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The Discipline of Unpacking Those Boxes that Have Been in Storage Forever

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Your 3 Choices When Unpacking Boxes

To keep an item, I have to be 99% certain that I would use this again.

You need to consider these three choices:

Each item can only be held once and must be acted upon in one of three ways —>

Choice 1.

  • Decide. . . .  Decide whether an item is “a part of some whole,” “a whole with many parts,” or doesn’t belong. This choice will seamlessly establish a sorting system that matches your thinking one choice at a time. Keep these decisions rational. Don’t overvalue or romanticize. Treat every item as if it belongs to someone you don’t know. Avoid the urge to rethink an earlier decision. You can revisit any decision when all the boxes are gone. Then you will know what to do.

Choice 2.

  • Deposit it or dump it. . . . Put the item where it will stay — file it, put it on a shelf or in a drawer, or put it in the circular file. Resist the temptation to put things in a staging area. That just generates more work, making the task expand in size. Hold fast to the rule that you touch each item only once.

Choice 3.

  • Direct it (Immediately send it to someone who needs it or can act on it.)

Prepare yourself to work more slowly than you anticipated. The key is to keep an even pace to so that decisions begin to fall into place naturally. It will take longer to empty a box, if you stick to those choices, but each box will be sorted for good.

The Value of Words

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The Value of Words

When I was a small child my mother had a simple cardboard box in which she kept toys in closet. She believed that we would value our toys more if we didn’t always have all of them all around us to play with. So every few months she would take the toys that she felt we had grown tired of and put them in the box in the closet. Then she’d replace them with some of the toys from the box we hadn’t see for a long while.

It would be as if those old, forgotten toys were new when she brought them out again!

It doesn’t take much to make me think of that old cardboard box. I often wish we had a box like that for words that we’ve used too much — words we’ve grown so familiar with that they’ve lost meaning.

Imagine if we could make some words new again … restore them back to their original meaning.

Words like . . .

peace

joy

wonder

good will

wishes

awesome

irresistible

Take a moment to savor the words you use to define yourself, to describe the people you value, and to share your feelings about the people you value with them.

Stop to value what’s dear and delight in the familiar.

Be irresistible,

Liz

Put Your Mind to It

The words we choose are like the stories we tell. Without realizing their effect, choosing and using them changes us — how we see ourselves and how others see us. Consider the phrases you use without thinking, like answering, “I’m fine,” when people ask how you are. Try saying, “I’m fabulous.” Watch how that changes your day.

More from Liz . . . about the Value of Words

Images & Words: Are You Ready to Make Opportunity and Change the World?

How Do Get You People to Stop Listening to Words and Start Hearing Ideas?

Is It Wrong or Different?

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Do you know the difference between wrong and different?

When I first became an editorial manager, it took me a while to realize how subjective editing can be. The fact is if I ask 15 editors to revise an essay, I’ll get back 15 versions, each uniquely worded by the person who did the work.

Allowing that no mistakes were made, not one of the revised versions would be exactly as any other. Possibly even more important, not one of those revisions would be exactly I would do it. The choices made by other editors weren’t wrong. They simply were different from how I would do it.

It can be disconcerting when we ask for help or delegate work and what we get is something other than we expected, a different solution than ours would have been. But, if we’re willing to stop for a moment and consider the new approach on its own merit, we’re likely to find that what separates the two is how we were taught to do it or what we personally prefer.

Old recordings in our head tend to tell us that being different is wrong. We search for the answer our teacher wants us to parrot. We’re supposed dress like, and act like, our peer group. Don’t buy it!

What makes each of us valuable is the difference we bring to the table. When someone brings you something different than you expect, do all you can to understand the new solution. You might just find that the new solution solves the problem in a more interesting way. If new solution doesn’t suit your intended purpose, still do all you can to express respect for the new solution before you set it aside. Leaving room for other solutions opens the door to learning those new tricks old dogs aren’t supposed to be able to learn

.… And when you have a different solution, don’t seek disruption, but find a low-stress opportunity to ask about trying it. Bring your idea gently, but please bring your difference. We need it.

Be irresistible,

Liz

Put Your Mind to It

The next time someone brings you a solution that’s different from what you expected, try to catch yourself before you show them the right way to do it. Instead, ask that person why they chose to do the task as they did. You might find the thinking behind their method is stronger than the thinking behind the way you do it.

More from Liz . . . about Wrong and Different:

The Difference Between Wrong and Different

The Minute I’m Sure I’m Right, I’m Most Certainly Wrong

It’s Not Your Passion, But Your Purpose

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Everyone feels lost sometimes.

Everyone feels lost sometimes.

I don’t think I know anyone who hasn’t been lost in their head at one time or another — even those folks overachieving all over the Internet. We all find those moments that we wonder about who we are and what we want. But the question is not whether everyone gets lost, but how we get ourselves back on the road to the life we want.

Ask everyone how to get back to moving forward, and soon enough someone will say, “Follow your passion.” Follow your passion? What if my passion is sitting on the beach, listening to music?

When faced with the questions of who we are and what we want, the road to moving forward follows your purpose. Passion is only half the story. However you define success in business or in life, a critical component is finding your purpose — your unique ability to help others that involves both your mind and your heart.

Purpose is both credibility and passion. Credibility is at the heart of knowing who we are. To find your credibility, ask yourself what you’re already known for, what you’re good at, what you’ve accomplished. Passion is at the heart of knowing what we want. To find your passion, name what you talk about, think about, and do every day — without payment — simply because it makes you feel like you’ve got a contribution to make. In other words, concentrate on combining what you do well with what you really like.

If you’re an ex-lawyer fascinated by marketing. You might find your crossroads showing lawyers how to market their business. If you’re a mother who wants to start a small business, research small businesses for mothers or by show mothers how they might get started in business. Then help others who feel lost find their unique space.

It’s hard to feel lost when you’re helping people find their own way.

Be irresistible,

Liz

Put Your Mind to It

Set your mind to find the crossroads of your credibility and your passion. You’ll find a problem that you have solved for yourself in your own, unique way. Consider how you solved that problem for yourself. Then go solve that problem for everyone else.

More from Liz . . . about Not Passion, But Purpose:

Are You Seeing the Things that Make a Difference to Your Business and Your Life?

Choosing and Deciding: How Do You Sort a Path to Opportunity?

Getting Past Fear

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I felt the more embarrassing fear of people’s judgment.

When I decided it was time to write again, I avoided the computer for the longest time. On the rare occasion that I managed to sit myself down to write, I’d get caught up answering email or reading articles around the web, not doing writing I had sat down to do. Some people would call what I felt was writer’s block or procrastination. But those words name the behavior, not its source — fear.

Fear is a silent villain. Until we see it, we can’t make it go.

Once I could speak loud enough to be heard and had the energy to think new thoughts, I found myself on shaky ground — I was afraid that I no longer had a “voice” that is relevant to the world. But I didn’t realize that at first. At first I was lost in overthinking. I felt like a trapeze artist to fly without a net for the first time.

At first, I was lost in rationalizations . . . I’ve been gone for so long, I don’t know what the audience is thinking. . . . I don’t know what their problems are now. . . . were the most common ones.

It wasn’t until I finally listened to myself that I found out what the problem was. I was consistently there every time I talked about what held me back. I thought I was stopped by what other people think or do. I was sidetracked before I even got to that by the words I don’t know. . . . Now I was getting somewhere. That was something I could know.

When I recognized my fear, I could consider it rationally rather than trying to rationalize it. I told myself I couldn’t possibly know everything. So what was all of this “I don’t know” fear about? I didn’t fear for my safety or fear getting lost. What feared was what people expected of me. I had faced that fear before. That fear is about fighting with ghosts. No one can win the approval of everyone.

I felt the fear of people’s judgment. Which people? My family? No. My friends? No. My third grade class? The city of Chicago or the entire population of the Internet? The world doesn’t have time to decide whether I do my best?

We have to find our true value by deciding for ourselves.

Be irresistible,

Liz

Put Your Mind to It

Take a few minutes to think about what you value in yourself. Do you give yourself the credit you’re due?  Decide what you know, what you do, and what you expect from yourself. Live up to that.  

More from Liz . . .
about Getting Past Fear:

What Is the Best True Story You Could Tell about You?

Are You Using History Strategically . . . to Claim Your Business and Life Future?

What Is the True Story about You?

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My father has his story. I have mine. You have yours.
My father has his story. I have mine. You have yours.

My father was a storyteller. It seemed that if he wasn’t telling a story, he hardly had anything to say. It was on his lap, by his side, sitting across from him at the table, listening to his stories that I learned how the world worked and how to understand people.

Stories not only help us make sense of the world; they help us define who we are. When we share our past with others, we link events together in a narrative — a story. My father had his story. I have mine. You have yours.

We all can experience an event, but our retellings of the same facts will differ. The story will change based on what we brought to the event and how we interpret what occurred. Though I might retell my father’s stories, my voice changes those stories making them my stories now, not his. The same is so about the stories we tell about ourselves. Everyone experiences us differently. So how do we know the true story about ourselves?

In telling our life story, we have to draw our own conclusions about what is true.

Refuse to decide and we give our future to people who don’t have to live our lives. We let others choose who we are and what we can be. The fact is that we can, should, and have to decide for ourselves.

Be irresistible,

Liz

Put Your Mind to It

It’s never too late to edit your life story. You’re the only one who can write the true story about yourself. Take the time to decide what are the best true stories about you. Send the out-of-date stories about you back to the past.

More from Liz . . .

about Your True Story:

What Is the Best True Story You Could Tell about You?

Are You Using History Strategically . . . to Claim Your Business and Life Future?