DW's Blog

A Tidbit of Consciousness

by DW Green — March 13, 2019

Tidbits to ponder

If you were traveling in Tibet, you would experience tidbits of Tibet. If you were a native Tibetan, you could be a Tibetan tidbit?Any way here’s some tidbits to ponder.Life will give you whatever experience is most helpful for the evolution of your consciousness. How do you know this is the experience you need? Because this is the experience you are having at the moment.You are not in the Universe. You are the Universe, an intrinsic part of it. Ultimately, you are not a person, but a focal point where the universe is becoming conscious of itself. What an amazing miracle.The secret to happiness is letting go.Accept all people and all circumstances in your life exactly as they are. Knowing that everything is as it should be. Practice defenselessness and relinquish the need to convince or persuade others of your point of view.Tibet is an administrative division of China. North of the Himalayas: prior to 1950 a theocracy under the Dalai Lama; the highest country in the world, average elevation about 16,00 feet. Capital is Lhasa. Tibet is north and east of Nepal. Kathmandu, Nepal, is my favorite city name.

The Dalai Lama on Leadership

by DW Green — March 6, 2019

“We are naturally driven by self-interest.”

The Dalai Lama seems like a pretty cool guy. It’s amazing to me how people get to be who they are. For example, Tenzin Gyatso is the 14^th and current Dalai Lama. He was born on a straw mat in a cowshed to a farmer’s family in a remote part of Tibet. He was born into a humble family of farmers as one of 16 children. He became the most popular world leader by 2013. It’s amazing how wise and insightful he has become.He wrote an article for the Harvard Business Review in the February 20^th 2019 issue. The article is titled The Dali Lama on Why Leaders Should Be Mindful, Selfless, and Compassionate. Here’s a portion of that article.Be selflessWe are naturally driven by self-interest; it’s necessary to survive. But we need wise self-interest that is generous and cooperative, taking others’ interests into account. Cooperation comes from friendship, friendship comes from trust, and trust comes from kindheartedness. Once you have a genuine sense of concern for others, there’s no room for cheating, bullying, or exploitation; instead, you can be honest, truthful, and transparent in your conduct.Buddhist tradition describes three styles of c...

by DW Green — February 27, 2019

Say YES to life

I really enjoyed reading Adam’s blog last week. Is the bar really lowered? At the end of the blog Adam wrote that “Adapting is not surrendering to the pressure of an unwinnable battle.” The word surrender got my attention. Surrender carries mostly negative connotations, for guys anyway. But I’ve learned that surrender is a positive action. I liken it to acceptance, to letting go, to trusting or having faith in a higher power, a higher intelligence. Surrender is to say ‘yes’ to life—to see how life suddenly starts working for you rather than against you. It’s about giving up everything that no longer serves you. Easier said than done.Eckhart Tolle defines surrender in the following way.“To some people, surrender may have negative connotations, implying defeat, giving up, failing to rise to the challenges of life, becoming lethargic, and so on. True surrender, however, is something entirely different. It does not mean to passively put up with whatever situation you find yourself in and to do nothing about it. Nor does it mean to cease making plans or initiating positive action. Surrender is the simple but profound wisdom of yieldi...

by DW Green — February 20, 2019

You don’t know what you don’t know.

I was reminded recently that I attended my first Amba Gale Leadership workshop in March of 2003. Wow, 16 years ago. I’ve attended Amba’s workshops and retreats annually since then. Her courses have affected my life in unimaginable ways. Her course content has sent me down a rich and rewarding path of personal discovery. Thank you Amba, Ruth, and fellow journeyers!The most important thing that I learned on my first day of class was this:

You know what you know. (yep)
You know what you don’t know. (yep)
But you don’t know what you don’t know. (huh)

We spent much of our workshop time learning about things that we didn’t know we didn’t know. Make sense? I’ve spent a lot of time in that space, that space of not knowing, sense and since then!So in the spirt of knowing and not knowing:“Appearance is not essence, perception is not reality, and the cover is not the book. Error is quite often convincing, which is an unpleasant fact to consider and accept. Everyone secretly believes that his or her own personal view of the world is real, factual, and ...

by DW Green — February 13, 2019

As a famous Philosopher once said, “Shit happens.”

We have to keep going.

He goes on to say “If I’ve learned anything in life, it’s that sometimes, the darkest times can bring us to the brightest places. I’ve learned that the most toxic people can teach us the most important lessons; that our most painful struggles can grant us the most necessary growth; and that the most heartbreaking losses of friendship and love can make room for the most wonderful people. I’ve learned that what seems like a curse in the moment can actually be a blessing, and that what seems like the end of the road is actually just the discovery that we are meant to travel down a different path. I’ve learned that no matter how difficult things seem, there is always hope. And I’ve learned that no matter how powerless we feel or how horrible things seem, we can’t give up. We have to keep going. Even when it is scary, even when all of our strength seems gone, we have to keep picking ourselves back up and moving forward, because whatever we’re battling in the moment, it will pass, and we will make it through. We’ve made it this far. We can make it through whatever comes next.” Because shit happens.

by DW Green — February 5, 2019

Intuition is the highest form of intelligence.

A client and friend of mine sent me this article last week. He said, “I found this article interesting and supportive of customer relationships. A good blog topic — technology vs customer interaction and experience.” I agree.PCC Removes All Self-Checkout LanesIn Seattle, KIRO-TV News reports that cooperative PCC Community Markets is removing all self-checkout lanes from its stores. The company says that it stopped putting self-checkout in new stores three years ago. Heather Snavely, VP of marketing at PCC, says that the company looked “at the relationship our shoppers have with our cashiers and our staff. And what we realized was a kiosk doesn’t create community or connections. So we wanted to take those out so that when someone comes into our stores, they have a human connection with someone and an interaction that will make the experience more special.” Snavely also says that “removing the self-checkout machines won’t create any new jobs, they’ll just shuffle existing employees around. They’ll also build new express checkout lanes to replace the kiosks and keep the lines moving.” The story notes that at t...

by DW Green — January 30, 2019

For almost everything you need time

Do you ever think much about the present moment, the NOW? I think we tend to take the present moment for granted…spending too much time in our heads thinking about the past or the future. But the reality is, all that we really have is the present moment, the NOW. And oddly enough, the present moment, the NOW is timeless. The NOW just is. I have a clock in my office. On the face of the clock, the numbers reflecting clock time (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11,12) are replaced with the word NOW. Because NOW is the only time we have.Eckhart Tolle, author the best-selling book, The Power of NOW writes… “The present moment has always been available to spiritual seekers, but as long as you are seeking you are not available to the present moment. Seeking implies that you are looking to the future for some answer, or for some achievement, spiritual or otherwise. Everybody is in the seeking mode, seeking to add something to who they are, whether it be money, relationships, possessions, knowledge, status – or spiritual attainment. Seeking means you need more time, more future, more of this or that. And there is nothing wrong with it. All that has its place in this world. To make money, to gather knowl...

by DW Green — January 23, 2019

Awareness is the answer!

I’ve always liked the phrase Holy Moly. It has a nice sound to it! Holy moly means “an exclamation of surprise, shock, or astonishment. Or, as in Wow! (the exclamation used by the comic book character Captain Marvel.) Holy moly! A whole quarter! Shazam!” Shazam is a pretty neat word too! Holy Moly, as an exclamation of surprise, dates back to at least 1892. Wow! Shazam!However, this blog isn’t about Holy Moly. And it isn’t about the blown pass interference call in the Saints Rams game that may have determined the outcome of that game. Or the dumb NFL overtime rule that doesn’t allow both teams an offensive possession, that did determine the outcome of the Patriots Chiefs game. Though I suppose, Holy moly is an appropriate term to describe both those football games! Shazam!No, this blog is about Ego! Holy moly! We have an ego due to social convention, but the fallacy we all make is that we treat this abstraction (ego) as if it were real and physical. But the ego is merely a composition of ideas and images about ourselves. This image is obviously no more us than the idea of a tree is a tree. Additionally, the image we carry about ourse...

by DW Green — January 16, 2019

It’s not what you sell, it’s what you stand for.

“Herb Kelleher, the fun-loving and wickedly witty Founder, Chairman Emeritus, and former CEO of Dallas-based Southwest Airlines Co., died Thursday, January 3, 2019. He was 87.” —San Antonio Express-News Obituaries.Mr. Kelleher and his business philosophy have been an inspiration to me. He believed in the importance of operating a business from a foundation of purpose. He believed that a successful business benefited all stakeholders, not just shareholders. We strive to do the same thing. Herb Kelleher was a brilliant leader and innovator. Truly a legend in his lifetime.In his HBR article, The Legacy of Herb Kelleher, Cofounder of Southwest Airlines, author Bill Taylor wrote “…here’s what’s so vital for us to understand about what Herb Kelleher built — the essential piece of his legacy. To him, Southwest Airlines was never just a company. It was a cause. The goal was not just to keep fares low and fly to more cities. The goal, in his words, was to “democratize the skies” — to make it as easy, affordable, and flexible, for average Americans to travel as it had always been for business travelers and the affluent. That mission may seem quai...

by DW Green — January 9, 2019

Who you are becoming is more important than what you are achieving.

Many of us feel we are our job, possessions, achievements, and relationships. This is how we know ourselves. If we lose one of them, we feel we have lost part of ourselves. Somehow we have not identified with the basis of all life, which is constantly moving, changing, growing. In order to expand our sense of self it is necessary to stop fighting and resisting life, to become willing to let go.But, whether or not we want to let go, life itself decides for us. Change comes in its own time, both giving and taking things away. When this happens, many suffer greatly from this sense of loss. A usual response is to hold on tighter. By fighting change this way we are insisting that life meet our particular demands, fulfill our needs and expectations. A battle is set up. Much energy is squandered.So it’s important to learn to Let Go, not only in our personal life, but in our business life as well. And this is especially true for leaders of organizations. A long-time client sent me an article on Letting Go. Written by Scott Mabry, Letting-Go Leadership. His words are very meaningful to me and I read them often. Let go.This line of thin...