You Got to be Kidding!

It was a little over 9 years that I’ve been on the old continent. My last trip was in 2002. Jennifer my first-born was 9 months old and I (actually we) 2 months short to my marriage. Funny, at that time we traveled with an Iberia flight and had scale in Madrid.

I made a not very successful attempt to flight to Barcelona in the end of 2009. The evening before my trip I had, let’s say, some kind of health issue that took me right into hospital and not to Europe.

Yes, I was booked on Iberia.

Well, the week before last I made it. On very short notice I had to catch a plane to Germany to pick up my mother. She wasn’t so well but urging to come to Brazil and to stay with me for a while. And though she had a flight booked for November, the cold weather made her change the date and, for the first time in – what – 200 years of happily traveling by herself, she was frightened to travel alone so I went to get her.

Since she already had her ticked, I had to book the same flight so I could be with her. And guess what! Iberia.

Because of the lack of choice and time, the only flight available for me had a nine hours connection gap in Madrid. No way I would stay nine hours sitting in an airport lounge waiting for a connection flight. So I started to make some plans on how to spent this precious time.

Basic rule of life:

First:
Everything comes different …

Second
As you thought it would be!

Our flight arrived at Madrid Barajas exactly … one hour late! By the time I made it through immigration another hour had passed. Not thinking to much, I felt a little tired … I went with the flow, made a wrong turn, took a train (yes, a train with only 2 stations) and ended up in the transit lounge of another terminal at the airport. The place I so much wanted to avoid.

No way! I made a 180 degree turn, went back all the way to immigration decided to take the exit and to go downtown and have a decent meal at a fancy restaurant.

I do not recall if I was high on drugs or simply being stupid. I mean, has any one of you recently been to Madrid Barajas Airport? It is quite a big place, remember, you have to take a train to change terminals … well, I got back to immigration and saw that hum angus line of people waiting to get through … I turned around again and went back to transit.

My connection flight was scheduled to depart at 19:40 h. The late arrival and my back and forth trips in between terminals had used up quite some time and when I finally got to sit down in a not so fancy restaurant in the transit lounge, almost 4 h of my 9 h stay were gone. So, I made some math … 1 h lunch, a little walking around for digestion, I have some movies in my laptop, … I could make it with no further damage.

Basic rule of life:

First:
Everything comes different …

Second
As you thought it would be!

Or in other words “Life is a bitch!”

I had beef, smashed potatoes, salad, juice some ice cream as dessert and a hot cocoa to finish and to use up some more time. They bring it with a cookie aside to fool you and to justify that they charge you the price of a small car for this meal … come on, it wasn’t even on a gold plate!

3 ½ hours to begin boarding.

I found a no to crowded corner to sit, got my laptop, sat back and relaxed. I’d watch “The Proposal” with Sandra Bullock, one of my favorite female actors. This would kill another hour and a half and I’d be just fine.

Basic rule of life:

… you get it! …

35 minutes into the movie my battery went down! “Holly CRAP!”

OK, relax, find a plug and everything is fine.

Did I mention that this is quite a big place. I mean, they have signs where they tell you how much time you need to walk from one gate to the other. Never less than 5 minutes! So there I was, walking the terminal top to bottom and back trying to find a place to plug in my laptop and to finish watching my movie! They have special designated places where you can do it. 3 on total with 8 plugs each, sums 24 plugs in a terminal as big as a city and 5 million people with cell phones and laptops all wanted to be charged …. arghhhhhhh….

But I found one! … only to discover (better, remember) that in Europe they use different plugs than we do in Brazil and that I had forgotten my adaptor at home … … …

I entered literally every store on that terminal looking for an adapter. There was none. Not a single one! I got myself a Coke and a Milky Bar, sat on a bench, grabbed my cell phone, headphones, I would just listen to some music and all will be fine …

And as I started listening to “Fireflies” by Owl City, singing along … my battery went down!

Well, at least time never stops and I had only around 45 minutes left for boarding so I looked for one of them displays to find out what gate I had to go. “Let’s see, Iberia IB number … to Frankfurt … 19:40 h … delayed!”

WHAT?

I arrived at Frankfurt airport 1:30 h late. Almost midnight. My luggage was one of the first to come out. My sister was waiting. I had a bottle of water took the keys and drove us back to Bonn, another hour and a half. It was a gorgeous full moon night, no traffic, music playing on the radio, sister sleeping on the passengers seat.

I made it back to the old continent. I felt good.

By the way, I could have exited the airport through the terminal I was staying with no problem at all. But when I figured this out I was standing in line to board the plane.

A great day you all! Life is wonderfull, I just love it. Never gets boring!

Time Killer - Procrastination - We don't Need It

I am often being asked about how to manage time, as if I was some kind of a time guru. But really, why is it that most of us have so much trouble doing what we supposed to do, instead of filling our time doing stuff we really don't need to do? And though I did not completely mastered the art of "not procrastinating" I do write a lot about it and I work hard on an every day basis to achieve this "diploma" - in this lifetime.

So here are some hints for you, and me, to practice on our procrastination habits.

So, good luck us all, we definitely need it!

Manage your time. Get it all done.

If you’ve found yourself putting off important tasks over and over again, you’re not alone. In fact, many people procrastinate to some degree – but some are so chronically affected by procrastination that it stops them fulfilling their potential and disrupts their careers.

The key to controlling this destructive habit is to recognize when you start procrastinating, understand why it happens (even to the best of us), and take active steps to manage your time and outcomes better.

What is Procrastination?

In a nutshell, you procrastinate when you put off things that you should be focusing on right now, usually in favor of doing something that is more enjoyable or that you’re more comfortable doing.

According to psychologist Professor Clarry Lay, a prominent writer on procrastination, procrastination occurs when there’s “a temporal gap between intended behavior and enacted behavior.” That is, procrastination is occurring when there’s a significant time period between when people intend to do a job, and when they actually do it. 

How to Overcome Procrastination

Follow these steps to deal with and control procrastination:

Step 1: Recognize That You're Procrastinating 

If you're honest with yourself, you probably know when you're procrastinating. But to be sure, take our Are You a Procrastinator? self test.

Here are some useful indicators that will help you know when you’re procrastinating:

• Filling your day with low priority tasks from your To Do List.
• Reading e-mails several times without starting work on them or deciding what you’re going to do with them.
• Sitting down to start a high-priority task, and almost immediately going off to make a cup of coffee.
• Leaving an item on your To Do list for a long time, even though you know it's important.
• Regularly saying "Yes" to unimportant tasks that others ask you to do, and filling your time with these instead of getting on with the important tasks already on your list.
• Waiting for the “right mood” or the “right time” to tackle the important task at hand.

Notes:
Putting off an unimportant task isn't necessarily procrastination: it may just be good prioritization!

Putting off an important task for a short period because you’re feeling particularly tired isn’t necessarily procrastination either, so long as you don’t delay starting the task for more than a day or so, and this is only an occasional event. If you have a genuine good reason for rescheduling something important, then you’re not necessarily procrastinating. But if you’re simply “making an excuse” because you really just don’t want to do it, then you are.

In his 1986 article “At Last, My Research Article on Procrastination”, published in the Journal of Research on Personality, Lay noted that procrastinatory behavior is independent of need for achievement, energy, or self-esteem. In other words, you may be a procrastinator even if you’re confident in your own abilities, energetic, and enjoy achieving things.

Step 2: Work Out WHY You're Procrastinating 

Why you procrastinate can depend on both you and the task. But it's important to understand which of the two is relevant in a given situation, so that you can select the best approach for overcoming your reluctance to get going.

One reason for procrastination is that people find a particular job unpleasant, and try to avoid it because of that. Most jobs have unpleasant or boring aspects to them, and often the best way of dealing with these is to get them over and done with quickly, so that you can focus on the more enjoyable aspects of the job.

Another cause is that people are disorganized. Organized people manage to fend of the temptation to procrastinate, because they will have things like prioritized to-do lists and schedules which emphasize how important the piece work is, and identify precisely when it’s due. They’ll also have planned how long a task will take to do, and will have worked back from that point to identify when they need to get started in order to avoid it being late. Organized people are also better placed to avoid procrastination, because they know how to break the work down into manageable “next steps”.

Even if you’re organized, you can feel overwhelmed by the task. You may doubt that you have the skills or resources you think you need, so you seek comfort in doing tasks you know you're capable of completing. Unfortunately, the big task isn't going to go away – truly important tasks rarely do. You may also fear success as much as failure. For example, you may think that success will lead to you being swamped with more requests to do this type of task, or that you’ll be pushed to take on things that you feel are beyond you.

Surprisingly, perfectionists are often procrastinators, as they can tend to think "I don't have the right skills or resources to do this perfectly now, so I won't do it at all."

One final major cause of procrastination is having underdeveloped decision-making skills. If you simply can’t decide what to do, you’re likely to put off taking action in case you do the wrong thing.

Step 3: Adopt Anti-Procrastination Strategies 

Procrastination is a habit – a deeply ingrained pattern of behavior. That means that you won’t just break it overnight. Habits only stop being habits when you have persistently stopped practising them, so use as many approaches as possible to maximize your chances of beating procrastination. Some tips will work better for some people than for others, and for some tasks than others. And, sometimes, you may simply need to try a fresh approach to beat the “procrastination peril”!

These general tips will help motivate you to get moving:

• Make up your own rewards. For example, promise yourself a piece of tasty flapjack at lunchtime if you've completed a certain task. And make sure you notice how good it feels to finish things!
• Ask someone else to check up on you. Peer pressure works! This is the principle behind slimming and other self-help groups, and it is widely recognized as a highly effective approach.
• Identify the unpleasant consequences of NOT doing the task.
• Work out the cost of your time to your employer. As your employers are paying you to do the things that they think are important, you're not delivering value for money if you're not doing those things. Shame yourself into getting going!
• Aim to “eat an elephant beetle” first thing, every day!

If you're pocrastinating because you're disorganized, here's how to get organized!

• Keep a To-Do list so that you can’t “conveniently” forget about unpleasant or overwhelming tasks.
• Use an Urgent/Important Matrix to help prioritize your to-do list so that you can’t try to kid yourself that it would be acceptable to put off doing something on the grounds that it’s unimportant, or that you have many urgent things which ought to be done first when, in reality, you’re procrastinating.
• Become a master of scheduling and project planning, so that you know when to start those all-important projects.
• Set yourself time-bound goals: that way, you’ll have no time for procrastination!
• Focus on one task at a time.

If you're putting off starting a project because you find it overwhelming, you need to take a different approach. Here are some tips:

• Break the project into a set of smaller, more manageable tasks. You may find it helpful to create an action plan.
• Start with some quick, small tasks if you can, even if these aren't the logical first actions. You'll feel that you're achieving things, and so perhaps the whole project won't be so overwhelming after all. 

If you’re procrastinating because you find the task unpleasant:

• Many procrastinators overestimate the unpleasantness of a task. So give it a try! You may find that it’s not as bad as you thought!
• Hold the unpleasant consequences of not doing the work at the front of your mind.
• Reward yourself for doing the task.

Finally, if you’re procrastinating because you can’t decide what action to take, and are putting off making a decision because you’re nervous about making the wrong choice, see our decision-making section. This teaches a range of powerful and effective decision-making techniques.

Remember: the longer you can spend without procrastinating, the greater your chances of breaking this destructive habit for good!

Key Points

To have a good chance of conquering procrastination, you need to spot straight away that you're doing it. Then, you need to identify why you're procrastinating and taken appropriate steps to overcome the block.

 

Best Syndrome of All

Do It Now Syndrome

I caught something overnight! Woke up this morning with a case of "Do It Now Syndrome". Not sure where I caught it - or how - but it's truly amazing! Didn't realise just how many things I put off because they can wait - or how often I did that: until this morning that is! I'm loving this feeling - hope it lasts!

I can phrase what I'm talking about as any of these:

Procrastination Vs Do It Now!
Laziness Vs Do It Now!
I'll get round to it Vs Do It Now!
I've got to write a plan first Vs Do It Now!

Planning for anything might be necessary as part of an everyday process; but the joy is in the actual doing; in taking the action and doing whatever it is that needs to be done!

It is just so darned easy to put things off!

And every time we do put something off we feel disappointed in ourselves; just a little bit each time;and those little bits add up over time. They add up quite rapidly actually; without us noticing it at a conscious level. But that adding up of lots of little incidences leads to massive guilt; even depression if allowed to linger longer.

It doesn't matter if we've got what seems like the right intention to do something later that day; later that week; or later that month! They're usually poor excuses for finding distractions to what we really should be doing; and from doing it now! Distractions are usually self sabotage; or the fear of doing something; so we have to learn to challenge ourselves and Just Do It! and Do It Now!

I've still got this Do It Now Syndrome! ... and hoping that it's incurable.

I am truly getting a buzz from doing things that I could normally have put off until a 'better time'; and doing them as I see them; or as I walk past them. I am not kidding - within just 24 hours I have embraced this new behaviour - and am loving it! Yes - the joy is in the doing!

To all Father's on this Special Day

Since I became a Dad almost 10 years ago, I was scared to death not being able to be a good father for my newborn daughter. I was afraid not to know what to do and to screw up. By the time my second baby was born, 2 years and 2 months later, I still didn't know if I would be the good father I hoped to become. One thing I had learned though. No matter how much I cared, how many precautions I took, I never would be able to prevent my babies from getting hurt, feel pain, get sick, get disappointed, etc. 

The only thing I could do was and is, loving them unconditionally, being there whenever they need me, comfort whenever it was necessary and guide whenever asked for directions. It is absolutely necessary for my kids to make their own experiences so that they can grow knowing what life is like and all about. Sometimes experiences are good, other times they hurt but all are equally important - and I - I will always be there praying for more good than bad experiences, for the strength to be able to comfort and for enough time with them, until they are ready to go without me.

I found this little story and wanted to share it. I believe it is exactly about what I feel;

A man found a cocoon of a butterfly. One day a small opening appeared. He sat and watched the butterfly for several hours as it struggled to force its body through that little hole. Then it seemed to stop making any progress. It appeared as if it had gotten as far as it could, and it could go no further.

So the man decided to help the butterfly. He took a pair of scissors and snipped off the remaining bit of the cocoon.

The butterfly then emerged easily. But it had a swollen body and small, shriveled wings.

The man continued to watch the butterfly because he expected that, at any moment, the wings would enlarge and expand to be able to support the body, which would contract in time.

Neither happened! In fact, the butterfly spent the rest of its life crawling around with a swollen body and shriveled wings. It never was able to fly.

What the man, in his kindness and haste, did not understand was that the restricting cocoon and the struggle required for the butterfly to get through the tiny opening were God's way of forcing fluid from the body of the butterfly into its wings so that it would be ready for flight once it achieved its freedom from the cocoon.

Happy Father's Day to all of us

Good Decision Starts with a Stop

More often than we like, most of us face choices that can have serious and lasting impact on our lives. Do we go along with the crowd? Do we tell someone off, quit a job, or end a relationship? Unfortunately, these decisions are not preceded by a drum roll warning us that the stakes are high. Even worse, we often don't have a lot of time to figure out what to do.

It's no surprise that most bad decisions - the ones that mess up our lives - are made impulsively or without sufficient reflection.

Ancient proverbs tell us to "count to ten when you're angry" or "think ahead." But anger and lack of preplanning are only two factors that can impede excellent decision making. Fatigue, fear, frustration, stress, impatience, and emotions also create obstacles to wise choices.

Just as we learned to look both ways before we cross the street, we can learn to analyze every important decision-making situation to allow us to arrive at conclusions that are both effective and ethical.

Each decision, therefore, should start with a stop - a forced moment of reflection to help us clarify our goal, evaluate the completeness and credibility of our information, and devise an alternate strategy, if necessary, to achieve the best possible result. Stopping also allows us to muster our moral willpower to overcome temptations and emotions that could lead to a rash, foolish, or ill-considered decision.

While it's great to have a day or two to sleep on a problem, or even a few hours, many situations don't afford us that luxury. But a pause of even a few seconds can often be enough.

Have a great weekend and stop a little, next time you need to make a decision! Won't hurt ...

Do You Know You Are Loved?

A recent conversation with some friends made me think a little about values, love, friendship and things like that. I can't stop wondering why it is so difficult to live among friends and loved ones and why so many people believe that they are not loved enough. Maybe because we don't say it enough?

Anyway, this all made me want to share this little story with you. Who knows, it motivates you not to hide your feelings, what in exchange will make others not hide their feelings to and you might be surpriced how much you are really loved.

It has been my good fortune to know Dr. Everett Blanton and to be counted among his friends. Come to think of it, that doesn't make me all that special. His circle of friends is pretty large. And I don't know anyone in his still-larger circle of acquaintances that didn't like him and respect him.

This is how his booming voice greeted those of us fortunate enough to be his friends: "Has anyone told you today that he loves you?"

The first time he posed the question to you, you may have tried to answer it. You would try to remember if your wife or children said "I love you" before they left for school or when you left for work. Or perhaps you would simply be stunned by such a question - and stand a bit wide-eyed and not know how to respond.

His face would break into a broad grin, and he would say something on this order: "Well, I do! And I just wanted you to know how much I appreciate you. You are special to me, and I am grateful to have you in my life."

Now that might sound mushy - if not downright suspicious - if Everett's hair had not been completely white and his face marked with the signs of age. Coming from him, both males and females heard the genuine affirmation of a godly man who wanted to tell the people in his life how he valued them.

Everett Blanton passed away december 2010. Loved and supported by children and grandchildren, he had battled cancer courageously - and tried to keep his family from worrying too much about it. The battle had become hard.

His closest ally, best friend, and devoted wife through all his life adventures, Peggy, mourns his loss - but smiles at the treasure trove of sweet memories they made together. She tells me how fortunate she was to have had all those years with him. He would tell you he was the lucky one.

You don't have to know Everett to learn from him. Learn to affirm the people who are important in your life. Tell them you love them. Then tell them again and once more for good measure. Be remembered for it when it comes your time to go home. As Joe Bain said, Everett was "a man with the kindest heart I've ever known." Wouldn't that be a wonderful way for people to remember you?

It All Changes In An Instant