Dr. Kenney’s Friday 5 Spot
On Fridays I like to share experiences I’ve had during the week with patients and in my personal life that I’ve found significant. I share these in the hope that you might find value in them and have something that resonates with you in your life.
Something I believe. When my oldest son was about 7-8 years old, he had his first piano lesson. After a 30-minute session, his teacher told his mom, “Well, he’ll never be a concert pianist.” To her, somehow a kid that had just touched piano keys for the first time was supposed to be Mozart and anything less was a waste of time (we fired that lady). As someone that has experience coaching kids and mentoring adults, I find that type of assessment appalling. In fact, my way of seeing things is quite different.
Personally, I look for attitude and energy first and worry about skills second. Anyone that has passion and desire can easily be directed. They already care, want to do well, and are excited to learn; all of which are invaluable. Talent is wonderful too but cannot make up for deficiencies in those areas. When someone possesses great skill but has no fire behind it, they are difficult to coach and often don’t work hard because things have come easier for them. Given a choice of having an army of the most passionate or the most skilled; I’ll take the most passionate and turn them into something special.
Something that helps me. Most of us have been on the receiving end of tough situations such as abuse, abandonment, adultery, and the like. These things hurt badly and cause damage. When I was younger, I would allow hurtful things to impact me indefinitely and they would manifest into poor actions and decisions within my own life. Over time, I began to understand that not moving past what had happened gave it more power than it deserved. Thus, I began to understand the importance of forgiveness.
Forgiving someone does not mean you must justify the terrible things done to you. It is simply a way of letting go of the past and freeing yourself of the burdens it produced. When I forgive someone, I don’t even need them to apologize. I make my peace with what has happened and decide to move forward without resentment. I do so not because I’m weak, but because I’m smart enough to understand the benefit and strong enough to move forward. This does not mean I forget what they’ve done or trust them because if that happens, it must be earned. Unforgiveness is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to do. Therefore, become great at forgiving but not necessarily forgetting. If you do, it will be far easier to live a happier, more content life, with far less anger.
An important concept. I used to have a tremendous fear of public speaking. In fact, there were 5-10 times when I absolutely bombed including a best man speech and a dedication speech for a former coach of mine. In each instance, I prepared extensively but let fear affect me. I became so scared about how it would go that I forgot to be myself and, in the end, it went exactly how I worried it would. Eventually, these botched speaking engagements taught me a valuable lesson.
Fear can destroy anything because it changes your mindset from “I can do this” to “I can’t do this” and then your physiology and actions follow. As an outgoing, confident man, I used to get in front of an audience, lose all my personality, and begin rushing through my material. After enough failures, I adopted a different approach. First, I committed to being my authentic self, figuring it couldn’t go any worse than it had. Second, I focused on simply getting through the first 30 seconds of my speeches/talks because after that point, I was able to relax and build confidence. Fear kills anything it touches so do not allow it to absorb you. Take even the smallest steps so that fear becomes manageable and holds no power over you.
A recent interaction. My oldest son and I were discussing an adult we know that neither of us care much for nor respect. This person is highly arrogant, quick to criticize, and slow to make any changes of his own. I pointed out to my son two important lessons that behavior such as that should teach us.
First, you will never meet a hater doing more than you. High-performing people have neither the time nor energy to concern themselves with petty criticism or judgement. They are too focused on what they’re trying to accomplish to demean what others may be striving for. Second, I encouraged my son to look for people around him that are exceling in something and learn from them. Seeking out people that are doing remarkable things is far more effective in creating personal growth than tearing down others. All of us will encounter people that we don’t like but I recommend keeping this consistent strategy to deal with them.
Some quotes I Love.
“Your next move matters more than your last mistake.”
“If you didn’t have a dad to teach you how to be a man when you were growing up, the best thing you can do now is become the man you should have had when you were a boy. Let your baggage expire. You’re a clean slate. Now, become the man you would have looked up to as a child.” – Ryan Michler