What's this about?

Every month in The Scribbler I feature two hand-selected articles from writers and thinkers I admire, as well as a short article by me. The articles have a common theme in that they offer insights and tools to help you live a better life. You get a few paragraphs of each of my guest authors' articles, and the link if you'd like to read more.

This month, my two writers are Mike R. Jay and Tim Sharp.

Mike is the whirlwind of innovation in the coaching world. He's the founder of B/Coach School, Leadership University, and a host of other things. He has also just released his new book, CPR for the Soul, which focuses on creating personal resilience by design. His article is on 'pressure-prompting', and provides a nice twist on a way of being that is often labeled procrastinating.

Tim Sharp, also known as Dr Happy, is the founder of the Happiness Institute in Australia (appropriate, because today is in fact Australia Day), a clinical and coaching psychologist and author of The Happiness Handbook. In this Scribbler he's sharing his report on ten tips to stop worrying.

Don't forget, in two week's time, you'll receive Outside the Lines. This is a splash of creativity and wisdom, with a longer article from me mixed in with a bunch of quotations and additional resources to help you explore its themes further.

Taking coaching more deeply and more widely into organizations

If you're interested in having coaching flourish in your team or organization, you'll enjoy a Thought Leader webinar I'm conducting in conjunction with HR.com. It's on January 30, and you can find out more information and register here.

Rather than keeping a calm head, and carefully making our way down, we panicked. We picked the fastest, most dangerous route down … and tried to go down it as fast as possible. As a result, we spent most of our time falling down the mountain – and got our bus home only because they'd decided to wait.

December felt a little bit like that final ski run. The goal of "tidying up" the year – whether in completing projects or using up budgets – meant that both my clients and I were jamming things in, squeezing what we could from the two working weeks of the month.

Come the holiday season you could almost hear the "whump" as people stopped working, stopped being hectic … and caught the "I'm on holidays" cold.

And now, as people come back to work, I see them (and me) gearing up for another hectic 2006, trying to pick up momentum to charge on through the year.

"For fast-acting relief from stress, try slowing down."
Lily Tomlin, comedian

The truth is, it is almost impossible now to "get on top of things." With the ease most of us have of receiving email and accessing the web, the amount of information we have to process is almost infinite. You'll never wrap your head around it all. You'll never know everything.

And in fact, the evidence suggests that working harder and faster doesn't mean that you're working more productively. In The European Dream, Jeremy Rifkin points out that the French are more productive than the Americans, even though, by some estimates, the average American puts in 350 hours more on the job per year than her European counterpart.

One of the books I've enjoyed reading recently is In Praise of Slow by Carl Honoré. He demonstrates that if we slow things down in how we enjoy food, how we engage with our leisure time, and how we raise our children, we all add to our quality of life.

But to do this, we have to start making choices. What will you say yes to – the things that are important enough to do well and do slowly. And when you say yes to them, what are you willing to say no to?

Gandhi wrote, "There is more to life than increasing its speed". Don't gear up for the year. Look to find ways for gearing down.

"Leadership and pressure prompting" by Mike R. Jay

A polarity exists between those people who have preferences for 'early-starting' as it's called, or those who are 'pressure-prompted.'

You might say that pressure-prompted is the opposite of early-starting and I think you know what that means…

Now, most (especially those who prefer early-starting) people call us 'pressure-prompted' folks, PROCRASTINATORS.

For some reason in the West, we have this habitual manner of labelling things as 'pejorative' when it's really just a difference.

Read the full article here.

"10 tips for overcoming worry" by Tim "Dr Happy" Sharp

Tip 1: Set aside a worry time

Some people find it difficult to stop worrying. Worry tends to intrude into their minds at all times, interfering with work or other activities. A useful way of dealing with too much worry intruding in one's mind is to set aside a "worry time". This can be, for example, half an hour just after work. At any other time, when a worrying issue comes to mind, acknowledge to yourself that you need to think through, and note that you will do so during your "worry time." At the appointed time, think the issue through and try to use one of the approaches [in this report]. Before then, give yourself permission to put it out of your mind and to get on with the task at hand.

Read the full report here (PDF)

What's going on?

Get Unstuck & Get Going Learning Annex workshops, Toronto. Wednesday February 15 and Tuesday March 14. Register at http://www.learningannex.ca/instructor.taf?id=9052

Get Unstuck & Get Going free teleforum. Monday February 20, 2pm EST. A regular forum I host for this community, to support you in getting unstuck. Register by sending an email to admin@BoxOfCrayons.biz.

Creating Get Unstuck & Get Going, New York. Wednesday 17 May. Sponsored by the NYC ICF chapter. Save the date – registration details coming soon!

As you might be able to guess, I love to speak or run workshops for groups! Read more about the keynote and workshop topics I offer here (PDF).

Michael Bungay Stanier helps people, teams and organizations to get unstuck and get going on the stuff that matters. He is the author of Get Unstuck & Get Going ...on the stuff that matters (www.GetUnstuckAndGetGoing.com), a self-coaching tool endorsed by leaders in the coaching and training professions, and creator of The Eight Irresistible Principles of Fun (www.EightPrinciples.com), a Flash movie that's taken the internet by storm. He is the 2006 Canadian Coach of the Year. You can find out more at www.boxofcrayons.biz or you can contact him directly at Michael@BoxOfCrayons.biz or +1 (416) 532-1322.

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©Box of Crayons 2006. Box of Crayons is a registered trading name of Maida CC Inc.

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