our value that others do not share? Might our contribution to the communities in which we find ourselves (geographically and theoretically) be more than what we individually perceive?
The professional world involves exchanges, an economic force in which some task or knowledge that one possesses is of value to someone else. There is an exchange of some monetary reward for that corresponding value. It is perpetually an imperfect market in which determining value is a struggle both for appreciating our own skills and for determining what is appropriate for us to pay for the skills of others. We may strive to maximize our reward, but key to that is understanding what value we bring to the exchange. How it is valued, and monetized (years ago, Forbes published an overview of how to ask for a raise. It is enlightening), is another factor, but first, what is that value we bring?
How do we demonstrate worth, and achieve our best, if we do not understand what skill(s) it is we bring to the equation. For example, perhaps anyone could be a judge (even Nikki? I feel sorry for Nikki), but a particular judge "performs the job with _________." The same sentence could be repeated substituting your occupation for "judge." The point is not the title, the task, or the vocation, but how do you deliver that? What do you do, in the performance of the day-to-day that brings real value, value that makes you special?
I think that bit of retrospection is worthwhile as we focus on the next year. How will you deliver value? But, as important is that you are not just a supplier of services, but just as persistently a consumer. Do you suppose that those with whom you work understand and appreciate what value they bring to the economic and professional relationship with you? Here is an easier question, have you taken the time to tell them: "_________ (insert name), have I ever told you that I respect and appreciate the way you _________?" If it is "patience" you find valuable, why not say so, and compliment it? The same might be true for any number of thoughts: persistence, promptness, professionalism, practicality (oh, there are so many adjectives).
For my 2019 New Year, I am going to strive to be conscious of what I bring to my interactions this year. I will try to appreciate what value I bring and how. But, I am also going to be more descriptive in my praise of others. I am going to strive to tell people more than "thank you" or "you are valued," and to add thereto what I perceive as their strengths, contributions, and value. I am hopeful that this will help them better understand their value in the exchange. Perhaps other's better understanding of that value, that skill, that attribute will encourage and motivate them. At a minimum, perhaps it will help them know they are really valued and appreciated.
Perhaps that resolution (and others) may be minimally valuable if you believe the Wilde approach. But, even if it is as Zorn suggests, there is potential for my growth even if this resolution ends in failure. In the end, I will have tried. And, best case, perhaps I grow and encourage others to grow around me. Happy New Year 2019. I hope that the year is all that you wish it to be.
