Meredith Whipple Callahan's Blog: The Intentional

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Tucked into a folder on my laptop is a half-finished manuscript about how reflective writing informs leadership development; and, therefore, how leaders can approach journaling as a developmental tool. It’s waiting for a day when I have the space to look at it with fresh eyes, magically see how to reframe the content, and then put in the elbow grease to get it out the door.

I don’t have that time or insight right now. Like many of you, I have a full-time job, two kids (under four), no childcare, a wife who is similarly busy, and a ‘shelter-in-place’ order. On a daily basis, I wouldn’t say that I feel stressed. Instead, I would say that I run the gamut from feeling completely overwhelmed by my obligations, despondent about our future, contemplative about what it all means, bitter about our government, motivated to follow my purpose, delighted to spend so much time with my family, and stressed as all get-out. And, that’s just today.

The current coronavirus epidemic, however miserable, forces self-evolution, whether we like it or not. We are living through a completely new set of events that none of us experienced before. We are forced to renegotiate our way of being with ourselves, our way of being with other people, and our way of living in the world. We are experiencing so many emotions. We are making hard decisions. We are re-examining our lives and reconsidering our institutions. Bottom line: we will all be different — as individuals and as a human race — after this collective experience.

So, that’s a lot. What do we do now? And, how do we make the most of this moment?

Enter: journaling. This is a time when journaling is needed more than ever. Journaling is the practice of dumping your head out on a sheet of paper; and, thereby, helping yourself sort through the mess more effectively. Now, I know you might think that journaling is either 1) lame and best left to six-year olds with unicorn diaries or 2) strange and best left to middle-aged hippies with so many emotions. But, I am not talking about recording all the mundane details of your day in a painful “Dear Diary” situation. No, I’m telling you to use journaling as a mechanism to uncover what’s going on within you and better deal with that.

In a time of change and ambiguity, writing brings clarity. As Natalie Goldberg writes, “writing is the act of burning through the fog in your mind”. What you hazily perceived before, you now know more crisply. Suddenly, you see that you should not go to your friend’s birthday (even if there are fewer than ten people there), that you underestimated how extroverted you actually are, and that you need to find a job more aligned with your life’s purpose. You see yourself more clearly and understand yourself more deeply. You are also able to take better action — action that is aligned with who you are and what you want. In a time of craziness and confusion, journaling will help you consciously drive forward to what you want, instead of being thrashed about by your situation.

Happily, journaling is perfectly adapted to a quarantined lifestyle. First and most importantly, it’s individual; you don’t need anyone else to do it with you. Like Netflix and Hulu, you can enjoy it on-demand. And better than those television options, it’s accessible and flexible. No subscription needed. No minimal amount of time required. No issues streaming as you access Wi-Fi at the same time as the rest of the world. And finally, in a time of economic uncertainty, journaling is free. I would tell you that journaling is portable too; but, let’s be honest, you’re not going anywhere.

You have to keep yourself company anyway, so you might as well evolve into the person you want to be along the way. It will make spending time with yourself through these weeks and months far more pleasant.

And so, instead of waiting around to polish off that manuscript, I’ve consolidated a short guide of “How to Become Your Best Self from Your Couch”. Between rearranging the pantry and your next Netflix binge, here’s what you need to start journaling now.

With love,

Meredith

HOW TO BECOME YOUR BEST SELF FROM YOUR COUCH

“Direct your eye right inward, and you’ll find

a thousand regions in your mind

Yet undiscovered. Travel them, and be

Expert in Home-cosmography.”

-Henry David Thoreau

WHAT MATTERS IN JOURNALING

How frequently you journal, how long you journal, where you journal, when in the day you journal, what your journal looks like: none of it matters. You can certainly have your own preferences and get into your own beautiful routines, but I don’t want you to get hung up on thinking any of those factors are required for good journaling. Instead, only three things really matter in journaling:

1. You must feel safe to share your true thoughts: You must feel a deep and certain sense of safety when you approach your journal. This safety is required so that you can be completely honest with yourself. Lying to yourself — or simply failing to share the deepest version of your truth — will stunt your personal growth. Most often, this sense of safety is rooted in privacy — and the confidence that whatever you write will be kept confidential from others. Do what you need to do to be certain of this (e.g., hide your journal, have a serious discussion with your family rip it up and throw it away immediately, etc.).

2. You must suspend judgment of content and format: You have to write without fear of looking stupid or silly. Avoid self-editing as you go. Instead, let the words flow. Just because you wrote something down doesn’t mean you believe it. Just because you put words on the page doesn’t mean it has to be of publishable quality. Do not judge content. Ignore spelling, punctuation, grammar, and penmanship. Do not self-censor.

3. You must write without ego or audience: Per the Miriam-Webster definition of “journal”, this is writing intended “for private use.” Unlike other forms of reflective writing, journaling is for you and you alone. When you are conscious of an audience beyond your current self, your tone changes. You are, consciously or unconsciously, less in service of your own development and more in pursuit of the engagement of others. Your truth is tempered and contorted in all sorts of unexpected ways. So, don’t write this as a coronavirus memoir for your grandkids; write it for the sake of your own evolution.

HOW TO JOURNAL

Just begin: Do not presume that you need a path and a direction as you begin to write. Simply begin. If you don’t know where to start, the easiest and most obvious place to start is with your current experience. Start with “What is happening now?” Don’t try to answer it clearly or pithily. Just use it as a starting point. Even if the first line is “I don’t know what to write about”, just get going. If you’re still stuck and want me to fix this for you, that’s interesting; you can check out the prompts below (Appendix).

Get curious about everything: You started the page writing about the effects of quarantine on your pet ferret or considering whether you’ll lose your job. Now get curious about it. Go deeper. Ask why. And then ask why again. And again and again. And then look at other dimensions of your experience: How do you feel? What else does that make you think about? What does that tell you about yourself? Per Emerson’s quote, “your self is a place to be discovered. Look for the new horizons within yourself”.



Follow the energy: Is the topic changing? Is something else coming up? Good, write about that now. Don’t hesitate to abandon a thread or quickly change topic.

Notice how you feel: As you write, notice what comes up. Are you judging the quality of your writing? Are you judging the content of your thoughts? Do you reject or embrace an image that came to mind? And why? Note not only what you write, but also notice how you feel as you write. This too becomes fodder for your reflection.

Stop when you’re done…: Write until you are done. Like a train running out of momentum, you will likely be going, going, going until suddenly you are slowing, slowing, slowing. You may write for five minutes or for fifty minutes; you will be done when you have done a serious look around your internal world and there is nothing more to express.

…But Keep Going: You will get the most out of journaling if you come back to the page over and over again. Give yourself a break — a minute, a day, a week — then come back and keep going.

WHAT JOURNALING WILL BE LIKE

Before you move forward, I want to set your expectations of what it will feel like to journal. Here is what you need to know and make your peace with before starting the work of journaling:



You will feel self-conscious: It can feel weird to write down a bunch of your thoughts and feelings, especially when you haven’t done it before. That’s okay. Let it be weird. As Anne Frank wrote: “It’s an odd idea for someone like me to keep a diary; not only because I have never done so before, but because it seems to me that neither I — nor for that matter anyone else — will be interested in the unbosomings of a thirteen-year-old school girl.” Even Anne Frank felt strange writing things down. Whatever.

You will not produce beautiful writing: To be clear, your writing may be beautiful or poignant. But you are not sitting down to write the great American novel. If you are thinking a lot about the mechanics of writing, the correctness of your grammar, or the beauty of your craft, your attention is taken away from the developmental task at hand.

You will feel uncomfortable: Go straight at what is hard, what is scary, and what is embarrassing. What do you suspect is true deep down? What are you afraid of? If you are uncomfortable, you are likely onto something productive. Those are the places to investigate.

You will contradict yourself: Your journal is a place where you work out what you think, what you want, and how you feel before sharing it elsewhere. It will be messy. You will play with different possibilities. Do not expect that every sentence you write will be true. You are experimenting with different ideas. You are figuring it all out through the process of journaling. Clarity will come, but likely not until you have spent some time wading through the messiness.

You will resist the process: At some point, you will resist journaling. You will not want to do it. You will avoid it. This resistance is born of fear. The list of potential fears is nearly endless: You are afraid that someone will find what you have written. You are afraid that putting your thoughts down in writing will make them real. You are afraid of facing uncomfortable emotions. Whether you consciously sort through your thoughts or not, they still drive you. And, they are likely bigger determinants of your path and your success than you know. When you feel resistance, lean in and do the journaling work to see yourself and your situation more clearly.

You will live your life with more awareness: As you write out your experiences, you will start to pick them apart. You will see deeper drivers and motives. You will come to know yourself better. You will come to see more clearly. This will not only be true while you are journaling, but in your day-to-day life as you live it.

You will deal with this coronavirus challenge more effectively: Journaling is a precious support in times of challenge. No one writes better about how precious journaling can be in traumatic times than author Elizabeth Gilbert. She writes about journaling in the midst of divorce:

“So tonight I reach for my journal again. This is the first time I’ve done this since I came to Italy. What I write in my journal is that I am weak and full of fear. I explain that Depression and Loneliness have shown up, and I’m scared they will never leave. I say that I don’t want to take the drugs anymore, but I’m frightened I will have to. I am terrified that I will never really pull my life together.

In response, somewhere from within me, rises a now-familiar presence, offering me all the certainties I have always wished another person would say to me when I was troubled. This is what I find myself writing on the page:

I’m here. I love you. I don’t care if you need to stay up crying all night long. I will stay with you. If you need the medication again, go ahead and take it — I will love you through that, as well. If you don’t need the medication, I will love you, too. There’s nothing you can ever do to lose my love. I will protect you until you die, and after your death I will still protect you. I am stronger than Depression and Braver than Loneliness and nothing will ever exhaust me.

Tonight, this strange interior gesture of friendship — the lending of a hand from me to myself when nobody else is around to offer solace — reminds me of something that happened to me once in New York City. I walked into an office building one afternoon in a hurry, dashed into the waiting elevator. As I rushed in, I caught an unexpected glance of myself in a security mirror’s reflection. In that moment, my brain did an odd thing — it fired off this split-second message: “Hey! You know her! That’s a friend of yours!” And I actually ran forward toward my own reflection with a smile, ready to welcome that girl whose name I had lost but whose face was so familiar. In a flash instant of course, I realized my mistake and laughed in embarrassment at my almost doglike confusion over how a mirror works. But for some reason that incident comes to mind again tonight during my sadness in Rome, and I find myself writing this comforting reminder at the bottom of the page.

Never forget that once upon a time, in an unguarded moment, you recognized yourself as a FRIEND…

I fell asleep holding my notebook pressed against my chest, open to this most recent assurance. In the morning when I wake up, I can still smell a faint trace of depression’s lingering smoke, but he himself is nowhere to be seen. Somewhere during the night, he got up and left. And his buddy loneliness beat it, too.”

We need to show up for each other, but, with the help of journaling, you will help yourself get through this crisis.

And finally, you will become more of who you want to be: Ultimately, it is an act of both radical self-care and radical self-development to take time to journal. If you invest in reflecting on yourself and your situation, and in directing your action through these uncertain times, you will consciously evolve more into the person you want to be. You know, the version of yourself who has learned the lessons of this moment and who will thrive on the other side of this coronavirus challenge.

Start small. Start today. Pull out a piece of paper or a notebook or a computer, and just go. Your fellow shut-ins and your future self will thank you for it.

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Schools cancelled on account of coronavirus last week, making this past Monday the first day of total remote work plus zero childcare. My wife, Liz, has been incredible in the situation, running ‘homeschool’ for our three-year old Elliott Claire every morning from 9AM until noon with conference calls mixed in to the curriculum. The structure keeps her preschool mind and body on track in a way that we would all likely benefit from at this moment. I, on the other hand, have mostly been quarterbacking our eighteen-month son, Hawk. He has about a 50/50 hit-rate on conference calls. On some, he is delighted to read books independently or just make an adorable cameo; on others, he insists upon being held or throws an impressive tantrum while I’m on mute.

As every stay-at-home parent knows, the challenge of parenting while doing anything else is immense.  And the challenge of parenting while doing *everything* else is even more intense. I am proud that I have managed my emotions, made reasonable parenting decisions, and leaned into love this week; but, damn, it took a lot of self-management, a bunch of late nights working, and not-a-few junk food binges from our special quarantine stash.

One of the hardest challenges for me is the ambiguity of how long it will be like this. For two weeks?  You got it. For twelve weeks? I’m getting stretched. For two years? No.

One of the upsides of a virtual life is that I am connecting with people and organizations more broadly around the world. So last night, after the kids went to bed, I joined a virtual healing session with my old San Francisco reiki master, Christopher Tellez. For those of you who aren’t familiar with reiki, it’s a Japanese energy healing methodology similar to the Christian idea of “laying on of hands”. Reiki means something like “life force energy from the higher power.” (If that jives with you, great. If you think that’s crazy and hippie, read on; that’s not the punchline.)

Anyway, at the start of every reiki session, the practitioner invokes five precepts. These are the code by which the reiki practitioner lives in order to be of service to others. And so, as everyone on the Zoom gallery closed their eyes, we recited:

“Just for today, I will not worry.”

“Just for today, I will not be angry.”

“Just for today, I will be grateful.”

“Just for today, I will do my work honestly.”

“Just for today, I will be kind to every living thing.”

Just for today. In the face of quarantine, I can handle “just for today”. I can agree not to worry about health, wealth, or safety. I can agree not to be angry with the limitations on my life and my obligations at this moment. I can be grateful for fresh food, shelter, relationships, and Wi-Fi.  I can do my work with love and focus, even if that’s early morning or late night. And I can be kind to my kids, my wife, our dog, and the rabbit who has moved into our yard. And the Amazon package delivery people; I always yell “thank you so much” out the window as they hurry back to their vans.

Look, I am a parent facing a potentially interminable stretch of childcare-less life. No breaks. No stops. No room. No space for working. No space for recreation. No space for self. I can’t do that forever, but I can recommit each morning to doing it for the day.

So, whether you find yourself caring for children, for elders, for friends, for yourself, or some combination, I know the burden is tough. I would send you toilet paper, but I can’t. So I am sending you so much love. And, I wish you the chance to be what you aspire to be in these tough times if only “just for today”.

With empathy and love,

Meredith

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During business school at Stanford, the activity I devoted more time to than anything else was a series of events called “Talk” – or, in my class’s case “Talk 10” (alluding to our graduation year). Talk10 happened once a week. Sixty, seventy, or more classmates would crowd into someone’s living room (often mine) and listen to a classmate speak. The ‘talker’ had thirty minutes to speak and followed by thirty minutes to answer questions. Unlike other business school discussions, these talks were not content-filled discussions of ideas or even chronological life stories; instead, they were carefully-crafted narratives designed to elucidate what was most important to the person. Topics ranged. One woman discussed what she learned through a legal battle with start-up co-founders and how that influenced her experience of friendships at work. Another man discussed his relationship with his grandfather and how that formed his personal values. I talked about my relationship with ritual and resulting philosophy of bringing the sacred into the everyday. Each talk unfurled with a series of personal anecdotes all tied back to an overarching theme and underlined by personal meaning.

The Talks were sacred. In contrast to our variable in-class behavior, classmates showed up on time and sat with rapt attention. They radiated love, compassion, and welcome for the Talkers. The Talkers, on their side, bravely shared their most personal, vulnerable stories.

I, along with two classmates, coached the Talkers in crafting their stories. What did they want to say?  Why was that important? Who were the characters in the story? What vivid sensory detail could they bring to illustrate their experiences? We would sit with the Talkers to hear their truth and help them hone their stories. I was touched in every interaction.

Now, I’m again coaching classmates on telling their stories in anticipation of our ten-year reunion this May. This time the Talkers will share their learnings and lessons since graduating from business school. For me, this is an apt moment to reflect upon my learnings about storytelling over this time as well.

I’ve consolidated my learnings from coaching storytelling over the last ten years – distilled not only from my classmates putting together their Talks, but also from the many senior leaders I’ve coached to share their personal stories for business purposes. That wisdom, a useful but incomplete nugget of knowledge on storytelling, is shared below.

With that, my questions for you:

If you had thirty minutes to share your story, what would the theme be? What would you talk about?
What might be hard about sharing that story?
Why would it be worthwhile?

Meredith

On choosing what to talk about

Tell your own stories: It’s sometimes easier to tell other peoples’ stories (e.g., the stories of the people who influenced you, the people you met, or the people you were inspired by). Sometimes you need to do this for context, but more often you can focus on your reactions to those people and your feelings about them
Speak from the heart instead of the head: We can all share facts and figures, explanations and reasons. Minimize the background, rationale, explanations, and generalized truisms. Lean into the emotions, the struggles, the challenges, and the difficulty that you felt
Be vulnerable: The parts of your story that people will find most meaningful are often the parts that you find hardest to share. To the extent you’re able, include more of what makes you real, even if it’s uncomfortable

On structuring your content

Choose anecdote over narrative: When possible, choose two to four anecdotes that illustrate the ‘peaks’ of your journey instead of telling a continuous, chronological narrative. Not all events are created equally
Consider an keeping your punchline for the end: Unlike a good five paragraph essay, a story can be most interesting when you include the point at the end instead of including it up-front. Without sacrificing clarity, consider letting the audience come on the journey with you rather than turning your story into a long proof of your initial thesis
Edit, edit, edit: It’s impossible to fit the full richness into a story of tolerable length. Know that you will have to edit yourself and be selective about the things you share. Choose to include fewer events at more depth instead of covering everything on a more superficial level

On choosing the right words

Show don’t tell:  Illustrate how your points are true instead of stating them as facts. Take us there and show us
Avoid generalizing your unique experience: Everyone’s view is unique. We want to hear your view. Shift generic statements about ‘how the world is’ (e.g., “Start-ups are hard”) to be personal expressions of your unique experience (e.g., “I found starting my company hard because. . .”)
Make people into characters: To the extent you have one or two other key players in your story, take the extra time to make them into characters. Give them names. Share one or two sentences of description about them so the audience can see them in your story and interact with them as well

On delivery

Overprepare the beginning: The opening of your story is when your nerves are typically at their worst. Overprepare the first few minutes of your talk so that you can deliver it confidently and with ease. Typically, you will settle in after a moment and be able to speak more freely as the story progresses.
Speak in paragraphs: People need silence and space to digest. Make sure you pause between ideas. This is particularly true if you’re delivering a stretch which is more focused on narrative than anecdote. The silence will feel more uncomfortable for you than it does for the audience
Use “I” language: This is your story to tell. Avoid “we”, “they”, and “you”. If you are compelled to speak in the plural, reflect back on the part of the story that you own. Within the “we”, what was your piece of it?
Moderate your speed: Start slowly to dampen the nerves and then use a varied pace as you progress. When in doubt, slow down
Enjoy yourself: Your emotional state will come through in your voice. Try to have fun up there.

 

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Though it’s a few weeks after Valentine’s Day, the aura of the holiday still hangs in the air. My daughter’s box of school valentines sits on the kitchen counter. The cupboard hides a pile of candy ready to be doled out to children once a day (maybe). And, the pink alstroemeria blooms on the sideboard only recently croaked.

While Valentine’s Day represents a fun diversion in our house, I’m wise to the Valentine’s Day Fallacy: the holiday has a tenuous relationship to true love.

You know what true love feels like. It feels like a lightness and a heaviness all together. It is seriousness and joy simultaneously. It is softening and strengthening. It is the blade and the bandage. It is the state in which we are both most ourselves and care about ourselves the least.

Far from being limited to romantic relationships, this true love permeates our lives. It’s everything and everywhere. We tend to misunderstand love because we only experience it here and there. But, in truth, our loving relationships are only access points in which we partake of something much bigger. It’s as if, in each relationship – with a beloved partner, child, friend, or pet – we poke a hole in the firmament which holds back the expanse of universal love. Love squeezes through that pin prick, taking on the color and flavor of a particular relationship between particular beings in this incarnate world. And so, you experience a particular incarnation of love – romantic love, familial love, love of country, love of friends, or love of pizza. The risk here is that it’s easy to misidentify what you’re experiencing – to, for example, see romantic love as the only relevant version of love instead of just one manifestation of many.

Given this, the recipe for expanding the love in your life is straightforward. It doesn’t take mastering a dating app or having a child. Instead, find a love or two or three in your life. Look for the places where love comes easily for you. You could begin with a particularly lovable pet, place, or, yes, even a human. Feel this love. Deepen into it. And then, know that this love is available in your relationships with all people and with all things.

Start by holding that belief in your mind and that feeling in your heart. Then, look for the data which might support your new understanding of the world. When you look now, where do you see love that you didn’t see it previously? What new capacity for love has opened up inside you? Look at the world with eyes that see the possibility for (and inevitability of) love in all exchanges. This is the work of expanding love in the world.

I would love to hear your reflections on love and how you bring more of it into life.

With love,

Meredith

First published in Coaching World in October 2019, published by the International Coach Federation.

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Coaching across generations can be tricky. You may wonder: Who are these Millennials?  Who is Generation Z?  What are they like and what do they care about?  It can feel like, if only we could understand them, we would be able to meet them better where they are.

Similarly, you may wonder about the methods for best engaging them:  What are the unlocking questions for today’s youth?  Would they respond more to encouragement or challenge?  Do they yearn for embodiment, balance, stability, fulfillment, authenticity, or something else entirely?

However exhaustive the descriptions or guidance for intergenerational coaching might be, it will necessarily be of limited use. Expanding your capacity to coach the next generation is not about figuring out the tips and tricks. Instead, your ability to coach across generations is determined by your own inner preparation rather than by any external knowledge you might acquire.

Inner preparation is important because the challenges we face in coaching intergenerationally are largely the limitations that we, as coaches, bring to the table.  Our societies are engrained with patterns of how we treat those older than and younger than us.  Embedded power dynamics privilege age above youth along certain dimensions (e.g., wisdom) and youth above age in others (e.g., energy). On top of these broad patterns, we have our own individual experiences of aging, authority, wisdom, youth and even death. If we have not worked through these challenges, we bring them as baggage into our coaching relationships, often impeding our ability to be of service.

So, how to approach this work?  First, set aside some time for reflection.  Consider your relationships across age—both as the junior and as the senior—and look for how they affect your coaching relationships.  Spend time unpacking your relationship with youth, aging, authority and wisdom.  What did you hate about being younger?  What do you love about being older?  Inevitably, reflecting upon age brings up the bogeymen of our own mortality; face these, too. To help you get started on this process, I’ve included an approach for structured reflection below.

Ultimately, as with all coaching, it is only by doing our own inner work that we are able to be of service to others. Generational differences across coaches and clients are a call for us to break out of our patterned ways of acting. Awareness and reflection are the first steps.

Reflection Questions

The following questions are intended to unpack your thinking about generational differences.  Focus on the handful of prompts that feel most resonant to you in the “Expand and Understand” section. You need not answer every question; three to eight questions is sufficient.  Then move on to answer each of the questions in the ”Synthesize and Apply” section.  For maximum benefit, you may want to sit down in a quiet space, avoid distractions, and write your answers out longhand with pen and paper.

Expand and Understand

Views of Age and Youth

Older people have…
Older people lack…
Younger people have…
Younger people lack…


Generational Responsibilities

The future generations must…
The future generations cannot…
When it’s all said and done, I think the impact of my generation on the world will have been…


Personal Experience of Age

What I love about being my age is…
What I loved about being younger was…
What I’m excited about growing older is…
What I hate about being my age is…
What I hated about being younger was…
What I’m dreading about growing older is…


Past Experience of Intergenerational Relationships

When you were younger, how did the older generation treat you?
If this was not ideal, how would you have wanted to be treated?
When you were younger, who “coached” you (even if this was not formal coaching)? Who mentored you or gave you advice?
What worked well in those situations? What worked poorly?


Current Experience of Intergenerational Relationships

What relationships do you have now that have an age gap to who you might coach?

Mid-level manager to young employee?
Grandparent to adult grandchild?
Parent to child?
Boss to employee?


What patterns have you developed in those relationships?


Your Legacy

What do you have to give to future generations?
How do you want younger people to see you? To interact with you?


Associations with Related Values

What is your relationship with authority?
…With wisdom?
…With aging?
…With youth?
…With death?


Fears

When you think about youth, what scares you?
When you think about aging, what scares you?





Synthesize and Apply

What did you learn through your reflections? What is emerging as true?  What else are you curious about?
Where, if at all, are these mindsets and patterns of behavior showing up in your coaching?
What’s the impact of those? Alternatively, what might the impact be?
What do you want to do about it?

Meredith

It’s mid-January, and we’re just beyond the new year when poorly-set resolutions start to crumble. And so, I’ve been reflecting on the nature of goals and, as is often the case, looking beyond myself for wisdom on the topic.

In searching out the answer to “what makes a good goal,” I keep on running into the SMART model. Taught in business schools and applied widely in companies, the SMART model uses an acronym to propose that goals should be:

Specific
Measurable
Achievable
Relevant
Time-Bound

Every time I read through this list, it makes me cringe. These criteria feel far from the way I want my goals to look and feel. I don’t want a goal that feels narrow, limiting, or boring. Instead, I want a goal that articulates the desires of my heart. I want a goal that I am fiercely devoted to achieving even though the road may be long and hard. I want a goal that inspires me to do better. Whether goal-setting in my personal or professional life, I want a goal that acts as a compelling North Star, not something beaten into flat corporate-speak.

This isn’t to say that the SMART model isn’t useful; indeed, it seems perfectly helpful in directing what the line items of my plan to achieve my goal should look like. But, at the goal level, it leaves something to be desired.

And so, I propose a new model for goals, one which connects far more to meaning and motivation. In the Callahan “C-Star” model for consciously choosing goals, I propose five aspects that matter:

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First and most importantly, is your goal CONGRUENT with who you are as a person? Any exercise in goal-setting needs to start with a period of introspection. What is important to you? What are your values? And, above all, what do you want? Your goal cannot be something given to you by another or dictated by your circumstances. Instead, your goal must begin with congruence to who you truly are.

Second, is your goal CONSISTENT with what you actually want? To be most effective, a goal needs to be set at the level at which you fundamentally hold it. For example, if your desire is to spread your organization’s message far and wide, you should not set your goal as talking about your organization on Oprah. Even if you failed to get on Oprah, you could achieve your real goal in many ways – by going on a road show to related organizations, by writing a book on the topic, or by being featured on a morning show. Resist migrating away from what you truly want because an alternative feels more specific, more attainable, more socially acceptable, or more aligned with your current reality. Shifting the focus from what you really want always misdirects your efforts and often limits what you can achieve. When it comes to goal setting, articulate what you actually want – even if you don’t quite know what that will look like yet. To be fair, this is a hard concept to get right and the dimension on which I most frequently see experienced professionals stumble.

Third, is your goal CHALLENGING? Your goals should not be limited by what you currently believe to be possible – for yourself or in the world. As Ray Dalio, founder of Bridgewater Associates, writes in his book Principles, “Once you start your pursuit you will learn a lot, especially if you triangulate with others; paths you never saw before will emerge.” By setting ambitious goals, you are pushing yourself to the edge of growth and accelerating your evolution as a person.

Next, is your goal CLEAR? In the previous three dimensions you have dug deep to specify a goal which is appropriately-sized and particular to you. That said, when you dug deep, did you bring up a bunch of muck along with your insights? If so, work through this – the fears, beliefs, patterns, feelings, and whatever else – to get clear about what you want. This clarity will allow you to navigate more effectively in the direction of your goal when life gets muddy and unclear again. To do this best, write your goals down. Iterate the wording to get to precisely what you mean.

Finally, ask yourself: to what extent are you COMMITTED to your goal? Your commitment is the source of your motivation. Why is your goal important to you? What’s at stake if you don’t achieve it? And, what is it worth to you to achieve it? Your goals should have a sense if you don’t achieve them, you fail yourself.

And that, collectively, is a good goal: one that is congruent to who you are, consistent with what you actually want, challenging to achieve, clear in articulation, and to which you are committed with the full force of your being. This January, that is the type of goal I want to sign up for – along with a SMART plan to achieve it.

I would love to hear what you think. Test my model out and send me your feedback.

What is your goal for 2020?
How does it stack up against the C-Star model?  Versus the SMART model?
What does each model help you see more clearly? What does each leave out?
What else would you want to consider in setting goals?

Wishing you a year full of achieving your goals,

Meredith

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Nearly three months later:  Settled enough to start adventuring again.

In late July, we packed up our home and sent a truckload of boxes and furniture off with movers. That same week, Liz piled the remaining most-treasured items (especially Reese, our family dog,) into her Subaru and started the week-long drive from Connecticut to California. I followed a week later, flying solo across the country with our two kids in tow.

We spent the first month in San Diego holed up at a Best Western Hotel. We enjoyed a “two room” suite, which turned out to be one large room half-heartedly divided by an archway. This meant that every member of the family could be easily awoken by any other member of the family at any point during the night. Anytime Reese shook his collar, my son cried at 5:00 AM, or an adult took a 2:00 AM bathroom run, there was a good chance that others would rouse. A typical day at the Best Western included waking up groggy, taking conference calls from the bathroom due to lack of space, and discretely microwaving frozen meals for dinner after the kids had (hopefully) fallen asleep.

Yet, hotel living wasn’t entirely unpleasant. We enjoyed breakfast every morning (we learned that cheese omelet/sausage day and scrambled egg/bacon day were both delightful). There was a well-heated pool (often just to ourselves). And, the housekeeping staff got to know and appreciate both of our kids.

Physically moving ourselves and our stuff across the country has taken the better portion of three months. And, as you might guess, the psychic disruption has been even more pronounced.

At first, I coped with the change by attempting to consciously and quickly put down roots. My intention was to “root ourselves in San Diego”, and I set to it with typical fervor. Sitting on the balcony of the Best Western, I researched and reached out to the service providers who would help us make a home here – the pediatricians, babysitters, dentists, hairdressers, lawyers, and car mechanics whom would take care of us. I fired off emails to reignite our network of friends in the area. I even found ritual ways of honoring our relocation, ordering a new return address stamp and change-of-address announcements for friends and family. I journaled about what our best life in San Diego might look like and what was needed to manifest that.

Wasn’t this putting down roots? Wasn’t this what I needed for us to self-actualize our best lives in this new city? To feel completely at home in this place?

And yet, none of my efforts helped me feel settled.

No, it wasn’t until the truck arrived with all our stuff, six weeks after moving, that I got a hint of what I was missing. I shared my three-year-old daughter’s unrestrained joy when she exclaimed, “It looks just like our house in Connecticut!” after the moving trucks left. I felt just as giddy – and just as inclined to jump up and down on the newly-delivered bed.

Why did all these things – our familiar sofa, a loved coffee maker, and even the boxes of old college books – bring such succor? I found it disturbing to think that I was so materialistic that these items could significantly impact my happiness. And yet, as I sat at the dining room table, eating Chinese food off a real plate and drinking from a real wine glass, I couldn’t deny the feeling of home.

The answer came to me in a conversation with a friend: “It makes sense that you weren’t settled; it’s like someone kicked the bottom out of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.”

Maslow’s hierarchy of needs is an all-too-familiar and yet oft-applicable psychological model. It holds that the more basic human needs – beginning with physiological needs for food, water, warmth, and rest – must be satisfied before more complex human needs – like achieving one’s full potential – can be addressed. Between these extremes there is an entire pyramid of needs, building one layer upon the other. The original version, presented in Abraham Maslow’s original 1943 paper on the topic, is illustrated below. For the academically-inclined looking for the source materials, you can find the whole paper here.

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Now, as an executive coach, a leadership development professional, and a writer, I am accustomed to live and move in the realm of self-actualization. I sit in the realm of the emotional, the conceptual, and the reflective. And, frankly, when I arrived to California, that’s the natural level at which I engaged. I automatically went to manipulations of meaning, purpose, community, and ritual to make us feel at home. My efforts started at the top of Maslow’s hierarchy and extended down.

But these top-heavy efforts were doomed without the foundation. While I had the few creature comforts that fit in my luggage, I fundamentally lacked my own bed to sleep in as well as my own clothes to wear. I didn’t realize it at the time, but I was getting the pyramid of needs upside-down.

Now that my feet are underneath me, I can get back to focusing on the things I do best.  And next time I’m inexplicably disoriented, I’ll know where to look: to the bed underneath my head and the things around me.

With love,

Meredith

Postscript: Frankly, my experience was temporary and – even while in transition – quite comfortable. I can’t begin to imagine what it must be like for those who struggle without the fundamentals on a day-to-day basis. For refugees, for detainees at the border, and for those without a home the question of self-actualization is far from fundamental; it’s a luxury. It’s important and grounding for me to remember that shifting one’s focusing at the top of the pyramid is, in itself, a privilege. While I continue to work at the top of the pyramid, I am recommitting to make a positive impact for those struggling to address the bottom.

July is eminently photographable. The reds, whites, and blues of patriotic clothing pop against lush green lawns. Bright fireworks light up dark night skies. Watery scenes are highlighted by neon bathing suits and flamingo pool floats. Even without filters, my Instagram and Facebook feeds are studies in light and color.

At the center of most of these photos are the people. A whole family of rainbow swimmers dripping with water. Clusters of kids sticky with purple popsicle sweat. A couple in matching sunglasses in front of a rolling gold landscape. And there’s me: in a colorful dress; but still postpartum, a bit too heavy, and struggling to defrizz my hair in the humidity.

A couple of years ago, I made a decision. I was posing for a random group photo with a half dozen others. As for any other iPhone shoot, we posed and smiled. And then, I noticed what happened.

Half the subjects flocked the photographer to see the pictures and weigh in on which was the best. I – and most of my friends – are approaching middle age, so this can take work: not only should eyes be open and smiles be appropriate, but double chins should be hidden, underarm flab smoothed, and bodies at an angle to minimize hip width. There was a quick but important chatter about which of the many versions were acceptable to all parties and permissioning for posting on social media.

Interestingly, the other half of the subjects (and, to be honest, mostly the men), simply walked away from the scene. It was as if nothing happened.

My instinct was to join in the evaluation. For years, I had been a participant in assessing the photos based on my vision of how I thought I looked best. This was an automatic response rather than a conscious one, conditioned by my society – and likely reinforced by pressures put upon my gender. I was supposed to care not only about what I looked like, but also about how that was represented. But in this thing, as in all things, I had a choice. Did I – not as a woman, but as Meredith – actually care about those things?

Not much.

And so, I decided. From that moment forward, I would not evaluate photos of myself. I would simply let them be. I refused to expend intellectual or emotional energy editing the pictures and selecting the most favorable version of the truth. Whether each photo fit my own expectation of what “good” looked like for me really didn’t matter: the picture was represented what I did look like at that moment, whether I liked it or not.

It seems small and trivial. After all, it’s only my behavior in the moment after the flash. But, in this as in everything else, it’s freeing to realize that I get to decide how to be.

Since making that decision, I’ve felt free. I categorically don’t care. I consistently don’t need to engage. Now, when people take pictures of me, they often still ask: “Do you want to see it?” It feels like it’s really me answering when I say “no.” I’m sure it’s fine. Or not fine. It is how it is. And whether I like it or not, it is the truth of how I look in this moment. Then, I go back to my conversation.

This is your chance to choose as well. There is no right answer. You can care or not care. You can look or not look. You can edit or not edit. As long as you make a conscious choice aligned with your own values, it’s perfect.

How do you act when photos are taken?

What does that say about what you value? What does that say about what you fear?

And if you were to consciously choose, how do you want to be in those situations?

Meredith

Like what you’re reading? Find more in my newest book, The Intentional Life: Reflections from Conscious Living, available here from Amazon.

EXHIBIT A:  Most recent mediocre picture of me, from Drag Queen Story Time yesterday (Note to self:  Beyond this article, I will simply never look good enough standing next to a Drag Queen)

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July is eminently photographable. The reds, whites, and blues of patriotic clothing pop against lush green lawns. Bright fireworks light up dark night skies. Watery scenes are highlighted by neon bathing suits and flamingo pool floats. Even without filters, my Instagram and Facebook feeds are studies in light and color.

At the center of most of these photos are the people. A whole family of rainbow swimmers dripping with water. Clusters of kids sticky with purple popsicle sweat. A couple in matching sunglasses in front of a rolling gold landscape. And there’s me: in a colorful dress; but still postpartum, a bit too heavy, and struggling to defrizz my hair in the humidity.

A couple of years ago, I made a decision. I was posing for a random group photo with a half dozen others. As for any other iPhone shoot, we posed and smiled. And then, I noticed what happened.

Half the subjects flocked the photographer to see the pictures and weigh in on which was the best. I – and most of my friends – are approaching middle age, so this can take work: not only should eyes be open and smiles be appropriate, but double chins should be hidden, underarm flab smoothed, and bodies at an angle to minimize hip width. There was a quick but important chatter about which of the many versions were acceptable to all parties and permissioning for posting on social media.

Interestingly, the other half of the subjects (and, to be honest, mostly the men), simply walked away from the scene. It was as if nothing happened.

My instinct was to join in the evaluation. For years, I had been a participant in assessing the photos based on my vision of how I thought I looked best. This was an automatic response rather than a conscious one, conditioned by my society – and likely reinforced by pressures put upon my gender. I was supposed to care not only about what I looked like, but also about how that was represented. But in this thing, as in all things, I had a choice. Did I – not as a woman, but as Meredith – actually care about those things?

Not much.

And so, I decided. From that moment forward, I would not evaluate photos of myself. I would simply let them be. I refused to expend intellectual or emotional energy editing the pictures and selecting the most favorable version of the truth. Whether each photo fit my own expectation of what “good” looked like for me really didn’t matter: the picture was represented what I did look like at that moment, whether I liked it or not.

It seems small and trivial. After all, it’s only my behavior in the moment after the flash. But, in this as in everything else, it’s freeing to realize that I get to decide how to be.

Since making that decision, I’ve felt free. I categorically don’t care. I consistently don’t need to engage. Now, when people take pictures of me, they often still ask: “Do you want to see it?” It feels like it’s really me answering when I say “no.” I’m sure it’s fine. Or not fine. It is how it is. And whether I like it or not, it is the truth of how I look in this moment. Then, I go back to my conversation.

This is your chance to choose as well. There is no right answer. You can care or not care. You can look or not look. You can edit or not edit. As long as you make a conscious choice aligned with your own values, it’s perfect.

How do you act when photos are taken?

What does that say about what you value? What does that say about what you fear?

And if you were to consciously choose, how do you want to be in those situations?

Meredith

Like what you’re reading? Find more in my newest book, The Intentional Life: Reflections from Conscious Living, available here from Amazon.

EXHIBIT A:  Most recent mediocre picture of me, from Drag Queen Story Time yesterday (Note to self:  Beyond this article, I will simply never look good enough standing next to a Drag Queen)

[image error]

 

Five years ago, I started this blog. I launched it in May 2014 while I was visiting the Kloster Arenberg, a convent outside of Frankfurt, Germany. I was then—and continue to be—a junkie for solitary, spiritual retreats. At the time, nothing sounded better than a quiet weekend amongst nuns. Between walks in the woods, visits to the stations of the cross, and trips to the sauna, I managed to write my first post—all 518 words of it.

In that first entry, “The Courage to Begin,” I expressed anxiety that my writing would not be good enough, and that posts shared on the web would be hauntingly permanent. But more than either of those fears, I feared the judgment of others. I wrote, “There’s vulnerability in expressing myself authentically… What if you think I’m silly, stupid, or too much of a hippie? What if you think I’m too pragmatic, too intellectual, or not intuitive enough?” While I was theoretically bought in on authenticity, I dreaded its ramifications both online and in real life.

Yet, over the last five years and seventy-five posts, I continued to put myself out there. With each post, I learned more about myself. With each post, I came to care less about the opinions of others. Just as important, with each post, I came to understand more about what mattered to me. As I moved away from worrying about approval, I focused more and more on my mission: to give a clearer view to life and how to live it meaningfully. Now, I have the courage not only to publish my work online, but also to share the collective wisdom of The Intentional in my second book, The Intentional Life: Reflections from Conscious Living, which publishes later this week.

[image error]The element of The Intentional Life that I’m most proud of is its authenticity. While the topic of the book is living intentionally, the content could not be more personal. It includes reflections on major life events (e.g., engagement, marriage, childbirth) and mundane, everyday life (e.g., parenting, cooking, working). It shows my weaknesses, fears, and failings. And, if it has been successful, it gives a better view into what it looks like to live intentionally and calls you to reflect more on your own life.

So happy birthday, The Intentional. I am meaningfully different than I was five years ago when we started this journey. Thank you for providing an incredible platform for my on-going development – and the inspiration for my next big turn as an author.

Meredith

The Intentional Life is live this week!

Order the paperback here.

Order the Kindle version here.

And, if you prefer to hear my voice while you’re out and about, wait for the audiobook release shortly!