Posts Tagged ‘Self-Improvement’

Financially speaking, this has been a difficult year for many people around the world. Some of us keep hearing recovery is imminent–and things may be looking up for our friends–but our ship is still anchored in the distance, a long way from shore.

Although we understand the world’s economic woes have nothing to do with us, we can’t help feeling like we’ve screwed up somehow. If we’d only had the good sense to turn left instead of right, we wouldn’t be struggling so much. But we need to accept that, even when we make reasonable decisions, circumstances may conspire put mountains in our path. It’s a lesson Andre-Francois Raffray learned all too well.

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The best gift for me during the holiday season is the opportunity to spend time with my extended family. And I feel doubly blessed when I listen to some of my friends discuss the trials and tribulations of being with their families—particularly the delicate task of trying to bring together the families of both spouses. I actually like my family. Not only that, I like my brother’s in-laws, too. I even like my sister-in-law’s dog.

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Finished with your holiday shopping? How did it go? Did you spend a lot of time second-guessing yourself? Calling friends, your spouse, your parents and asking them to validate your choices or help you make a decision? Do you sometimes wish you were one of those people who seem easily able to decide for themselves?

Then why don’t you try to become one of those people?

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This holiday season like every other, I will walk into my sister-in-law’s kitchen. I will see the enemy. And the enemy will be mine.

Unfortunately, the enemy is a cookie—and it has friends.

Every year, my sister-in-law goes to a small local bakery and buys Christmas cookies I seem to find irresistible. Why oh why can’t she just buy Oreos? I can resist Oreos. But just because I indulge in some of these lovely bakery treats doesn’t mean they have to immediately attach themselves to my buttocks.

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It’s a tired cliché, but in my case it’s true: I’m a people person. No, I’m not annoyingly peppy, but I could probably make friends with a tree stump. When nothing’s on the line, I have no problem chatting with complete strangers in stores, doctor’s waiting rooms, post offices. But ask me to go somewhere and network … Network? Gadzooks!  You might as well be asking me to bungee jump from the Golden Gate Bridge.

For some reason, the idea of networking to further our careers scares a lot of us to death. Maybe it’s the idea that something is riding on our ability to be gracious and charming. Maybe we feel disingenuous about socializing to get ahead. But whatever the reason, we balk. And we fail to cultivate the contacts we need to help us connect to the opportunities we’d like to have.

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When you think back on the favorite gifts you’ve received in your life, chances are the most memorable aren’t the grandest or costliest, but the ones that came from the heart when you needed a lift. Maybe you remember the day you were recovering from surgery and a friend stopped by with a home-cooked meal or an offer to clean your house. Or perhaps you remember how you were taking the bus to work every day when someone offered you the keys to an old clunker of a used car. Then again, maybe the best gift was just a hug on a day when the world seemed too dark and too lonely.

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When I started out, I used to take on temp administrative jobs to help make ends meet. Once I worked for a bank that seemed very proper on the outside. But every year, the prim bankers dropped their conservative personas for one weekend while they attended the office holiday party.

They gathered at a hotel near the beach, sans spouses and significant others, partied all night, then stayed in rooms booked for them by their employer. The tales of debauchery arising from this annual weekend were legendary. It’s hard for me to imagine how some of those people could look each other in the eye over a conference table the rest of the year. When they began sharing their stories and telling me I just had to be around for the festivities … well, let’s say I was glad my assignment ended in November.

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When my brother and I were kids—in the pre-Internet days—our mom used to hand us a catalog from some department store, turn to the toy section, and ask us to show her what we hoped Santa would bring. It’s a tradition we continue as adults. My brother, sister-in-law, and I create Internet wish lists, including links, that we share with each other and my mom to make shopping easier for all concerned. We give everyone a variety of choices, so we’ll have no idea what we’re getting, but we’ll all be sure to get something we like.

That’s the nice thing about gift-giving among family members. We can be honest about our likes and dislikes. I’m not embarrassed to e-mail my sister-in-law and say, “Do not get me any pink football jerseys.” Ewww. But we can’t be quite so blunt with friends—which is why regifting was born.

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I hated Casual Fridays.

 No, it wasn’t because I didn’t like having a chance to dress down a bit. It was because my organization had been taken over by a prig who had no interest in the welfare of the workers—or the welfare of the company for that matter. And rather than addressing real issues of wage inequities and mismanagement, the new president thought he could make it all better by tossing us a bone: Casual Fridays.

So when Casual Fridays rolled around, I made it a point to dress my best. The priggish president never noticed and wouldn’t have cared if he had. But at least I knew I wasn’t going beak down like the chickens Gordon Mackenzie’s dad “mesmerized” back in the summer of 1904.  Read the rest of this entry »

According to Carol L. Tilley, a professor of library and information science at the University of Illinois, comic books are just as valuable to children as any other form of literature. And in research recently published in School Library Monthly, the professor says it’s about time this underrated yet sophisticated type of reading material got a little r-e-s-p-e-c-t.

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