Tag Archives: character

Dropping balls

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One of the most frustrating things is to realize that you dropped a ball. You are juggling so many things and one falls through your fingers. You miss it.

A good juggler can make the mistake a part of the show. A good leader can’t.

In this specific case it’s not that bad because the only person really let down is me. I can still pick the ball up, I can put it back into play, and the only harm is that everyone saw me drop it. A little embarrassing, but I can handle it.

I can make the excuse that I had just returned from medical leave and I had a lot of balls to juggle, but that’s not accepting ownership, it’s just making excuses. It was something that should have been prioritized. Other things were less important.

I just need to accept the mistake. I need to own it. I need to pick up the ball and put it back into play. The challenge is not explaining, justifying, or excusing, but owning my mistake. Then doing what I can to fix it.

This is harder to do when you let people down. It is challenging to face when others are counting on you.

Excuses are not the way. Own it. Do your best to make it right, and be sure to keep similar balls in the air in the future. That’s the best way forward.

Faces and stereotypes

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I like to think that I don’t make snap judgments of people, but I do. Sometimes I see a face, or a haircut, or a mannerism, and I start to create a profile of the person’s life. Yesterday I overheard a conversation between a server and a very nerdy customer. Everything about his voice, dialogue, clothing, and even posture told me he was a geek.

That sounds mean. But here’s the thing, the profile I built for him was this:

He has a very small group of friends, but they are great friends that would go out of their way to help him. He loves board games, and prefers that they are cooperative rather than competitive. He isn’t involved in any organized sports but isn’t afraid to participate in sports with friends and comparatively he is as good as them and that’s good enough. He will go out of his way to interact with someone serving him and finds joy in those interactions. His sense of humour is as geeky as he is, and he isn’t afraid to laugh at his own jokes. He’s happy.

There are a lot of people who find it hard to be happy, I don’t think this guy has a problem being happy.

My judgement could be totally wrong. This guy might have been offended if he knew what I thought. He might lack confidence, or be quite unhappy. But I like my profiling.

On the other end of the spectrum, when I see someone grumpy or unhappy, I build back stories that give them reasons for this. I see them more as victims of circumstance rather than inherently angry or mean.

But in the end these are all fictions I create. I see faces and they tell me stories… not real stories but stories I create for them. Stereotypes are oversimplified, I tend to complicate them, individualize them, and create lives based on faces, looks, and mannerisms. I wonder what people see, when they see me?

No matter where you go…

More than half a life ago I had a girlfriend that was a fair bit older than me. She was very well travelled, including a solo trip to Africa in the early 80’s. While I haven’t seen her in almost 30 years, I still remember one of her favourite sayings, “No matter where you go, there you are.”

That saying is said by a lot of people, but I finally understood it when she said it. There is no escaping yourself. If you are kind in life, you’ll be kind in a sunny destination spot. If you’re a jerk, you’ll be a jerk at a touristy landmark. If you feel lost, you won’t find yourself on the peak of a mountain. You take whomever you are, wherever you go.

So whether you seek adventure, excitement, relaxation, or rest, it’s your own expectations and hopes that will determine what kind of trip you have. Disappointment because the room wasn’t quite what you expected, or although the room wasn’t what you expected the view was spectacular and made up for it? The food was more expensive than expected, or the food was pricey but you would have paid double for that red snapper last night? Are you looking for disappointment or are you looking for opportunities to see, hear, and feel positive experiences in a foreign land?

No matter where you go, there you are. Sometimes it takes travel experiences to truly understand what that means. As the world opens up, I hope people find exactly what they are looking for when they travel… just make sure you are looking for the right things.