Category Archives: Daily-Ink

The nod

When I lived in China, if I passed a foreigner, an ex-pat, I got ‘the nod’. It didn’t matter if the person was British, East Indian, Australian, Japanese, or American, they were from another country and I got an acknowledging nod. We were in Dalian, North East China, and of all the foreigners, the Russians were most abundant. The Russians would not give you the nod, even if you gave them one. It was weird.

I got to know a few Russians while in Dalian and they were all very nice, but seeing a Russian stranger on the street, or in a shopping mall, they would give you a quick glance, decide you are not ‘one of them’, and look away. Never the nod.

It’s funny, one of my daughters once asked, “Do you think that they think we are American?” Because we were often asked (in Chinese) by locals if we were American? (Nǐ shì měiguó rén ma?) To which we would answer ‘Canadian’ (Jiānádà rén). Then the person would smile and be even more friendly. My kids picked this up pretty quickly and figured the Russians were assuming we were American.

Here in Canada I get the nod from people of Middle Eastern descent. It happened last night, when I was in a Lebanese Donair shop. I ordered my large, spicy, extra lamb donair, paid and walked along the counter to where I pick it up. Directly in front of me I made eye contact with a young man sitting and enjoying his meal, and he gave me the nod. I returned it with a smile. That was the whole exchange, nothing more. The knowing, ‘you are one of us’ nod.

Oddly enough, I have a Russian grandfather, and my Middle Eastern ancestry is that I’m 50% Ashkenazi Jew. So, the Russian in Dalian that shrugged off without the nod had no idea I actually had heritage, and the Middle Eastern in Canada would probably be surprised to know that my heritage is Jewish. And the Chinese in China had no idea my Grandmother was Chinese.

I’m used to not fitting in a cultural box. As I mentioned before, “I have a look that Italians mistake for Greek, and Greeks mistake for Italian. I am neither.” I am ‘white’ but with a combined heritage of being 75% Ashkenazi Jewish and Chinese, I don’t readily identify as white… other than the privilege I know that I ‘wear’.

But the nod is not about that. The nod is not really about nationality or heritage, it’s about sharing a common experience. It doesn’t matter if the nod is a case of mistaken identity, it doesn’t matter if you are from different parts of the world. The nod is a way that two human beings connect and say “I see you.” And it’s a beautiful thing.

Satisfactory Work Habits

When report cards go out, they include Work Habits. The usual standard is either that you got a ‘G’ for good, or you haven’t done a good enough job. Admittedly, as a parent, I wanted to see ‘G’s more than ‘A’s, because I wanted to know that my kids were trying their best.

At Inquiry Hub we look at it differently. We think the scale is skewed to the negative with ‘Satisfactory’ being something bad, when in fact in means you are doing a ‘good enough’ job. This was part of my message home to parents that went out on report card day:

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Work Habits – The work habits provided are ‘G’ – Good, ‘S’ – Satisfactory, and ‘N’ Needs Improvement. 

Many middle and high schools break this up as ‘G’ = anything above average. ‘S’ = There are some issues. ‘N’ = Not good. Some schools even give awards for students that get “All G’s”. That is NOT what we do here. The word ‘Satisfactory’ is not a bad word. Satisfactory means doing what needs to be done. That’s not a bad thing… could it be better? Yes, it is possible that a student can step up and do more than they need to… that’s ‘Good’. And for us an ‘N’ means that work habits need improvement, like most other schools. 

We like to have a positive distinction between ‘Satisfactory’ and ‘Good’ rather than ‘Good’ being the only measure of doing good work. It’s more important to us to separate 2 kinds of ‘Good’, than 2 kinds of ‘Needs Improvement’. In fact, we have many over-achievers in our school, and one thing we stress is that sometimes it’s perfectly OK to do ‘enough’ work in one area so that you can focus more attention in another area. Can you still talk to your child about moving from ‘S’ to ‘G’? Sure, but please don’t put a lot of emphasis on this! ‘Satisfactory’ can often mean, “I did what I needed to do to get the job done.” If everything you do is always good, that’s a heck of a lot of stress to deal with when you have a lot on your plate. 

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This approach seems even more apt now that we are having students do SCRUM projects, because part of working on a scrum team is defining what ‘Done’ looks like. For some parts of a project ‘done’ doesn’t mean ‘excellent’, it means good enough to move on. This is an important skill to learn. The interesting thing is, when you are working on a team, the collective definition of done is usually more than just ‘satisfactory’, and is already better than ‘good enough’. This isn’t about putting the least amount of effort it, it’s more about not extending the team so much that they can’t finish a project on time.

Sometimes satisfactory work really is the goal, so that you have the time, energy, and enthusiasm to do other work at an excellent level. A satisfactory work habit means that you’ve done what you needed to do.

The sales pitch

We bought a TV last night from a wonderful man with the softest sales pitch I’ve ever experienced. This included going to competitor’s web pages to show us their prices, and sharing the actual cost of the TV we were buying. It was a smooth, sincere sounding pitch, from a delightful person.

He gave us a bit of his sales background as we were paying. During that time he said he started his career in car sales but he couldn’t stand it because, “It’s impossible to sell a car without lying.”

He didn’t tell us which car company he worked for. He did mention a couple different ‘big box outlets’ he worked at for over two decades, without saying anything bad about them. And the he shared the name of one he worked for, for just 6 months, that we should never buy from. And of course, now that he knows us, he can share the same kind of deals with our family and friends.

Except for the fact that he was the busiest salesperson on the floor and we had to wait a couple times while he dealt with other customers, the whole experience felt positive… from the first time we talked to him on the phone to when we left the store.

One funny point is that when he was on the phone with us, we thought he was a young, enthusiastic sales person, on his first sales job. We arrived and was told he was in the back with a customer and walked right by him without knowing him. When he found us he said, “Didn’t I tell you to look for the short bald man when we were on the phone?”

He didn’t, and my wife and I had a good chuckle about how mistaken we were about what this man would look liked. But the mistake fed into the appeal, who was this older-than-us man who sounded so genuinely enthusiastic to serve us over the phone? Turned out he was a nice man, working for a good company, with the smoothest, most enjoyable sales pitch I’ve ever heard.

A commissioned sales job is not a job I could ever do, and so I have respect for someone that can do it so well.

Crossing the Thin Line

Have you ever noticed that sometimes it feels like the days slip by. You follow a routine filled only with preparing for work, work, preparing and eating meals, your commute, and preparing for the next day? Sometimes there is a thin line between existing and living. This line separates what feels like a Groundhog Day from some simple things that make life great.

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Crossing the Thin Line

A genuine laugh.

A shared smile.

A deep conversation.

A thoughtful contemplation.

A short walk.

A long reflective pause.

A delicious lunch.

A worthy cause.

A kind gesture.

A little surprise.

A random purchase.

A twinkle in someone’s eye.

It can be internally driven, it can be externally motivated.

It can be deliberately sought after, it can be accidentally activated.

It’s not a chasm to cross, just a simple fine line… Between a day lost simply existing, and a life sublime.

I can be prickly

It’s hard to admit to yourself that you are stubborn, but in some cases I really am. There are certain colours that I just don’t like. There are pieces of art I just can’t appreciate. There are things that annoy me that don’t bother other people. The thing is, I’m not usually apologetic about this kind of prickliness.

I think the only people that really notice this are my family and close friends. I’m not terribly vocal about it, well except for sharing it here, and it’s not like I launch into public rants about my dislikes. But if I own up to it, I can be a bit over the top and annoying about some pretty small things. I think my wife has to put up with this more than anyone else.

It can be hard to admit that I have these annoying idiosyncrasies, but I think for the most part it’s me being annoyed and I leave the rest of the world out of it. Still, I probably need to reflect on that a bit, and when I get prickly about something really insignificant, I need to take a breath and not take my unimportant concerns so seriously.

I don’t want to be that old guy that took the ‘ly’ off of prickly. 😜

The most powerful paradoxes of life

I just read this thread of tweets by Sahil Bloom and it needs to be shared! Click on the tweet and read them all. More than one will speak to you. These are indeed paradoxes that you will have experienced and understood intuitively at some point in your life.

Beyond that, I’ll let them speak for themselves:

Another trip around the sun

Today I turn 54. I’m starting my 55th rotation around sun on this tiny blue rock. While I have been taking good care of myself and feel great, I also realize that there are things that time does to your body that are irreversible… like my hairline. 🤣

On a more serious note, it amazes me that I am now older than my parents were when I left home and headed to BC. They were in their late 40’s when I left. That means the vast majority of my memories of being in my family home are memories of parents who were spring chickens compared to me now.

How did I get here? Time passes so quickly. Five years ago retirement seemed a lifetime away, now it’s actually something my wife and I are planning for. 10 years ago ago I had 2 kids that weren’t even teenagers yet, and in a few months my youngest will be 20 and once again I won’t have any teenagers.

I feel blessed for having the life I’ve had, and I look forward to a lot more (hopefully healthy and happy) years ahead. I just marvel in the fact that so many years have gone by so quickly, and time seems to be speeding up.

I don’t usually think much about birthdays. The one birthday that made me sad we my 36th. A couple days after that birthday I had to fill out a form and the checkbox for my age went from ages 36-54. That put me in the dumps. I felt all depressed that I was now lumped in with the 50-year olds. Now that I’m at the tail end of that category, I simply look forward to what comes next.

Hairline be damned, it is going to recede and turn more grey no matter what. But I’m hopping on my exercise bike this morning, I’m going to shoot some arrows, and I’m going to have a wonderful family dinner. It’s a good day to appreciate the gift of life, and to use the time I have well, as I rocket towards this spot on the earth’s orbit again in another year.

Good-Cheap-Fast

As the saying goes, you can only pick 2:

Cheap and fast won’t be good.

Fast and good won’t be cheap.

Good and cheap won’t be fast.

Of theses I think fast is the most challenging. You can pump a lot of money into something to make it happen faster but it won’t necessarily be good anyways. When it comes to implementing change, time deadlines are important, and budgets are always limited. But going too fast undermines effort and cost.

Systems need time. People need time. And rushing deadlines quickly becomes counterproductive. Faster isn’t always desirable or attainable without sacrificing quality.

This doesn’t mean you can’t launch a beta product that isn’t quite ready. It does mean that nor everyone will be happy with the results. Even a beta product can be rushed and launched too early. It has to be affordable/worthwhile. It has to be be good (enough). It can’t be rushed… there are few things in life that can be rushed and good, no matter how much money is thrown at it.

It comes down to this

I just deleted 3 paragraphs that led up to me writing this:

If you can’t take care of yourself during your busiest times, then you aren’t actually taking care of yourself.

That’s the whole post. No excuses, no postponing, no making up for it later. Take care of yourself. You’ll get more done and feel better doing it.

Thinking and sharing in the blogosphere

Yesterday I wrote about this quote, “Mindfulness is a pause – The space between stimulus and response: That’s where choice lies.” ~ Tara Brach

And Shiela Stewart shared a post she wrote with a similar quote, “Between stimulus and response, there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”  ~ Viktor E. Frankl Man’s Search for Meaning

Sheila wrote this in July of 2014, over 7 years ago. Although I wasn’t blogging every day back then I had already been blogging for 8 years. In those early blogging years I was an avid reader of other blogs, including Sheila’s, and a whole host of other educators. We were all writing, and reflecting, and learning from each other. We were in a community that understood the power of sharing our thoughts out in the open.

But there were other people who didn’t understand why we would do this. There were those that questioned how we had the time. Those that thought we were self-indulgent and thought we were only writing for self promotion rather than self reflection and learning. That’s still around today but not as much.

The reality is that I enjoy writing. I’ve enjoyed it since high school. And I feel like a writer when I share my work publicly… when I share my work in a community of other writers. When I add to the blogosphere.

And I absolutely love when another blogger shares their work with me. I totally see why Sheila connected the two quotes above. I understand her ‘blogger’s mind’ that thinks, ‘Dave will appreciate me making this connection’. I love that the connection was to a 7-year-old post, and the Sheila was able to put the connection together so many years later. Bloggers can do that. They can pull an idea up from a decade ago and see how it relates all these years later. And they aren’t afraid to share those thoughts.

This is driven by an understanding that when we learn in the open we are exposed to more connections and ideas than when we keep our learning to ourselves. The idea of being an open and connected learner is one that I think can still be misunderstood, but it isn’t misunderstood by those who are doing it, only by those on the outside that don’t get it. This isn’t ‘insider information’, it’s not a secret. We happily share it out in the open, here in the blogosphere.