Grace Marshall's Blog, page 16

Declaration

I love setting goals – the act of declaring that I’m going to make something happen. Some of my favourites this year were: “run a 10k race” (tick!) and “use my passport” (tick, tick!)

I also love speaking out hopes and dreams, like the one in 2011 that went something along the lines of “I’ve always wanted to write a book…”

But there is something I’ve never quite liked about New Year’s resolutions. Then I stumbled across this article, which hit the nail on the head as to why:

- Lose 10 pounds (it goes up by five pounds each year)

- Finish writing my book

- Be a better mom

- Volunteer

- Workout 6 days a week

- Take up yoga

- Visit with friends more

- Spend an hour with God every day

…all of these…are rooted in feeling like I’m not enough—not writing enough, not slim enough, not spiritual enough, not fit enough, not a good enough friend or mom and not a giving enough member of the community.

My underlying message seemed to be, “you have to do better, because who you are right now isn’t making the cut.

~ Claire De Boer, She Loves Magazine

No wonder we don’t keep New Year’s resolutions.

Time for something new.

Something empowering rather than defeating, inviting instead of berating, simple not complex.

Something like One Word.

One word is an idea I’ve been toying with for a while, and one I know others to have used in the past – Selina, Diane, to name a couple (and Chris Brogan who goes for 3).

The last few years I didn’t choose a word, but a word was definitely there.

2011 was Voice: the year I became a speaker and started singing again.

2012 was Breakthrough: the year I became an author, a runner, a fairy and a ninja!

2013 has been a year of Growth: growing roots, digging deeper and growing up – personally and professionally.

This year I’m deliberately choosing my word: REACH

Reach is a word that has purpose and direction. To me it is a verb, an action, an attitude. One of movement and eagerness. It’s about:

Reaching up - instead of laying low. Standing tall above the parapet, taking bolder risks, stepping up. It’s an act of being open and visible – like a plant that flowers to show the world what it has to offer. Beautiful, scary, risky, vulnerable, and necessary.

Reaching out – instead of staying hidden. Engaging with a wider audience, encouraging more people. Getting out there into the wider world, further afield from the comfortable corner of my world.

Reaching across – with those around me. Reach isn’t going to be something I intend to or can do alone. It’s going to be a team effort. A family effort. With my husband and children most of all. And my wider family of friends, ninjas, professional contacts and networks. Think Thelma and Louise as they go hand in hand (although maybe not off the cliff).

As the saying goes, “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.”

What about you? What’s your one word?

As the folks behind #OneWord365 put it:

“Your word can be anything you want. All that matters is that it has personal meaning for you. It can be something tangible or intangible. It can be a thought, a feeling, an action, a character trait. Your word will stand as a reminder, a nudge. Something you can reflect on, that will challenge you, inspire you. A touchstone you can return to time and time again to help you stay the course this year…”

What do you reckon? Fancy giving it a try? Let me know which word you choose for 2014!

Gratitude

 

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What do you want to give thanks for as you look back at 2013?

Experiences enjoyed, lessons learned, opportunities, challenges, successes, surprises, people…

I love how in shifting our perspective, gratitude actually changes our lasting experience of something. In fact, the days when nothing makes sense are the days when I know I need to stop and declare what I’m thankful for.

Who do you want to say thank you to? 

Go do it now – say it in person, send a message, give them a hug. Bless them by letting them know what a blessing they’ve been to you this year.

Highlights

 

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What are some of your highlights of 2013?

One of my clients told me that they typically deal with around 200 orders a week. Most of these are happy, satisfied customer experiences. Occasionally something goes wrong. An order goes missing, something isn’t where it should be, a customer is not happy. Even after the mistake is fixed and problem solved, the main focus of conversation within the team, the primary source of anxiety and the most vivid memory they took away from the week was the one that went wrong, rather than the other 199 that went well.

Yes the hard work and struggles matter, as well as fixing mistakes, but don’t let them overshadow your achievements and highlights. What you focus on grows.

Set your radar to notice highlights as you reflect on the year that’s been. Make those the memories you take away.

What highlights are you taking away from 2013? I’d love to hear about them in the comments below.

Release

“You can’t reach for anything new if your hands are still full of yesterday’s junk.”

~ Louise Smith

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What did you let go of this year?

It always amazes me how much clarity and space I gain when I let go - of physical clutter, old plans, expired projects, disappointments, hurts, dreams that didn’t work out, emotional and mental ‘stuff’.

When we release the stuff that no longer serves us, we release ourselves to reach out with open hands and grab hold of new opportunities.

What about you?

What did you release yourself from this year? What are you leaving behind in 2013?

Journey

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Think back to this time last year.

Where were you? Who were you with? How were you feeling? What was going on?

Now think to today.

What’s changed? What’s different?

How have you grown? What did you learn? How have you developed? What did you discover about yourself?

How would you finish this statement:

“ 2013 is the year I became….”

Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments below – as always I love hearing from you.

Battles

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The struggles within yourself – the invisible, inevitable battles inside all of us – that’s where it’s at.” ~Jesse Owens

Jesse Owens was an African American track and field athlete who competed in the 1936 Olympic games in Berlin, while Nazi propaganda promoted concepts of Aryan racial superiority and depicted ethnic Africans as inferior. Owens countered this by winning four gold medals.

What battles have you been fighting this year? What barriers have you overcome?

What did it take for you to come through? Give yourself a moment to acknowledge the attributes, qualities, resources and spirit you have inside you.

Today

“Yesterday is history. Tomorrow a mystery. Today is a gift.

That’s why it is called the present.” ~ Kung Fu Panda

 

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What are you doing with your gift today? How are you using or enjoying it?

Progress, not perfect

 

If you’ve come to the end of a crazy day, week, month or year, and there’s still more to do…

Take a moment. Pause. Celebrate what you have done.

Wrapping up the year

It’s been a week of wrapping things up before Christmas over here.

It occurred to me that there are three things we typically wrap up at this time of the year.

Highlights and Trophies

These are the things we wrap up to celebrate.

I love how every year, despite my best efforts, my kids attack the Christmas tree with bags of enthusiasm and no finesse whatsoever. It always looks like they stuffed a shotgun full of tinsel and just fired it at the tree. You can’t miss it.

What achievements from 2013 would you choose to highlight and celebrate? What’s on your ta-da list this year?

Done and Dusted

I love the sense of completion we get when we tick things off, especially at this time of the year.

What about you? What’s done with and finished? What can you tick off the list? What are you wrapping up and leaving behind in 2013?

A project, task or chapter that you’ve brought to completion, a season you’re ready to move on from, or something that’s been holding you back that you’re ready to let go of perhaps?

Gifts

Then of course we have presents. Christmas wouldn’t be complete without presents. But despite what my kids might argue, the greatest gifts we can give always come from within. A smile, an encouragement, our attention, our belief, our talents, our gifts, our passions, our vision.

What part of you do you want to give more of in 2014, to the world, or to your world – your clients, your family, your community?

And what do you want to give yourself? What qualities, skills, characteristics or spirit have you developed this year, that you want to wrap up and pack in your bag, to take with you into 2014?

Just some thoughts to leave you with as we say goodbye to 2013 and hello to 2014. I’d love to hear what your thoughts are too.

What are you wrapping up to celebrate, leave behind or give? Do leave me a comment and let me know.

And if you’re subscribed to my newsletter, keep an eye out for a little treat over the 12 Days of Christmas – to inspire you as you reflect on 2013 and get ready for 2014.

Can Games Boost Your Productivity?

I don’t know about you but when things get too serious, my brain freezes.

That big important goal I’ve just set myself: way too scary. All those website changes I need to make: no idea where to start. That high profile speaking engagement I’ve just said yes to: what was I thinking?

Resistance has a field day. The inner child in me wants to break out and play Candy Crush for a few hours…

That’s why I’m delighted to introduce Helen Routledge as my guest blogger today. Helen was first introduced to me as a ‘serious games designer’ who is passionate about the psychology of games and productivity.

Games and productivity? Surely that’s a contradiction in terms?

I’ll let Helen explain…

How Game Thinking Can Boost Your Productivity!

by Helen Routledge

Games to productivity is like chocolate to a diet.

That may well be your first reaction, but game design and game thinking can actually help us achieve those pesky little tasks or big scary jobs that have a tendency to hang around longer than they are welcome.

Games are nested problems. They give you an overarching problem to solve, say save the world, defeat the bad guy, build a city, but they don’t tell you how to get there. They give you a long term goal and it is up to the player themselves to work out how to get there.

Also a game doesn’t just throw you in and say “hey dude, go and save the world”, and then leave you to it. What actually happens is that you save the world through very incremental tasks that individually may not seem so important but that actually come together to have a great impact. These are short term goals.

Save the world, one step at a time

What great games do is progress a player along this learning curve very gradually and it’s almost as if the player doesn’t realise that they are getting better and better but in fact they are achieving harder and harder goals.

The careful balance between short term achievable gaols and the long term ultimate goal is a great tool for motivation and is grounded in psychological theory around memory function, decision making and data processing.

And importantly, don’t forget the rewards! 

Games always reward a player for doing something that moves them closer to the ultimate goal whether it’s Experience Points (XP) new equipment, stars, coins or even just points, you always receive something for the effort you put in. You can take this mechanism and apply it managing your task list.

Balancing rewards with overcoming evil is also another element of games we can take inspiration from.

Why not name your distractions as the bad guys? 

Give them names and think about their powers. By identifying and labelling these distractions you’ll start to notice when you’re doing them more often.

To me how a designer approaches game design can be transferred to almost any other task requiring gradual progression leading to that ultimate goal.

Often when faced with a task we focus on the end goal, the long term ultimate goal and all of a sudden it’s ‘eek’, how am I going to get there?!? But by sitting down and applying some game thinking to the process we can break the task down into incremental short term goals. We can work out how best these tasks will flow together (creating our difficulty curve) and then we can apply relevant rewards to those tasks. The rewards don’t have to be complicated or expensive, perhaps it’s a cup of tea, a biscuit, or a an extra five minute break, just so long as it’s something you value. And place a reward on the ultimate goal, something a little more extravagant that is going to make you feel really good and motivate you to get there.

If you don’t have the discipline to do it yourself, rope in your partner or your children and they can become keepers of the rewards and keep an eye out for the bad guys. By even giving fun titles to the people around you you can make a difference.

Just to sum up game thinking can help us:

By breaking down tasks into achievable goals and focusing on what’s important
By rewarding ourselves when we reach our goals
By identifying our bad guy distractions

Task management doesn’t have to be boring; by applying a few tips and tricks from game design we can start to make our tasks less scary and more fun.

About the author

With a background and passion in behavioural sciences and psychology Helen Routledge has over a decade of experience of applying behavioural and cognitive theories to highly-interactive serious games and training solutions. Helen’s understanding of psychology and game mechanics, combined with her deep knowledge of learning theory has been applied to an incredibly varied range of solutions including team building, leadership, sales training, IT security, disease control and health.

Find out more about Helen’s work at Totemlearning.com and follow her on Twitter at @helenroutledge.

What bad guy names would you give your distractions? Leave a comment…