Donald Miller's Blog, page 62

3 Things Oprah Believes About All People

*Photo Credit: Anne Worner, Creative Commons

I heard something great recently that has stuck with me. I heard the 3 things Oprah believes about all people are:

1. People want to know whether you see them.

2. People want to know whether you hear them.

3. People want to know whether if what they say matters to you.

If you think about it, these are fairly true of all people.

We’re all wondering if we matter.

And of course, we do. But Oprah’s empathetic understanding of this desire and her affirmation of people on these three levels might explain a lot about her success. She has made a killing listening to other people, seeing them, hearing them and letting them know what they are saying matters. She has done it with common folks and celebrities alike.

Often, we try to build our platforms by espousing our beliefs.

But what if we toned that back some and spent more time acknowledging the existence and importance of others? What would change in our work and families if we saw people, listened to them, and registered what they were saying on a deep level?

Who knows, we might end up with our own television network.

3 Things Oprah Believes About All People is a post from: Storyline Blog

Why It Always Pays To Tell The Truth

You’ve probably heard the saying “money follows value.” It seems to be thrown around a lot in the business world, but I believe it also has a lot of light to shine on the desks of writers and creatives like me.

I haven’t been able to find the name of the person who first dropped this token of wisdom on the world, but I believe it was someone who honored his or her convictions and ended up wealthy because of it.

We all want to make money.

Not only is money a reward for the work we do, it is an important resource that enables us to live, rest and grow. But I believe there is something we all want even more than money, and that is to influence others on behalf of our personal values and to be valued in return.

*Photo Credit: Cooperweb, Creative Commons

Think about it: we choose the people, brands, foods and music we identify with based on how much they reflect our values.

People will pay more money for Apple products than others because Apple values innovation, beauty and creative processes. People pay twice as much for groceries at Whole Foods and farm-to-table restaurants because they value integrity, quality, and health.

Value is how we differentiate between good and great.

Value is the difference between “I’m not interested” and “this matters to me.”

For example, if you want to have a career in writing, you will need an audience. Your audience will listen when they get the sense you have an authentic relationship with your values, and they will stick around if they feel your values are a reflection of their own.

In order to build an audience around your work, you have to be brave about who you are.

You’ll also need to accept the fact that some people will dislike, reject and patronize you because values are personal and sometimes polarizing. I’m not saying the entire spectrum of our beliefs should be reflected in our work, but I do think it’s important that our most beloved values guide and inspire what we contribute to society.

Now you’re probably wondering where the money comes in.

Fair enough. If you want to be fulfilled and great, then the money must come in second. When your values come first, your work, your audience, and your story will be inspiring and ultimately have purpose.

Your work will matter. And when it matters, it’s valuable. And where there is value, there is money. Good, clean money — and often more money than if you’d tried to please everyone, watered down your message, or put your desire for money in the driver’s seat.

Money is made when we are inspired, honest, helpful, healing, passionate, and true to our values as communicators and creatives. If we want to make money, especially the kind that helps us sleep at night, then we must let our values lead us.

What will your work be about?

Why It Always Pays To Tell The Truth is a post from: Storyline Blog

Are You The Assassin of Your Own Ideas?

I was recently chatting with a friend about the idea of running a half marathon. It has been several years and a few Moon Pies since I last embarked on a 13-mile run.

To be completely honest, I like the idea of being someone who runs half marathons more than the reality of actually lacing up my shoes and doing it.

*Photo Credit: Fort Meade, Creative Commons

As we talked, I noticed all the excuses I was tossing out to avoid pursuing this goal: the training would take too long, the distance was too far, and the time I had to devote was too small.

The cost was too high.

My arguments to prevent the idea from becoming a reality were well organized, reasonable, and completely self-defeating.

I was unintentionally engaging in “idea assassination” — like a sniper firing convenient excuses at my own idea. The truth is, shooting down my ambitions allows me to avoid hard work, the risk of failure, and public criticism. Amazingly, I seem to carry an endless supply of ammunition.

New projects and challenges can always be cast as too big, whether it’s getting into shape or out of debt, abandoning a bad relationship, or starting a new job.

There is never a perfect time to move beyond the wounds of past abuse or set a big personal goal. Global issues can be even more daunting. When we think about things like injustice, poverty, human trafficking and violence, the challenges seem even larger and our individual actions can easily be dismissed as too small.

So, we kill our ideas.

Then we often soothe ourselves with convenient distractions like streaming media and weedless lawns. We rationalize that our limitations render the problems of the world immutable.

Like Goldilocks from the children’s story, many of us find things too big or too small, too hot or too cold, too firm or too soft. We are looking for something just right. Chances are, no one is going to roll out a risk-free red carpet so we can make a grand entrance onto the world’s stage.

There is no great honor in being a Goldilocks. She was a burglar who broke into the home of an innocent bear family. She then committed larceny by stealing their food, vandalism by damaging their furniture, and — in what can only be described as creepy — she slept in everyone’s beds. Goldilocks is many things, but she is not a role model. Goldilocks should be indicted not imitated.

If we wait for “just right” we will end up like Goldilocks.

And it will be hard to make a positive difference in the world. We can whine that none of our options are “just right” and putter around the edges of good ideas, or we can start. We can tinker, or we can build. We can fiddle, or we can create.

The next step we need to take probably isn’t a perfect fit for our schedules and it may not be “just right.” Seeking justice for others, righting wrongs and pursuing our best work almost always interferes with our agendas and comfort, but this remains true:

Great joy lies in the challenge of forward motion.

People suffering from hunger, loneliness, disease, abuse, and injustice want more than our excuses.

We should not allow the steady cries of the oppressed to be drowned out by the spastic noises of our own busyness and procrastination.

Realizing that I, like Goldilocks, am often the assassin of my own good ideas has allowed me to stop firing excuses at my goals.

So instead, I took the next logical steps for me to run a half marathon by calling my friend back, registering for the race and starting a training program. The run is still too long and I am still too slow, but I am no longer held back waiting for a “just right” moment. Instead, I’m making moments happen.

What are you waiting for? Are you assassinating of your own ideas?

Are You The Assassin of Your Own Ideas? is a post from: Storyline Blog

What We Can Learn About Relationships From A Hostage Negotiator

I recently read an article about a hostage negotiator that has significantly changed the way I interact with people. Specifically, I’ve become a much better listener and it now matters less to me that I talk or am even heard in casual conversations.

In the article, the negotiator talked about how important it was to listen to the hostage taker in a way that was not judgmental.

And he had to do it for real.

Even though the criminal might have been dangerous, treating him or her in a way that was judgmental would negatively affect the outcome of the negotiation.

*Photo Credit: timparkinson, Creative Commons

What the negotiator had to do, then, was establish trust with the hostage taker. This was the only way the hostage taker would ever come to negotiate. He did this by listening and then repeating back to the hostage taker what he heard, making sure he got it right. No matter what the demands were, the negotiator was never supposed to let the hostage taker know they were extreme or abnormal.

The technique doesn’t work all the time.

But the percentages of people getting out safely are greatly increased, apparently, when the negotiator treats the criminal like a human.

I’m not a hostage negotiator, but recently on a plane I found myself in a conversation in which I was tempted to butt in and share my opinion before the person I was talking to had been fully heard. After reading the article, though, I stopped myself. Instead, I heard the person out fully then repeated back to them what they’d said, only in my own words. Then I told them how the situation they’d described would have made me feel if I’d experienced it.

What happened next was surprising.

I had immediate trust from the person and, in fact, they wanted to attend my next conference. I didn’t even tell them what the conference was about.

Here’s what I learned in the exchange: often the words we speak are only part of the conversation we’re having. The real conversation is about whether or not we think the person we’re talking to is worth listening to or important. And if we can communicate that, and nothing else, we are communicating something enormous and validating.

Here’s an idea.

What if we spent the next 5 days (mark it on a calendar, this will be fun) not presenting our opinions about anything, or at least keeping them to a minimum, and instead really tried to listen to and understand the people we were talking with? What if we turned up the empathy to the highest level? How would our relationships change? How differently would people view us? And how much stronger would our own positions be perceived coming from a person who was so empathetic and understanding?

After all, we’re all holding our hearts hostage, and we’re all afraid.

Maybe the key to getting somebody to open up isn’t argument but empathy.

Works for hostage negotiators.

What We Can Learn About Relationships From A Hostage Negotiator is a post from: Storyline Blog

Are You Afraid Of Admitting What You Want?

We’ve all said, “I don’t want to get my hopes up.” Whenever the possibility of a good opportunity is in sight, or you start dating someone new, or your boss hints at a job promotion, our reaction is often to not get our hopes up. It seems smart, right?

I was the never-getting-my-hopes-up person for a very long time. I made straight As all through college (which means I’m neurotic, not smart), but each semester I convinced myself that a B was going to slip its way into my report card. I didn’t hope for all As.

Instead, I prepared for imperfection.

My reasoning was that if I expected the worst, I wouldn’t be disappointed if that was the turnout. And if that wasn’t the turnout, and I had indeed made all As yet again, I would be pleasantly surprised. I didn’t know this then, but this reasoning of mine was a way to protect myself. I was building shields and walls in order to not have to fully feel disappointment or failure.

*Photo Credit: MarioMancuso, Creative Commons

Dr. Brene Brown, my life yoda, talks about why we refuse to get our hopes up in one of her Ted Talks. She says, “We sidestep getting excited about something because we’re not sure it’s actually going to happen. Joy becomes foreboding… and then we become compelled to beat vulnerability to the punch. It is much easier to live disappointed than it is to feel disappointment.”

It is a vulnerable thing to get your hopes up about something.

It is saying, “I want this to happen so badly that I will be crushed if it doesn’t.” I avoided this type of vulnerability in most areas of my life, not just my grade reports. I expected the worst so that the best would surprise me and the worst wouldn’t get me down.

However, this can have an unexpectedly isolating effect on your life. My friends and family didn’t know when to comfort me or rejoice with me in good and bad because I refused to make it clear what I was excited about or what I feared.

Not getting my hopes up left me alone in my suffering and alone in my rejoicing.

Dr. Brown explains in her book The Gifts of Imperfection that if you refuse to get your hopes up, it doesn’t lessen the disappointment if your dream doesn’t happen, but it can lessen the joy.

You are up for a big promotion but keep telling people, “Oh I might not get it, and that’s totally fine because of this, this and this…” Then you do get it and want to shout from the rooftops about how excited you are and to be celebrated by your friends, but it doesn’t happen. Because no one in your life knew you even cared. You protected yourself so fiercely that, sure, it would sting a little less if you didn’t get what you hoped for, but the joy was greatly lessened, too.

Is it worth it to you?

To not feel either emotion?

As Dr. Brown says, “Vulnerability is absolutely at the core of fear and anxiety and shame and very difficult emotions that we all experience, but vulnerability is also the birthplace of joy, of love, of belonging, of creativity, of faith.”

I used to pity those who flung around their dreams and told everyone their hopes. They shouldn’t get their hopes up, I thought. But now, I aspire to be like those people.

Instead of building walls around themselves, they have successfully built a community around them who knows when to rejoice with them and when to grieve. Maybe they experience deep disappointment on some days, but they also experience deep, deep joy, and I want to feel alive like that too.

Are You Afraid Of Admitting What You Want? is a post from: Storyline Blog

Why 80% Of The Work You Do Is A Waste Of Time

I read on airplanes now because it’s almost the only time I get to read. Life has become that busy. And fortunately (or unfortunately) I’m on airplanes several times each month, so I’m keeping up with my reading.

When I’m traveling for business, I tend to read business books. Recently I read one that changed the way I think and live.

It’s called The 80/20 Principle.

The book was written by Richard Koch and the argument is this: 80 percent of the results you’re getting at work flow from just 20 percent of your efforts. And not only this, but 80 percent of your profit likely comes from 20 percent of your products.

*Photo Credit: Robert S. Donovan, Creative Commons

It’s an old theory, honestly, but Koch explains it well and helps us apply it in new ways. And this theory applies to much more than work. It also means 80 percent of our unhealthiness is likely coming from just 20 percent of the food we eat. And 80 percent of our social troubles likely come from just 20 percent of our relationships.

Amazingly, Koch presents statistical proof:

The theory holds true in much of life.

And I think understanding it and adjusting accordingly is a great way to become more and more productive.

So, the trick is to figure out what your 20 percent is and enhance your understanding and commitment to those actions. What meetings should we take? What products should we get rid of? What employees should we hire? In other words, what’s in your 80 percent bucket, and what’s in your 20 percent bucket?

I’m buying a copy for every member of my staff, not only so we can be more productive, but because it’s going to prevent us from burning out.

Spinning our wheels in the 80 percent is exhausting.

What about you? Is the 80/20 principle true for your life? Are you willing to identify and enhance the 20 percent and cut back on the 80 percent?

Of course, this then begs the question: What if we turn our 20 percent into the 80 percent and are that much more effective? Wouldn’t that disprove the theory?

Perhaps, but then again, wouldn’t we find there to still be a top 20 percent that is that much more productive than the rest? Perhaps continually asking what the top 20 percent is would be a great way to make sure we’re only getting better and better.

The theory works for me, and I hope you find a way to apply it yourself. Have fun dropping the 80.

Why 80% Of The Work You Do Is A Waste Of Time is a post from: Storyline Blog

Two Types Of Pain You’re Going To Experience

Avoiding pain was my default mode for a decade or two. I avoided pain like it was my job. I steered clear of situations and relationships that might’ve been painful, and I tried to keep my emotional investment at a minimum.

Obviously, this was a disaster.

Not only is it impossible to completely avoid pain, avoiding pain means avoiding life.

One of my biggest challenges as an adult has been realizing that not all pain is created equal. So, I created two terms that have helped me healthily process and respond to different types of pain in my life:

Stove Pain vs. Bicycle Pain

The difference between stove pain and bicycle pain is one helps me know when to back away and the other when to lean in.

Stove pain is simply what happens when we touch a hot stove — it hurts, but hopefully we learn to stay away from this source of pain in the future. This is healthy. This is how we stay alive — stove pain alerts us to dangers in the world and encourages us to avoid them. We experience stove pain when we get speeding tickets. We experience stove pain when the person we knew was trouble breaks our heart.

Stove pain is what teaches us that moderation is better than excess. Stove pain is what teaches us to prepare differently for the next test or interview or presentation. Stove pain teaches us that there are some things in life worth avoiding.

But not all pain is stove pain.

Not all pain teaches avoidance.

How tragic would it have been if the first time you fell off your bicycle you interpreted your scraped knees and elbows as stove pain? You would’ve kept your bicycle in the garage or sold it to a neighbor kid, and you never would’ve learned to ride. You would’ve missed out on the adventure and freedom that belong to a kid on a bike. You would’ve been safe in your driveway with your Etch-A-Sketch (it has rounded corners, which are especially safe), but meanwhile, life would’ve passed you by.

The message of bicycle pain — that first time you fall off, that first time you fight with your spouse, that first time your boss squashes your idea — isn’t to back away; it’s to lean in.

Bicycle pain is an invitation to push through.

It’s an invitation to get your knees scraped up now and then, and then to keep riding. Bicycle pain says that life, real life, is found in the scuffs and scrapes and scars — bicycle pain says they’re worth it.

There’s nothing on the other side of stove pain — it’s just more pain. Putting your hand back on the stove or leaving it there longer will not make your life more meaningful.

We’ve already said adventure and freedom await us on the other side of bicycle pain.

But that’s not all.

On the other side of bicycle pain, we form scars that give us stories of riding, falling, bleeding, healing, and riding again.

Bicycle pain means we lost our balance, which we all do from time to time. But good stories aren’t about avoiding this type of pain. Good stories are about mustering the courage to face our bicycle pains, find our balance again and ride on.

Two Types Of Pain You’re Going To Experience is a post from: Storyline Blog

A Communication Trick That Makes Customers More Likely to Buy

Every story is heading toward a happily ever after or sad ending. If we don’t know what those endings might be, the audience gets lost.

We have to know the guy can get the girl, or the hero might disarm the bomb, and the story lives in the suspense as to whether those things can happen.

Every person responds to story because they’re living in one.

They want things and have to work to get them, and they believe if they get them their life will be better. And if we sell good products, we can actually provide a happy ending to a story our customers are living.

We can provide a great meal if we own a restaurant, or a lawn mower that won’t break down or a night of entertainment or whatever.

A common mistake companies make in their advertising, though, is they describe the features and benefits of their products rather than the results (or happily ever after) their customers will experience.

But remember, people buy results, not features.

The car we are selling might have power windows, which is a feature. But customers don’t buy power windows, they buy the result, which is not having to reach across the seat to roll a window down.

They don’t care that the weed-eater has an auto-adjusting line, they only care that they don’t have to bang the head of their weed eater against the sidewalk all the time.

Some companies think their customers can connect the dots, and of course they can — except they don’t.

They don’t have time.

And they aren’t giving you the creative space necessary to do so.

In our marketing copy, then, we need to describe the results our customers will experience if they use our products. How will they feel?

What trouble will we be saving them from?

If You Turn Down Your Noise, You Might Finally Hear The Truth

I like to sleep with the radio on. But not because I listen to it. It’s the noise I need.

That constant hum of static, chatting and breaking news helps me block out everything else. It keeps me from thinking about actually needing to fall asleep. It prevents me from reeling over the details of the day or what needs to happen tomorrow.

But there’s a cost to sleeping with the radio on all the time.

It means without it, I don’t sleep at all.

There are other costs too. The radio also blocks out some of the good stuff, like rainstorms and wind in the trees. I can’t hear the faint cries of my daughter down the hall or the bubbling fountain out on my patio. And honestly, it probably leaves me more vulnerable to not hearing a thief trying to quietly slip into the house at 3 o’clock in the morning.

*Photo Credit: Bady qb, Creative Commons

But I need a way to escape the silence, so I take that risk.

I need my noise.

We’re like this with a lot of things. We get so used to the convenient, low hum of our white noises of choice that we are no longer comfortable just sitting still. Quietness and being alone with our thoughts can be scary. We need a little something extra to drown out the silence.

The noise is often just a Band-Aid to pain. The low hum helps us from facing the deeper parts of our story. The incomprehensible chatter in the background fills the lonely space.

At the core, noise is escapism, yet it keeps us from being free.

And the only way to overcome escapism is to stick around. To stay in some of the silence. To allow yourself to sit with what hurts. To grieve what has been lost. To allow your thoughts to move to the deeper, unexplored places of your story.

It won’t be easy.

Trust me, I know. I have tried to turn the radio off at night, and quieting my life often feels virtually impossible. But what might happen if we bravely embraced the quiet?

I believe on the other side of our discomfort with silence is a symphony of new sounds waiting to be discovered. It might be where you discover a new truth of who you are and a song of freedom that you’ve been waiting to hear.

If You Turn Down Your Noise, You Might Finally Hear The Truth is a post from: Storyline Blog

Double Your Productivity With Your Time Off

If you’ve read Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath, you know what happens when farmers fail to rotate their crops and let the ground rest. What happens is, of course, devastation.

We’ve all seen pictures of Oklahoma during the Dust Bowl.

It was a season when the ground, empty of nutrients, let go in any wind and suffocated an entire region. People took shelter in their homes but the dust got through the cracks- it got into their beds, into their food. Soon, hundreds of thousands had to move away.

*Photo Credit: USDAgov, Creative Commons

I bring this up because the same thing can happen in our minds and souls if we aren’t careful to get rest.

God asks us to take a sabbath and to take it seriously.

Mirroring other aspects of His creation, we also know that maintaining our physical and mental health with nightly rest and an entire “day off” is what we need to keep our minds fertile.

More than once I’ve taken a day off when I had pressing work only to find I was twice as productive when I came back.

Around Storyline we sometimes say “rest is work” and we mean it. We will get more done if we get time with friends and family, connect with God or just to watch football for an afternoon. Try it.

The results are terrific.

Of course we can get too much rest, but few of us have the luxury.

Most of us are too busy to rest. And when we’re too busy to rest, we’re less productive.

So as an organization intent on helping good people live great stories, we whole-heartedly endorse taking a day to simply rest.

Otherwise, there’s going to be dust. And lots of it.

Double Your Productivity With Your Time Off is a post from: Storyline Blog