return to normal

How to Transition Back to “Normal”

It’s finally happening.  After over a year of living with some quite unexpected and unprecedented constraints, the world is finally, slowly opening back up.  Whether we return to a fully open state tomorrow or several months from now – and also regardless of whether you think it should have happened yesterday or should be put…

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perfection

How to Combat the Need for Perfection

I recently had a conversation with a friend I hadn’t spoken to in years.  I’ve always loved talking with this particular friend, but this time she was more somber when the conversation ended.  My friend was working herself to exhaustion – she couldn’t sleep, was losing more weight than she could afford to, and was…

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Why Boredom Is Good For You

It’s safe to say that most of us have experienced a higher-than-average level of boredom in the last 12 months.  Nothing like having everything closed and being forced to stay at home to make you wonder what exactly to do with your time.  For many of us, the answer was to complain about it.  I’ve…

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Moving Forward in 2021

Moving Forward When Everything Has Changed

And here we are.  It’s 2021, and the longest year in living memory is finally behind us.  Time to celebrate and get back to normal, right? Except that there really is no getting back to normal, is there?  Both personally and professionally, you’ve experienced too many changes for too long to just hit ‘reset’ and…

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Positive Thinkinging 2020

Looking On The Bright Side of The Worst Year Ever

We made it!  We are at the end of the longest, most annoying year any of us has experienced.  I think it’s safe to say 2020 has been thoroughly exhausting – and in case you don’t agree, I recommend keeping your thoughts to yourself if you want to keep any of your friends. And yet,…

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zoom fatigue article

Conquering Zoom Fatigue Once and For All

So, you’re sick of videoconferences.  You’re not alone.  Healthy percentages of us – between 25% – 35%, depending on which survey you read – are zoning out on calls, or doing other things, or simply staring at the wall and waiting to hear our names so that we can say, “Uh-huh” or “I agree” and…

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decision making article

Overcome the Paralysis of Making Small Decisions

Sometimes I spend ten minutes trying to decide which pair of pants I should wear.  My wife has been known to agonize for weeks about what theme to choose for our children’s birthday parties.  And my brother once spent two years debating which couch to buy for his living room.  None of these are life-altering…

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Business Improvement Tips During Coronavirus Times

What To Do When Your Business Is Idle

Last month I wrote an article about what to do when you have nothing to do.  It was designed for individuals who were starting to get tired of walks around the neighborhood and board games and all the things we’ve spent five months doing waaaaay more of than usual.  It was a great article, possibly…

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Personal Improvement

How to Improve Yourself When You Have Excess Downtime

The pandemic has brought a grand reckoning to almost every element of our lives, but the one I’d like to focus on here is how it has forced us to figure out what to do when we might feel there is nothing to do.  In fact, if you can ignore for a moment the various…

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The Upside of Catastrophe

The Upside of Catastrophe

I’m not saying anything especially ground-breaking when I say that the last several months have been catastrophic for just about everyone.  There’s the pandemic, obviously.  But that’s not the only catastrophe I’m referring to.  There’s the murder of George Floyd in broad daylight on a busy street, which was not the first time a person…

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Funny Fishing

It’s Not All Catastrophe

Thankfully the last month hasn’t been all catastrophe.  Here are some things that should bring a smile to your face.  The world is still weird – rejoice! Lucky Man Can Fish All He Wants A Michigan man recently won a $4,000,000 jackpot – 3 years after winning a different $4,000,000 jackpot.  He used a lucky…

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One thing stronger than a pandemic

The One Thing Stronger Than a Pandemic

(aka Colemans Rule!) So my house flooded last month, because why not.  And not just my house, but several thousand of them where I live.  You may have seen it on the news – a dam broke about 30 miles north of where I live and forced an immediate evacuation of about 10,000 families immediately…

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Howl At the Moon!  (Or Your Neighbors)

And here we go, yet another month of disruption – and yet another month where people found interesting and fun ways to deal with it.  Hope you enjoy! If You’re Happy And You Know It… Howl as loudly as possible.  That’s at least what one Facebook group with over 500,000 members has decided to do. …

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how to eliminate risk

Can Risk Be Eliminated?

I’ve been thinking a lot about risk lately. In all fairness, as I near the end of my second month in quarantine I have been thinking a lot about all kinds of things – poetry, weasels, gymnastics, pancakes, mulch, and you get the idea. But as far as business goes, my brain keeps circling back…

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rent a donkey

Rent My Toilet Paper Donkey Pants!

Another month, another wave of uncertainty. Thankfully, some amusing things managed to happen even while we were all figuring out how to telework and take care of our kids and not drive our loved ones insane. Hope you enjoy! Virtual Animal Rentals! A farm in North Carolina is allowing people to rent its animals for…

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The Power of Proper Messaging

Hey everybody! So, this month has been different, hasn’t it? I was supposed to be in seven cities and two different countries this April, and instead I’m doing….well, not that. Also, my daughter’s 1st birthday is in about two weeks, and we have all the decorations you’d need for three birthdays – but since nobody…

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Upside Down Chicken Renting Teleconferencing Fails!

Last month was, for most of us, a monumentally awful one. But that doesn’t mean everything was awful. Here are some things I’ve managed to scrounge up that will hopefully put a smile on your face. Enjoy! Why Video Calls Will Never Be Standard Since everyone on the planet is working from home now, businesses…

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how to respond to a crisis

How Should You Respond To A Crisis? 

Ah, crisis. It’s a fun word to say, but that’s the only fun thing about it. Crisis brings massive uncertainty, and we generally don’t deal well with that. Besides, crises often bring the potential for something significantly negative without offering the potential for something positive. We call it risk when things might end well but…

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so you want to be famous

So You Want To Be Famous…

Culled from news headlines this month, here are a pair of stories that should give you hope that you can absolutely be famous (whether or not you should be), and that you can easily lie to whoever you want to as long as the lighting is right. Enjoy!  There Is A Record For Everything It’s…

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Perfection Article

Striving for Perfection? I’ve Got Something Even Better

Recently I re-did one of my bathrooms. Our home was built in 1990 but somehow decorated in 1970, and after a couple years of staring at that disco-inspired atrocity I was compelled to make it right. So I ripped everything out, including the walls, and rebuilt it. Gone are the flaking brass finishing, the perfectly-maintained-yet-suuuuuper-tacky…

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