Archives for January 2020

Passion

January 25, 2020 by Dr. John Townsend Leave a Comment

We all want to live lives of passion, and no one desires a life without passion of some sort. Passion makes us feel alive. And beyond feeling good, passion can also help life work better. Let’s look at how it works, and how you can develop and use yours.

I define passion as “focused desire.” That is, it’s a positive feeling that indicates that we want more of some specific and particular experience. For example, you might feel passionate about a person you love, or a work context, or an awesome restaurant or a cause that can make the world a better place.

Passion not only feels great, as it releases positive-feeling hormones into our systems, it also helps life out in practical ways. First, it helps us persevere through challenges. For example, if you have little passion for your job, it’s very difficult to push through hard times. Having a work ethic helps. So does knowing that your work pays the bills, and so is serving some worthwhile purpose in life. But having passion for what you do provides a deeper incentive and motive to stick with something and see it through.

Secondly, passion helps us determine what matters to us. We have so many options in today’s culture, from relationships to jobs to entertainment and spiritual values. It can be overwhelming to scan through thousands of movies and tv shows to see what you want to watch. But passion is sort of a “highlighter” for you brain, that points out something specific that you find you have positive emotions about.

How can we have a more highly developed sense of passion? Here are some tips:

Identify what currently gives you passion. Look over your last month’s calendar, and review what people and experiences you engaged with, noting which ones provided passion for you. Write down a sentence on why that person or experience made you feel passionate. You will begin to see themes underneath what you have been doing, and that will help you gravitate toward more. For example, one of my kids mentioned he saw a musical that he liked. I knew a little about it, so I went online and listened to a few of the songs, finding one that I just became locked into, listening to it over and over again. It brought an intense passion to me, and I began looking up songs in that song’s genre, to have more of the same.

Be intentional about living in the moment. We are so busy these days that we forget mindfulness. It’s easy to get stuck in one of two places: stressing about the future, or getting too focused on the task at hand. We do need to be future-oriented, and we do need to get things done. But a life of only those two is a life of deficit. Every single day, stop whatever you are doing, and ask yourself what you are experiencing right now: Happiness? Stress? Frustration? Love? Don’t miss out on life. And this is where we also find passion, because passion is a kind of emotion.

Develop an emotional vocabulary. Learning the nuances of feelings will give your passion more options to be expressed. Some of us only know “happy” and “hungry.” My book People Fuel has a list of 110 feelings, in 10 categories, so you can navigate your way through them. You will find as you review these, that you are more able to feel passion, as the brain needs cognitive “hooks” to express itself.

Be with passionate people. Nothing creates apathy like hanging out with apathetic people. And nothing helps us find what brings us to life like being with people who have a focused desire on something important to them, and who are willing to talk about it with you. In other words, passion is contagious.

Find your own passions. They help everything work.

Best,

John

Having Difficult but Effective Conversations

January 19, 2020 by Dr. John Townsend Leave a Comment

There is simply no way to get through life successfully and sanely, without having to sit down with someone to have “the talk.” Whether it’s your spouse, a family member, someone you’re dating, a friend or a work colleague, things just come up that rub us the wrong way, or are actually crises, that must be addressed and resolved. However, we aren’t born with the ability to have a difficult conversation that actually is effective. It’s a learned skill. So here are some steps to get you where you want to go.

The goal of any difficult conversation is to solve a problem while maintaining alignment. In other words, to speak truth about an issue without alienating the person. There is certainly a small percentage of humans that can’t tolerate any confrontation, and you can’t control their reactions. But the great majority of people are ok with hashing out problems. Here are the skills, in order of when to do them.

Convey that you are “for” them: Start by letting the person know that, while this is an important conversation, that you want their best. You don’t want to win over them or punish them, you want to solve a problem.
State the problem: Clearly and in a few words, state what the problem is, so that it’s understandable. If needed use a few examples, with dates and times, to jog their memory and understand what you’re trying to say.
Own your part: Take responsibility for however you have contributed to the issue. It may be 90% or it may be 10%, but the great odds are that you aren’t 100% perfect in this dance. Not only is it the right thing to do, it keeps the person from feeling like you think you’re a perfect parent, pointing your finger at an immature child. If you fail to own your part, you will not take the conversation anywhere near a positive direction.
Hear them out/deal with diversion: Everyone needs their day in court, so ask them what their side of it is. There may be info that you need to know, to flesh out how you see the problem. But don’t let the person hijack the conversation with endless diversions to other topics to keep themselves away from responsibility. Warmly, but directly, bring the topic back to the issue you began with.
Ask for specific change: People need practical suggestions, not high-concept ones. “I need for you to ask me how I’m doing around half the time we get together, that feels more mutual” is a lot better than “Get your act together.”
Consequences if necessary: Sometimes a good conversation is all that’s needed. But sometimes, after a few failed conversations, boundaries are needed.
End with “for”: These talks can make the person feel that you don’t care about them. Just reassure them, at the end, that you truly want the best for them and for the relationship.
Check in later: After 2-24 hours, reach out to them again and ask how they’re doing with the talk. Sometimes, they will feel hurt or misunderstood. Spend a bit of time clarifying that you really care and want things to work out.

These steps work. If you want more information, check out my book, How to Have That Difficult Conversation That You’ve Been Avoiding. Remember, it’s just a set of skills that you can learn.

Best,

John

Coaches and Why You Need One

January 9, 2020 by Dr. John Townsend Leave a Comment

Life has lots of demands and challenges. And it is very very difficult, if not impossible, to get life done well, without relational support. Through a great deal of neuroscience research, it’s been established how important it is to have a few supportive individuals to help us navigate family, relationships, self career and our careers. This is vital.

One particular kind of relationship which has unique value, is that of a coach. A coach is someone who has knowledge, experience and skills that we don’t have in some area of life, in either our personal or professional realms. It’s a broad term that includes more nuanced role differences such as mentors, counselors, advisors and directors.

You and I don’t know what we don’t know, to do life right. Nor do most of us have the time or capacity to know everything we need to know. For example, I love YouTube videos and podcasts, they give me great helpful information. But having a person who knows a lot, and can coach you through the situation, is irreplaceable. That second part is a big deal. A lot of people have great knowledge and skills, but they don’t understand the science of coaching, and take people through a successful growth process. There are principles and methods that have been proven to help people grow. At the Townsend Institute, for example, we provide an accredited online Masters degree or a certificate in coaching and consulting, because a person needs to know how to help an individual grow.

Research indicates that a coach will pay off 3-4 times what they cost, in terms of benefits. And there are lots of people who are available to help someone without charge, for example mature business people who want to help those just starting off, or older parents who are involved in a church ministry working with younger parents.

I always recommend a coach who works holistically as well. What this means is that the person deals with the personal as well as the “task” end of the process. The old stereotype of the coach who only deals with the plan just doesn’t work as well. For example, “Hi Beth, how did the homework assignment we worked out for you about your website go?” “Well, Coach Lydia, I didn’t get to it, bummer.” “OK, Beth, no problem, let’s try to make sure you get it done next time.” Compare that to “Sorry to hear that, Beth, you were really motivated and determined about this last session. Let’s dig into why you weren’t able to get it done; could have been discouragement, or not saying no to others’ requests for your time, or maybe some perfectionistic paralysis.”

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Life goes better with a coach. What area could you use one in this week?

Best,

John

Happiness

January 4, 2020 by Dr. John Townsend Leave a Comment

We all want to be happy, nothing wrong with that. When we are happy, we experience cheerfulness, positivity and an upbeat mood. Happiness is one of the most pleasant emotions a person can have. We feel energy and we feel hope. So how can we create this feeling more for ourselves?

The tricky part is that unfortunately, happiness doesn’t work well as a goal. People whose focus and goal in life is to be happy, often find that over time, they can’t stay happy. Think about these two categories of people who want to feel good all the time as their main focus: 2 years olds and addicts. Their internal systems are constantly craving the happiness experience, and their lives aren’t great models for how to live in the adult world.

The reality is that happiness is a much better byproduct than it is a goal. It is the result of other activities that provide a better life. It’s a little like weight loss. There is a ton of research that says we should weigh ourselves less frequently, and just concentrate on eating right and working out, and the weight will drop. The weight loss is the outcome of the right life activities. So here are some of the best “happiness-producing” skills:

Great supportive relationships: Engaging with people who are “for” you, can be vulnerable with you, and will tell you the truth.

Freedom: Instead of allowing others to control you, making the right choices because they are the right choices.

Living in reality: Avoiding perfectionistic expectations of yourself, others or the world.

Something to do: Competent work produces a positive sensation.

Giving with no tangible reward: It’s well known that altruism and service cause our body to release oxytocin, the feel-good hormone.

Resilience: Being able to bounce back after a failure, and self-regulate.

A purpose larger than oneself: We are happier when we engage in something meaningful that helps us transcend past “is that all there is?”

The ironic reality is that the happiest people in the world rarely, if ever, wonder if they are happy, or how to be more happy. They are otherwise involved in spending their energy engaged in the above skills.

So c’mon, get happy… by living the right life.

Best,

John