We had the speaker James Newton from Newton Learning come to speak with the group and our spouses, another bonus to have our spouses attend!  We spent 2/3 of the day hearing from James on many topics which we all deal with every day, learning curves, stress, how we communicate with those around us.  I hadn’t thought much of our learning curves and how some of the richest learning that we can have in life comes from the hardest of lessons.  James spoke about encouraging ourselves to go through that hard learning to enounter the great lessons.  He also spoke about the teenagers of today and how it can be difficult for them to experience these great lessons when they can easily be distracted with all things digital. 

He then spoke about the stress curve.  I found it fascinating to have stress broken down into different categories and to think about where the healthy balance of stress is.  It’s not when we are so busy that we aren’t taking care of ourselves, exercising, eating right, spending time doing the things we love (not just work!), and ensuring that we have followed up on all those things that we promise people we will do, be it at work or home.  It was a great reminder in this time of instant information, constant connectivity (although we all had to stand by some canoes to find cell phone reception!) and busy schedules that it is important to take time out, take care of ourselves and for us on Friday Harbor to enjoy the scenary.

Juliana

Businesses deal with this balancing act through establishing a common vision and doing annual strategy planning.  The vision tells everyone in the company where they’re going, and based on their current situation, the company can adjust its strategy planning  to ensure they are moving toward their vision not away from it.  So my question is: Is there something in the idea of having a vision and annually planning a strategy that might help me achieve my goal in life – to really and truly experience life?

Alright, I’m willing to admit that I can’t control every aspect of my life or determine with complete accuracy where I’ll end up, nor do I want to.  But there’s a great conversation in Alice in Wonderland between Alice and the Cheshire cat that illustrates my point.  In the conversation, Alice asks the cat: 

“Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?”

“That depends a good deal on where you want to get to”, said the cat.

“I don’t much care where—“, said Alice.

“Then it doesn’t matter which way you go”, said the cat.

“–so long as I get SOMEWHERE”, Alice added as an explanation.

“Oh, you’re sure to do that”, said the cat, “If you only walk long enough.”

I don’t want to end up just ‘somewhere’.  I want to be able to look back and say, “I lived life to its fullest…experiencing it…giving back to it…creating it!”  That’s my vision of the ‘somewhere’ that I want to be.   One benefit that I’ve noticed of going through the process of clarifying a personal vision for my life is I’ve found myself more aware of ways to channel my energy on people and experiences that are important to me, and with all the things that ‘bombard’ us every day, vying for our attention, that’s been really helpful.  Ok, so what about actually sitting down and planning a personal ‘strategy’ every year? 

In business, strategy helps companies figure out what they’re going to do to achieve their vision, and equally important, what they’re not going to do.  The paths they choose are strongly influenced by a variety of constraints and opportunities including current resources, current economic situation, current market conditions, etc.  Well, the idea of ‘constraints and opportunities’ obviously in terms of personal finances, life style, work requirements, applies to most of us. 

Constraints and opportunities can come in many forms, getting married, changing jobs, moving to a new community – to name a few.  I also need to adjust my strategy to take into account a lot of things that will be outside my control, and at the same time not lose sight that this is all part of ‘living life to the fullest.’  By taking time out to clarify the ‘somewhere’ I want to end up in life, and consciously thinking about my next steps, I’m able to point to steps (activities, experiences) that I believe are taking me to where I want to be. 

Obviously, I don’t know what those twilight years look like exactly, even with a clear vision, but that’s not the point.   I’m more confident now, that when I’ve reached those twilight years, I will be able to look back and think, ‘wow, what a ride’.  I’m clear on an idea of where I’d like to end up, and have a process that helps me be present in the journey along the way.  This is what ‘winning’ means to me. 

“Life’s about the journey, not just the destination.  You must be present to win.” That’s my philosophy.  “I lived life to its fullest…Experiencing it…Giving back to it…creating it!”  That’s my vision.  What’s yours? And what are you doing to make sure you’re moving toward it?

Mark

In Simon’s video he is talking about how we as people get others to align to our beliefs and passions through the way in which we communicate.  This is something that we talk about often at Oxygen Learning as describing to people the kind of classroom training that we can do is not given justice with words.  So we tend to talk about the passion that we have for what we do and how it has effected people both professionally and personally.  We work to paint a picture of what the classroom looks like, we talk about people having big “ah ha” moments and we share stories about how we have been affected by the training we provide.  It’s a great talk…check it out at the link below:

http://www.ted.com/talks/simon_sinek_how_great_leaders_inspire_action.html

The second Ted Talk by Ken Robinson talks about innovation and how through the education system of today we are in effect removing the creativity from children by putting them into lessons that we believe are what the jobs of tomorrow are going to require them to know.  It really sparked in myself that we need to be aware that this happens at school and also acknowledge that learning can come in all different shapes and forms, at all ages.  As a parent I know that this had me a bit freaked out and wondering what more I could do to ensure that our little one has many opportunities to be creative.  This also aligns to what we do at Oxygen Learning, it’s different, creative, outside the box, yet enables and allows people to really learn and remember that learning within both their professional and personal life.  It’s what keeps me so passionate about what we do and how we do it!  Check out this link as well…it’s worth the time to watch and think about!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iG9CE55wbtY

Juliana

It’s been a great start to 2010 for us, the market seems to be picking up, we are working on some fun projects, one of which has enabled us to work with Susan Scott, the author of Fierce Conversations and Fierce Leadership.  Not only was I able to attend one of their workshops to evaluate the content, but we have also been able to recommend Susan to one of our clients.  She will be  a keynote at one of the conferences we are designing and facilitating, and it’s been great to work with their team, located just down the hill from us in Pioneer Square. 

Beyond that I was also lucky enough to spend some time in Florida soaking up sun.  Unfortunately, this was right after the oil spill, so we witnessed a lot of helicopters flying by checking the waters and many people worried about what might happen.  On the flip side during the one week at our hotel there were four separate conferences going on, three large companies and one general audience conferences.  Another good sign that the market must be improving as companies are spending the money to have training, networking and evening events at nice resorts!