Skills For Success

I don’t know about you, but I find this world changes so fast and so constantly that surviving it means learning how to manage it. 

Change is inevitable. Change is stressful. 

We all experience this stress of change. It doesn’t matter what colour your skin is, or what culture you live in, or how old you are.  

Speaking of age, one of the groups often forgotten include the elderly when it comes to experiencing stress with the changes they experience.  I watched many of my parents' generation go through these changes. Their changes may not be about getting along in the school yard, job loss, or raising children, but it is more about a change in their physical location, their physical bodies, loss of mate, and ... well you get the idea.  My own father has gone through all of these changes I just mentioned, and many more. 

I have had the privilege of watching him manage his changing world.  It cant' be easy for him. He is the only one left in his family of seven. His wife for over 50 years passed away eight years ago. Yet he continues to get up every morning and begin his day.

What have I learned by watching him? He confirms the studies on managing stress and change, which conclude that the key is to control the circumstances. Don't let the circumstances control you. Don't be a victim to your circumstances, whatever they might be.

By taking control of our reactions to the change and the resulting stress we can make it through the day. Remember the story of the little engine that could?  Continually saying, I think I can, I think I can convinced him that he could. And he did!

By the way, dad is 101 years old this summer. So I have a great teacher. 

More and more Boomers are looking towards retirement. Some are excited. Some are fearful. Others are somewhere in between.  They all know retirement is one of the most stressful events of life. 

Meanwhile the Seniors are looking towards relocating their dwelling place. Some are excited. Some are fearful. Others are somewhere in between. They all know moving is yet another one of the most stressful events of life.

For both Boomers and Seniors the transition of retiring and/or moving needs to be handled delicately in order to make it the least stressful possible.

Yesterday, my daughter, Becky Hewis,  and I launched Delicate Transitions (www.delicatetransitions.ca), a company that focuses on these two major events of life’s journey: retirement and relocation.

Becky acts as Project Manager for seniors (and boomers too) who wish to either downsize their current living space or move to another space.

In addition to continuing Kate Jones & Associates, Kate provides workshop sessions and individual coaching on both subjects: retirement and relocation.

Launching a business requires assistance from many folks. All of our pictures are real people with real lives, whom we know, and love for posing for us. The pro photographer/graphic artist, Mike Hewis (www.hewisphoto.com), also created all of our marketing materials. Our hat is off to all of you for your wonderful support.

Finally, a huge thanks  to all the attendees at the launch.  It made for an amazing moment in my life’s journey!

While speaking at the Canadian Mental Health Association today, I realized that it is Canadian Mental Health Week as well as Teacher Appreciation Week. Since teaching is apparently the 4th most stressful profession, it seems fitting to think about ways we could show a teacher we care. There are many "mom- 2- mom" blogs that discuss this at length, and honestly, while some of the ideas do show they care it just serves to put even more stress on the parents. 

 And the point is NOT to stress anyone more than they already are!!  By the way, did you know that almost half of the Long Term Disability claims by teachers are stress related? Hmmm....I wonder what the percentage is for the parents who feel they have to dash all over town to buy just the right gift, or even worse, buy a small gift for every day of this week for the teacher, or teachers, if they have more than one offspring.

Ahhh, life just seems to get more complicated.

But, I'm here to say that, at least in the case of the teacher appreciation token this week, stick to the old adage: KISS (keep it simple stupid). If you want to buy a gift, the teachers I know well really enjoy gift certificates (Chapters are the easiest and work for both genders). If even that is too much for you because you are run off your feet this week, write a friendly note of appreciation; they are rarely received but always appreciated. 

As for the apple for teacher?  Well, you can't go wrong there either....as long as your kid doesn't eat it on the way to school!!

I know since when does anyone think of stress as "colourful"?  Well, since clients have been calling me to deliver the "colour" program (which really means temperament theory), for years now, I do!! 

Temperament theory simply put is about patterns of behaviour. Four to be exact. And, you guessed it, each of the four behavioural patterns includes its unique twist on stress.

 This was brought to mind the other day when working with a client who has lost her job. It happens. And when it does, life gets stressful for everyone, no matter what your "colour".  But our "colourful" reactions are not necessarily the same.

My client, for example, prides herself on her competence and intelligence. So she is so busy second guessing her very core that she finds it impossible to just go knock on doors and tell the next employer that she is a terrific worker. First she needs to be convinced in her own head that she is competent in her field.  How can she do that? Create a portfolio of her best work (which she can do with a little time).  Then she might want to read through her former performance records, which have some very positive statements about her excellent work.  Next, she can speak with some of her former colleagues and/or employers who can and will remind her of her specific competencies.  

Once she builds up her own self worth only then will she be ready to create a "killer" resume.  

My webmaster loves his MAC!  And he convinced me that I would too.  

"Oh the things it will do for you", he said.  As I nodded and said "aha".  

"Like what?" I innocently asked.

He proceeded to whiz around the keyboard at a pace I couldn't begin to keep up with, but oh those windows that opened looked so enticing, so exciting, and so easy.

So I was convinced. I put my hard - earned money down and bought a MAC -- on line no less!  (Yes I have discovered  the 21st century way of shopping! Oh my.)

 But every time I went to do something like I would on my old, comfy PC, I couldn't seem to find what I wanted. Until I innocently hit the little button, "INSPECTOR".  And suddenly all kinds of things became clear.  Oh yes, I love INSPECTOR ....now!! It did take more than a few runs at it, but I actually find myself going to the exact location I need to make a space change, or a font bigger, or,,,,well you get the idea!  

It seemed that once I found this key I was open to all the new buttons and gadgets available for this new user.

And now I must admit that I have relegated my comfortable old friend, the PC, to the grandkids' playroom where they can now access the internet  while I continue to play and discover new stuff on my own "toy".

As a Baby Boomer who works across the generations I have been enjoying being "plugged" in to the technological changes the net has to offer in this exciting century. Yet I also enjoy the freedom of being "unplugged"  from the net.

In Dr, Larry Rosen's book "Me, MySpace, and I"  he fills parents and educators in on how social networking sites (e.g. MySpace and Facebook) can improve socialization skills as well as overall emotional health of today's kids.  Personally I, a Baby Boomer, am enjoying  Twitter, Facebook,  YouTube, and blogging.

However,  when I shared some of Rosen's points  with other Baby Boomers there was a lot of negative discussion about these rapidly emerging technological innovations on the net. Too much time wasted.  Too many changes too fast.  Too complicated a society.  Too plugged in!

Yet at the end of the day, we all agreed the net is not going to go away and that all generations can use some of these  innovations to our advantage. We also reminded ourselves that when we were initially bombarded with a host of television programs we had the freedom to choose what we wanted to watch -- we didn't watch everything all of the time.

So that brings me to the freedom of being "unplugged".  We know that Twitter,  Facebook, Blogs, etc. can be addictive - just like TV.  And just as Baby Boomers learned to turn off the TV, all three generations need to learn to unplug themselves from the net.

I was speaking with a senior the other day who had just bought a used car. When he went to put his own licence plates on the screws were missing, and it really stressed him out.  He couldn't figure out why he was so stressed over simple screws. Afterall, he reasoned, he could easily buy more at the local hardware store.

I listened attentively to this story and asked him "why do you think you are so stressed over such a simple thing?" At first he answered with "I don't know". But after a moment of reflection he started telling me about some of the much more perplexing events that had happened in his family lately.  These major stressors  he told me he had seemed to take in his stride. But he then realized his stress really was not about the 4 missing screws but about the much more difficult events.

The screws were simply "the straw that broke the camel's back" so to speak. Cumulative stress has a way of piling up until one day a simple screw can make you fume all day.

Colleagues told me that I would find Las Vegas to be something I had never seen before and they were right.  Standing outside the Paris Hotel on a gorgeous Wednesday afternoon looking up at a replica of the Eiffel Tower (half size) seemed incredibly surreal. 

And it just got better.  Fountains at the Bellagio first caught our attention because of the beautiful music that accompanied the fountains which could be heard long before we saw the actual fountains. And these fountains were way beyond anything someone could ever explain to you.

 The gondola ride with gondoliers who broke out in Italian arias swept us to Florence Italy -- at least in our minds -- as we cruised along the waterways inside yet another beautiful hotel.

Everything was just bigger than big -- over the top we kept saying. 

 When we first drove down the strip, as it is known, we were like kids at Disney world -- our necks got a good workout that day!

As for the conference, it was all about different ways of learning. Some good insights, but really the whole trip became about how de-stressing Las Vegas turned out to be. We just had a lot of fun and laughed at ourselves frequently as we discovered yet another sight on "the strip"!