In college-level psychology courses, one of the fun things you get to do is train mice. In addition to being easy, training mice helps you learn a lot about behavior generally and rewards and punishments specifically.

Someone should write a book on training mice for kids. It’s simple. An 8 year old that can learn it.                                                      

For example, we can create a maze and put Miss Mouse at the entrance. Let’s say we want to teach her to always go right as the first move when entering a maze.  We’ll reward her when she goes right. If she goes left, there is no reward, we pick her up and start over.  Eventually we would expect Miss Mouse to always start out going to the right. That’s where the rewards are.

In the field of “Game Theory,” we can model learning without touching mice or spending money on cheese.  In the example above, we divide the mouse’s behavior into two categories: Go Right and Go Left.

Now let’s say that a basic store-bought, untrained mouse is equally likely to go left or right. So the probability left = 50% and the probability right = 50%.  Let’s also say that each reward will increase the probability of repeating the rewarded activate by 10%.

Here’s how the mouse learns: Chance of going right = 50%.

Event 1:	Mouse goes left	No reward	Chance of Going Right 50%
Event 2:	Mouse goes right	Eats cheese	55% (50 X 110%)
Event 3:	Mouse goes right	Eats cheese	60.5% (55 X 110%)
Event 4:	Mouse goes left	No reward	60.5% (no change)
Event 5:	Mouse goes right	Eats cheese	66.5% (60.5 X 110%)
Event 6:	Mouse goes left	No reward	66.5% (no change)
Event 7:	Mouse goes left	No reward	66.5% (no change)
Event 8:	Mouse goes right	Eats cheese	73.2% (66.5 X 110%)
Event 9:	Mouse goes right	Eats cheese	80.5% (73.2 X 110%)
Event 10:	Mouse goes right	Eats cheese	88.6% (80.5 X 110%)
Event 11:	Mouse goes left	No reward	88.6% (no change)
Event 12:	Mouse goes right	Eats cheese	97.4% (88.6 X 110%)

In this example we see that after 12 trips into the maze, the mouse is likely to go right 97% at the time! Notice also that the mouse went the wrong way five times and the right way seven times.

All you home psychologists should know that the reward must be given right away.

Notice that rewarding the behavior you want has a dramatic impact on future behavior.

Stop.

Highlight That.

Rewarding the behavior you want

has a dramatic impact on future behavior.

Reward and believe:

That was fun, but we’re spending too much money on cheese. We can’t give a reward every time. The next experiment would be to give a reward with every second correct move rather than every time.

The result is that learning is a bit slower, but still quite dramatic.  After seven correct turns, the mouse is likely to go right almost 75% of the time.

So, we know that rewards work. What about punishment? Since we don’t want to physically harm our mouse, let’s say we stick to psychological damage. We’ll reward every second correct choice, but this time we’ll also have a mild punishment for incorrect choices. For punishment we’ll play ten seconds at Jethro Tull at very high volume. Again, the punishment must be administered right away to be effective.

Because this is a mild punishment, let’s say the effect is to decrease the chance at going left by 10%.

We start out with chance Right = 50% and chance Left = 50%

Event 1:	goes left	Punish	Chance of Going Left 45%	Chance of Going Right 55%
Event 2:	goes right	Reward	39.5%	60.5%
Event 3:	goes left	Punish	35.5%	64.5%
Event 4:	goes right	No Reward	35.5%	64.5%
Event 5:	goes right	Reward	29.1%	70.9%
Event 6:	goes left	Punish	26.2%	73.8%
Event 7:	goes right	No Reward	26.2%	73.8%
Event 8:	goes right	Reward	18.8%	81.2%
Event 9:	goes left	Punish	16.9%	83.1%
Event 10:	goes right	No Reward	16.9%	83.1%
Event 11:	goes right	Reward	8.6%	91.4%
Event 12:	goes left	Pushish	7.7%	92.3%

As you can see, you don’t need to give a reward every time, but a combination of rewards and mild punishments is very effective. You can also summarize from the math that greater rewards and greater punishment would result in more dramatic changes and behavior.

Some Words of Caution
In our example we use a mild punishment. Strong punishments are generally to be avoided. In addition to electrocuting our mouse, we want to avoid instilling too much fear.

Punishment works by increasing fear. A punishment that is too strong can leave the subject (e.g. Miss Mouse) nervous about making a wrong move. This can result in slow, cautious, halting behavior. See the note on consistency below.

You must also be careful with rewards. Once a behavior is learned you can cut the rewards way back. Even sporadic rewards can maintain a well learned behavior.

We won’t go through the math necessary to demonstrate diminishing motivation, but you should know that the chances of correct behavior will decrease as the time between rewards increases. Dropping all rewards altogether will have no immediate effect. However,  over time even well-learned behaviors will drift back to the probabilities we saw in the untrained mouse. One big reward all at once has almost no effect. If we give Miss Mouse a huge chunk of cheese the first time she goes right, but no rewards after that, she’ll think she just stumbled on some cheese. Smaller, regular rewards are much more effective.

The most important factor in using rewards and punishments is consistency. Close behind that is timeliness.

If you give a reward or punishment it must be administered immediately after the behavior. Think about training your dog: Doggie brings you the newspaper, goes outside for no apparent reason, comes back inside, gets a drink of water, then lies down to take a nap.

If you then praise the dog for bringing you the newspaper, he won’t connect the two. He will think he is being praised for lying down. It’s my personal theory that this is the reason dogs spend so much time lying down–they’re trying to make you happy.

Timeliness and consistency go hand in hand. You want to reward (or punish) behavior right away to have the greatest impact. Timeliness connects the reward (or punishment) to the behavior. Consistency provides reinforcement. If a mouse is rewarded sometimes for going left and sometimes for going right, she won’t see a connection between behavior and reward. Even worse, if she is punished sometimes for a left turn and sometimes for a right turn, she will avoid both behaviors.

Let’s go back to the lab for an illustration. The classic example of arbitrary rewards is the pigeon who gets fed a food pellet at random intervals. If the pigeon happens to be cleaning his wing when this happens, he might try cleaning his wing again to see if there’s another reward. And if there just happens to be a reward at the time he is cleaning his wing, he thinks he has learned a connection.

The same happens for scratching the floor, nodding his head, etc. With no connection between behavior and rewards, the pigeon will “learn” things that result in reward. So, after a few days we have a pigeon who spends all his time scratching and squawking and strutting around trying to “learn” a reward. Inconsistent, arbitrary rewards create and encourage a pattern of behavior, but not necessarily the behavior you want.

There is also the classic pigeon example of arbitrary punishment. When researchers randomly administer punishments, pigeons “learn” to avoid various behaviors. So, over time, we have a bird that doesn’t clean, doesn’t scratch, doesn’t walk in circles, doesn’t walk in a line. Eventually, the bird stands in one place afraid to take any action at all.

Inconsistent, arbitrary punishments lead to a fear of doing anything. You actually train the pigeon to do nothing.

In general, I believe rewards are a better teaching tool than punishments. Based on a worst case scenario of inconsistent, powerful rewards, you will have a subject who is constantly trying to do what it takes to get the reward. This subject is highly motivated and easily trained in the correct behavior: as you adopt a consistent reward procedure (even with small rewards), the subject will learn the new behavior quickly. And as rewards disappear for the old, arbitrary behavior, the old habits will fade away.

The worst-care scenario for inconsistent, powerful punishments is a subject who is paralyzed by fear. Adopting a consistent policy of rewards and punishments is very difficult in this case. First, you have to teach the subject that it’s okay to do something. There you have to coax it to overcome specific fears in order to try the behaviors that will now be rewarded.

As you can imagine, the quickest way to overcome fear and train new behavior in this case is with timely, frequent rewards; rewards powerful enough to overcome fear of punishment.

Does all of this really translate to human beings? Remember the mantra “Rewarding the behavior you want has a dramatic impact on future behavior.”

People absolutely respond to reward and punishment. If you don’t believe me, raise a child!

I am over-educated. I have used a few simple rules for raising my daughter.
1) No physical punishment.
2) She knows what the rules are.
3) She is consistently punished for incorrect behavior.
4) She is consistently rewarded for good behavior

I’m not perfect and my daughter is not perfect,* but my daughter knows she’s loved and she’s very well behaved.  She never begs for toys or candy at the store. I never go through the routine of some parents who say “no-no-no-no-no” until they finally say “yes, but this is the last time.”

Children are extremely smart. They are all naturally lawyers. They want to pick apart your answer for clarity and consistency. They compare the current answer to all past similar behavior. They are willing to negotiate and compromise until they get something out of the deal. It is very difficult in change a policy without a good reason. If you show any weakness, they’ll take advantage of it.

Children are also delightful to work with because humans are intelligent enough that we can talk about punishments and rewards and create punishments and rewards through the use of speech.

For example, you can create rewards by agreeing that a hug is a reward, or staying up on extra five minutes, or helping to cook the soup, or putting a gold star on the calendar.

The same is true of punishments. Sitting on the floor for five minutes is a punishment. In fact, this may be the most consistently successful punishment we’ve ever used. My  daughter was told that this is a punishment and it became one.

Okay, but what about adults?
Adults have one major disadvantage: they have experienced a wide variety of rewards and punishments that are outside your relationship with them. Thus, they’ve learned about a world of rewards and punishments that is completely unknown to you.

Punishing Adults Confused about punishment?  See Ken Blanchard’s The One Minute Manger series.  Full citations are in the left-hand column.

Very often we adults are a jumbled mess of mixed-up, inconsistent motivations and fears. This is great for psychologists but makes team management difficult.  Adults also have some advantages: they tend to be motivated to do well and they have excellent reasoning ability.

This reasoning ability gives us the power to lay out reward systems without a lot of “trial and error.” We can also agree before-hand on rewards and punishments. And, best of all, rewards do not have to consist of instant gratification.

So, rather than having to instantly reward people as we see the correct behavior, we can agree on incentive programs, weekly meetings, and quarterly reports.

Here are some guidelines . . . But, don’t forget what we’ve learned:

You should reward the behavior you want to encourage. You should punish behavior you wish to discourage. Agree on rewards and punishment Consistent small rewards are generally better thatn a single large reward. Consistent small punishments are more effective than large punishments. Rewards and punishments must be timely. With humans they do not have to be “immediate” but should be close to the behavior. Be honest, open, and consistent. Don’t promise a reward and fail to deliver.

Why rewards and punishment, don’t work.

If this is all so simple, why does it seem to not work in your business? Well, as with so many simple truths, we humans don’t have enough faith and we don’t follow the formula. We sabotage over own efforts.

In the Big Picture, a motivational program should work like this:
1) Set goals – short, intermediate, long.
2) Establish rewards and punishments
3) Evaluate performance
4) Administer rewards and punishments (consistently, fairly, honestly)

Repeat:
1) Revise goals periodically
2) Revise Rewards and Punishments periodically
3) Continue to Evaluate
4) Continue to administer

A simple 4-step process, repeated continuously. So why does it fail? It fails because we don’t do one or more of the steps. And 99% of the time, it’s the bosses fault. His excuse is usually “I don’t have enough time.” Goals are not set.

As a result, there is no structure for success. The manager doesn’t have time to tell people what she wants. So they do what they think they should do, whether its what the boss wants or not. In fact, the boss doesn’t even set her own goals.

Stop. Be your own boss for ten minutes.

What are three things you want to accomplish today?
What are three things you want to accomplish this week?

This Month?

Why don’t you take ten minutes every day to decide what’s important today?
Be honest, you do have time.

We . . . the vast majority of bosses and workers . . . don’t set goals. We don’t have a clear idea at what we’re going to do today that will help us advance toward the bigger goals.

Goal-setting should not be a huge scary task that requires retreat time or offsite meetings or long arguments.

Make a habit every day of jotting down your goals. Look at them everyday, and adjust them as needed. This ten-minute habit will change your life. It will bring focus.

The second reason motivational plans fail is lack of integrity. Bosses promise rewards and fail to deliver. Or they are inconsistent with rewards and punishments.

People learn very quickly and they remember negative experiences for a long time.

I have the great good fortune of seeing how different businesses operate. As a result I see motivational plans come and go. I also see successful reward structures that last for a long time.
Overwhelmingly, the lasting techniques are those that are:
1) Clearly understood by everyone.
2) Consistently followed–both rewards and punishments.
3) Perceived as fair.

I berate bosses for being stingy with rewards. Some bosses are even stingy with small rewards. Bosses are rarely stingy with punishments.  If you have a system of large rewards–such as $1000 bonuses or trips to Maui–you had better be prepared to pay up.

But don’t forget that small rewards can be even more powerful. Five weeks into the quarter, some people know they’re not going to win the trip. What’s their motivation?

With small rewards there is a flurry of activity around the rewards. People get regular feedback and compete to get their name in the “star performance” chart, or try to collect the most T-shirts, squeezy toys, pencils, or whatever.

Every day and every week they can see their success. And their success is visible to themselves and others. Finally, competitions evolve as people display these little rewards as measures of their success.

It is beyond my capacity to understand why a boss would be stingy in this process.  Remember that, as humans, we create a reward by agreeing that something is a reward. When we say, for example, that a company T-shirt is a reward, then it has become more than a T-shirt.

If someone meets the criteria, give him the T-shirt! Stinginess with a ten dollar piece of clothing can destroy your motivational program.

First, you lack integrity. If you’re not fair on this little thing, how can your employees trust you on larger things?

Second, you turn a “performer” into a disgruntled employee.

Third, this kind of stinginess will become widely known in very short order.

So you see, bosses can sabotage their own motivational programs when they are stingy.

These discussions of the behavioral sciences are not meant to replace a Bachelor’s Degree in psychology. I encourage you to learn more about rewards and punishments in the workplace.

As a worker, consider what motivates you and talk to your boss about it. But don’t start with $1000 reward and trips to Hawaii. Start with an examination of your daily and weekly activates. What would be an appropriate, small reward for reaching the next performance level each week?

If you’re a boss, consider the two or three basic “building blocks” of your success. What are the measures of your success? These could be increasing sales, productivity, or timeliness; or reducing mistakes, injuries, or sick days.

Find measurable indicators of your success. Begin measuring them and consider what kind of small rewards you can dole out each work for improved performance.

Then have the integrity to present the rewards as promised.

There are lots of good books on reward systems and building motivation in your workplace. You (workers and bosses) need to find a system that works for your job.

As usual, I encourage you to read lots of ideas on this topic and then come up with your own plan.

*Note: My daughter is perfect.

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There’s a lot of “universal” advice out there.  The always-present everyone says don’t smoke, exercise more, eat your fruits and vegetables.

One piece of universal advice is to stop worrying, or at least reduce the level of worry in your life.  After all, we have plenty to worry about—Money, our children, our parents, our spouse’s happiness, a long list of problems at work, even the health of our pets.

Worrying, we are told, adds stress to our lives and focuses on the negative.  It keeps us awake at night, gives us ulcers and is bad for the economy.

I think that’s all a bunch of baloney.

Worrying is natural.  In moderation, worrying is good.  There’s something wrong with people who don’t worry enough!

In the big scheme of things, there are a few people who worry too much (some tiny percentage of the population).  They have intriguing phobias that become fodder for news stories.  This condition (worrying too much) is so rare that most people only learn about it from afternoon TV junk-talk shows.

There is much more of a problem with people who don’t worry enough. Think about this.  What’s your image of someone who doesn’t worry about what other people think, doesn’t worry about social norms, doesn’t worry about paying his bills or insuring his car, doesn’t worry about keeping himself clean or being responsible for his own actions?  The picture in my mind is a young person who is completely irresponsible, who has made a mess of his life and others and who has left it up to other people to fix his messes.

A handful of these people make it to adulthood without changing their ways.  Most, however, go through a long painful process of paying their debts, raising their children, having to work hard and becoming responsible adults.  At which point they find themselves worrying a normal amount—just like the rest of us.

Worrying is a fundamentally good behavior.                                                                                                                                         

As with any other behavior, there is a great benefit to be gained by:

1)      Examining the behavior

2)      Learning to control the behavior

3)      Focusing the behavior

4)      And integrating the behavior into our overall understanding of ourselves.

Thus, the behavior–worrying–becomes one more important piece of our success.

Let’s look at three aspects of worrying

–  What is worry?

–  How much worrying is right?

–  How can we focus our worry in order to reap its benefits?

By “worrying” we generally mean that we are thinking about something; the something is usually a problem that needs to be solved (e.g., “Where will be get the money to . . .”) or a concern about future events (e.g., the health of a loved one); our mind wanders back to the something whenever it has the opportunity; and we find ourselves thinking about the something when we don’t want to.

Thus we find ourselves worrying while we try to sleep or while we’re driving, but not when we’re engaged in a project that requires our full attention.  For example, work keeps our mind off our troubles.

Interestingly, most people “try not to worry.”  In practice this means we try to not think about our problems.  But our unconscious mind knows that the problem needs to be addressed.  So whenever our mind isn’t busy with something else, the thing we should be thinking about pops up to get its share of attention.

What are you trying to avoid addressing in your life?  Why is it that humans think some problems will go away if you ignore them?

Don’t think about the roof and it won’t leak.  Don’t think about your teenager’s risky behavior and it will stop.  Don’t think about your relationship problems and they’ll all smooth out.

Baloney!  You know it’s not true.

We have problems we want to avoid:  We know we should think about them but we don’t want to.  One way that we avoid thinking about problems we don’t want to think about “right now” is to spend time on a hobby or on busy work.

Have you ever noticed that our hobbies tend to be rather technical and detailed?  Whether it’s carving or needlework or gardening or making things or whatever.  Our hobbies fill our minds and are distractions.  This is good—in fact it’s extremely good for our mental health—unless we’re using it to avoid thinking about a problem that needs to be addressed.

Let’s face it, we have problems we embrace and we have problems we avoid.  Those we embrace are labeled “projects” and those we avoid are labeled “worry.”  The only substantive difference is whether we’re ready to address the problem.

Now we know what worry is.  How much worrying is the right amount?  That’s difficult to quantify.  I believe we need to think about the problems in our lives enough so that we understand them.  Notice I didn’t say that we need to “solve” the problems.  If a loved one is gravely sick, there’s little most of us can do to “fix the problem.”  We’re sad, perhaps depressed, maybe scared.  We have a flood of conflicting emotions that we “don’t have time for” or otherwise wish to avoid.

In such a circumstance, we need to force ourselves to sit down and think about what’s going on.  Let the emotions flood in; become overwhelmed; have a good cry; say a prayer; and then go back to our routine for awhile.

It may be necessary to do this every day for some time.  We need to let ourselves feel the feelings we’ve been trying to avoid.  We need to let all the aspects of this experience come out.  It’s difficult and physically draining.  But you need to let yourself experience what’s going on.

Some problems you can solve, but right now you don’t see the solution.  For example, financial problems.  Too many bills, or not enough income, or an unexpected expense.  It’s all too overwhelming, so we set it aside.  Intellectually, we know the problem will just get worse.  But it’s “just too much” to think about right now.

The answer, of course, is to consider all the pieces of this problem:  Your income, your regular bills, your credit, possible sources of loans or other income, payment plans, and so forth.  This is definitely a problem that can be solved.  It requires a lot of thought; it requires a plan of action; it requires some change in behavior; and it requires asking others for help.

These are just a few examples.  In each case the amount of “worry” (thinking about the problem) required is the same. You need to think about it enough to understand the problem.

Oddly enough, most of us spend more emotional energy avoiding our problems than we would spend understanding them if we tried.

Reducing Worry

You can reduce the amount of “worry” in your life by taking time to relax and simply reflect on what’s going on.  If you take time every day to sit down and relax and focus on yourself, you will find these problems a lot less overwhelming.

I try to sit down every day and reflect on four aspects of my life:

- Myself as an individual

- Myself as a father

- Myself as a friend

- Myself as a businessman.

I rarely make lists of what needs to be done or what problems need to be addressed.  I simply think about what’s going on and what I need to do today.  If there’s a problem in one of these areas, or with something else, I let my mind consider it.  I don’t look for solutions or answers.  I do try to consider all aspects of the problem.  The goal is to understand everything about the problem.  When I think I really understand the problem, then it becomes clearer what I need to do.

Worry brings benefits.  That sounds odd to us.  Let me rephrase it:  Spending time thinking about problems brings good things into our lives.

There are two types of “focusing” on problems.  The first is to open your mind and let the problems flood in.  Perhaps focus is the wrong term.  This is more like out-of-focus.  Sit down with a pencil and paper and relax.  Take a few deep breaths and try to clear your mind.  Think about nothing.  Focus on the way your breath feels moving in and out.

Relax.

If you have things to worry about, they will interrupt your relaxation.  As a “worry” presents itself, write down a brief note (not a long paragraph).  For example, you might write

-          College Savings

-          Business partner

-          Ad revenues

-          Etc.

Don’t pass judgment, don’t try to solve the problem, don’t get into details.  Just list your worries.  Set yourself a time a do this listing for ten or fifteen minutes each day for a week.  I guarantee that by day four you will be a lot less worried at night or when you’re concentrating on something else during the day.  Why?  Because your mind has been allowed to spend some time on the things it knows you should be thinking about!

The next step is to focus more clearly on your problems.  For the next several days spend your 10-15 minutes sitting comfortably and “organizing” your problems.  You may want to sort the list into categories such a family, finances, employees, etc.

Then spend a little time writing a bit of detail about each concern.  For example:

I’m worried about college savings for my kids because I’m starting late.  I wonder what college will really cost.  What’s my goal?  How do I get started?  Who can help me?  I need to talk to my spouse about this.

Set yourself a strict limit on this activity.  No more than 30 minutes a day!  You’ll be amazed!  It will give you energy.  Worry will stop draining your energy.  And as you focus on the problem you will naturally break it down into smaller pieces that are much more manageable.

This, in turn, will lead to taking actions that address the problem.  In other words, you’ll be working on a solution!  What you’ve done is to stop spending your energy trying not to worry.  Instead, you are spending a limited amount of energy focusing on issues that need some attention.

Instead of letting “worry” have an unscheduled, unlimited amount of your time, you have allowed a specific amount of time to be used improving your life!

Again, I guarantee that you will see a dramatic reduction in the amount of time spent on unscheduled worry during the day (and night).  Your mind knows that you need to spend time on these activities.  When you allot this time, your mind is more relaxed and it doesn’t need to force these thoughts upon you.

And, even better, when such thoughts pop into your mind now, they will be productive and bring solutions.  The process of focusing on a problem for a specific period and then setting it aside has tremendous power.  It organizes your unconscious mind, which works on possible solutions while you’re doing other things.  Then, seemingly out of nowhere, the solutions come forth into your conscious mind.

Problems never solve themselves:  You need to worry in a healthy way and you will find a solution.  Just as we have to focus on our happiness and our family and our health, we also need to focus on our problems.

You will never be without problems.  But you can be without excessive, unnecessary worry.  Allow yourself time to work on your problems and you’ll have a much more restful mind throughout the day.  Because you’re worrying enough—and not too much.

“Do not anticipate trouble, or worry about what may never happen.” – Benjamin Franklin

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In the Monty Python movie The Holy Grail, King Arthur’s men do not use the terms “charge” and “retreat.”  Instead they use “charge” and “Run away! Run away!”  So, when I tell my friends I’m going on my annual retreat, they always say “Run away! Run away!”

Part of me wants to say that I’m not running away.  But the truth is, I am.  As a part of modern society, a piece of me feels a little guilty about “abandoning” my family, friends and work and all the chores that need to be done around the house.  This is particularly acute since my retreat comes in the early part of December.  I’m also abandoning putting up lights, shopping for gifts and holiday parties. However,  perspective helps (as it always does).

Sometimes we need to “run away” from everything. To retreat is to withdraw, to enter seclusion.  Is the holiday season a bad time for a retreat?  Maybe.  But when is it a good time?  Maybe the holiday season is the perfect time to step back, take time for yourself and plan for the next year.

There are many benefits to be gained from a retreat.  The most obvious are Rest and Relaxation.  On the most recent retreat I attended, the leader asked people as they were gathering together whether they’d taken time for a nap.  “What’s the point of going on retreat,” he asked, “if you’re not going to take a nap?”

Many people find that it takes time–twelve hours or more–to quiet themselves and leave the world outside, and to focus on being away from it all.  And then the end comes too quickly.  We are a society completely deprived of quiet time and solitude.  Going on a retreat forces solitude upon you and then you become hungry for it.  With luck, you incorporate quiet time into your life.

Retreats are also a time for thinking and planning and goal-setting.  Who am I?  What’s my purpose here on Earth?  What do I want to do?  How do I get there from here?  Focusing is very difficult without time to relax.  On a retreat you will have time to think; time to straighten out problems; time to plan for the future; time to put thing in perspective.

And perhaps time to respond to a subtle call from God.

There are many kinds of retreats.  The first step in finding a retreat that’s right for you is to consider

What’s your goal? What kind of retreat are you looking for?

	Couple focused
	Educational
	Health/Fitness
	Meditation
	Men- or Women-focused
	Personal Development
	Re-energizing
	Relaxing
	Religious
	Renewal
	Yoga (spiritual or exercise)
	Other?

Once you begin considering what you want from a retreat, you can start looking for one that’s right for you.  How do you find one?  Most retreats have some religious or spiritual component, so the first place to look is at the office, at your church, synagogue, or temple.  There may be flyers or advertisements on a bulletin board, or someone may know who to call.

You can also search on the Internet.  If you put the words “retreat” and your city/county in a search engine, you’re likely to come up with something.  A few sites that can help you find retreats almost anywhere are:

	www.retreatfinder.com
	www.findthedevine.com
	www.passionist.org

Just remember that these are NOT comprehensive listings.  Almost every county in America has many retreat opportunities.  You just have to look.

Can you create your own personal retreat of one?  Of course.  As you might imagine, I encourage this.  But it is best to go on a guided retreat (especially a silent one) before you create your own personal retreat.  They will provide you with hints and tips, and probably some good readings, that will help you see the full benefits of a retreat.

Then you can “run away” whenever you need to.

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I have discovered two situations in which I’m willing to open my wallet and say “Here.  Take whatever you want.”

The fist situation is Disneyland.  Mickey Mouse can have all the money he wants.  When we’re at Disneyland, I’m happy and relaxed.   My daughter is totally wired, bouncing off the walls, and hyperventilating with fun.  So, lunch is $29 for three people?  No problem.  $50 for a sweatshirt I’ll wear twice a year?  Sounds like a bargain.

And all this is after paying for hotel, airfare, and admission to the park.  Somehow, Disneyland sucks you in and makes you feel that everything is okay.  You’re happy, relaxed, energetic.  Your attitude is positive and troubles have a tough time getting your attention.

You might replace Disneyland with Maui or some other place.  But the idea’s the same.

The other time when I open my wallet freely is during times of stress or emergency.  Something bad has happened and I need to make the problem go away as soon as possible.  As a consultant I see this all the time.  When people have an urgent need, they are willing to pay more.  I can’t count how many times I’ve heard a client say “Is there any amount of money that will get this done faster?”

Perhaps the perfect example of this is shipping a package.  You might pay a low price for “ground” shipping, but a much higher price for 2nd-day.  Overnight is a lot more.  Overnight by 10AM?  Much much more.  I once witnessed a man pay $50 to have a dozen donuts shipped overnight to his mother.

So, when do we open our wallets?  At the extremes.  We are willing to spend money when we’re happy and content or when we’re overwhelmed and frustrated.  In both of these situations your spending habits will be less rational than normal:  You won’t shop prices and you won’t make good decisions.  And yet one of these situations is clearly preferable to the other.

We’d all rather open our wallets to Mickey Mouse than to the repairman.  Why?  Because we’re in control.  At Disneyland, we are making all the choices.  We’ve planned to be there.  We’ve made decisions and set aside some money.

In an emergency or stressful situation, of course, we feel that we’re not in control.  Even if we get to make all the decisions, we feel trapped–we feel like we don’t have “real” choices because we don’t have the choice of walking away and not dealing with the problem.

So, what can you do to improve your attitude, choices, and effectiveness during emergencies and times of stress?

First, spend more time in the happy and content state.

You’re first reaction is probably “Easier said than done.”  True, but you control a great deal about your attitude and your reaction to situations.  You can choose to avoid being overwhelmed and frustrated.

One of the great benefits of meditation is that you learn to take a few breaths and relax, calm yourself, and focus on what’s going on at this moment.

When I first started taking yoga classes, I had an instructor who finished the class with a relaxation exercise.  We would all lie on the floor, eyes closed.  And she would say “This place is always available to you.  Come here when you need to center yourself and relax.”  At first I thought she meant the yoga studio.  (I’m pretty slow sometimes.)

By “this place” she meant the place of relaxation.  But to have relaxation available to you on “short notice,” you have to practice.  Being able to take three breaths and relax yourself takes practice.  You need to do it every day when you’re not stressed out.  Get to know how it feels.  Be comfortable with that state.  Then you can call on it as needed.

Second, when emergencies (or other stressful situations) happen, remember to stay calm.  Stop and think about your resources.  One of the great causes of stress is the belief that “I don’t know what to do.”  In reality, we usually do know what to do but we’re too anxious to think straight right away.  Again:  Relax . . . Focus.

Third, don’t be too shy to ask for help.  Most of the time we don’t need help and we get out of the habit of asking for it.  When we do ask, we are pleasantly surprised at the great response we receive.  How many times have you seen people “come out of the woodwork” to help?  Friends, relatives, and even casual acquaintances are their for you to rely on.  You’re not alone!

Fourth, communicate.  In stressful situations, you need to divide people into two groups — those who are close to you and those who are not.  Chances are very good that those close to you will also be affected by the stressful situation.  Let them know what you’re thinking, engage them in solving the problem, and reassure them that you’ll get through it together.  “Others” will be less directly affected.  They may be more useful at accessing resources and giving a more balanced view of the problem.

As with anything else, you need to practice the skills of stress management before they are needed.  Practice relaxing and focusing.  Practice asking for help and communicating.

And spend more time at Disneyland!

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We have discussed several aspects of “focusing” on your success.  Lots of books have been written on the concept of focusing on the moment, but I want to relay an incident that brought this point into focus for me recently. Brought clarity to focusing on the moment.

I take Bikram-style yoga classes several times a week.  This is a special type of yoga consisting of 26 poses in a hot room (about 100 degrees).  Each class takes 90 minutes.

A few weeks ago I was in a 6 AM yoga class.  About half way through, the instructor said to me “I’d like to see a little more effort there, Karl.”

My first thought was, “Hey!  I got up in the middle of the night to be here for a 6 AM class!  I’ve done 45 minutes of strenuous exercise and I’m about to do another 45 minutes of strenuous exercise!  In a room that’s 100 degrees!  There are only four other people here!  I’ve already put out the effort.”

After a little reflection, of course, I had a different perspective.  All those things were true.  But, after all, I was there to exercise.  And I’d gotten up in the middle of the night to go to a 6 AM class in order to do myself some good.  So I actually had many reasons to put in a little extra effort at that moment.

The lesson is simple:  You have the ability at any moment–at every moment–to put out a little extra effort.  When you find yourself in a meeting you want to escape, or at a cocktail party you can’t handle, or performing a dreary task at your desk, that’s the moment to focus on your success.  You are in the situation:  Make the best of it.  Put out a little more effort.  Then move on to the next moment of your success.

In the same vein, you have the power, at every moment, to take a breath and consider whether your first reaction to a situation is the reaction you wish to exercise.  You experience your life one moment at a time.  Being aware of that, and experiencing it at a conscious level, will give you many more opportunities for success.

So, let’s see a little extra effort out there.

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I am lucky to work with some wonderful people. Recently the work I do with a couple of different people has coincided with events in my personal life. And it has been a powerful experience.

Jenifer Landers (http://www.fullyexpressedcoaching.com/) is my life coach. She helps me with business and personal challenges. Because of all the changes going on in my life this year, she has talked to me about leaving space in my life for people and things to “show up.” For example, my daughter graduated from high school and will be going to college in the Fall. Yikes. That will leave a big space for me to fill.

Or, if you think about it, I don’t have to fill that space. I could just leave it open for awhile to see which opportunities arise.

Another wonderful person I work with is Kelli Wilson. Kelli recently published a book: The Clutter Breakthrough (See her blog). In this very powerful book, Kelli does NOT go through a “plan” to clean up the clutter. Instead, she looks at the root causes of clutter. Her argument is that people have painful experiences in their lives, and they fill up their lives with something in order to avoid the pain.

Some people fill these spaces with alcohol, drugs, sex, shopping, or any number of other things. The goal is not about the alcohol (etc.), but about coping mechanisms that keep them from having to experience the pain or the emptiness.

Analogy: Nerves

There’s a great medical device called a TENS unit. TENS stands for Transcutaneous Electrical Nerve Stimulation. A TENS unit operates from a 9-volt battery. It creates tiny electrical impulses and has pads that are attached to your skin. For example, if you have muscle spasms in your back, a doctor might use a tens unit to block the pain.

The electrodes are taped to the body near where the pain is.

Inside your body there are large nerve fibers and small nerve fibers. Of course these nerves carry pain signals. Well, actually, only the small nerve fibers carry pain. The TENS unit sends tiny electrical impulses down the nerve fibers. It floods the nerve fibers with these harmless impulses. Once the nerves are “filled” with these harmless electrical impulses, the pain signals cannot travel through the nerves.

This is a great analogy for thinking out the spaces in your life. Space might left because of a true loss: A death, a divorce, the loss of a job, or having a child leave home. Similarly, if you have a space that’s filled with pain, you need a mechanism to either stop the pain or at least take your mind off the pain.

And so the coping mechanisms we develop help us to 1) Fill empty space in our lives, and 2) Avoid dealing with the painful spaces in our lives that we’d rather not address. Just as a TENS unit fills the nerves with electrical impulses that keep the pain from getting through, we can use a variety of behaviors to fill our lives with *something* that’s better than the nothing or the pain.

Whether the space is empty (for example, loneliness) or filled with pain, “coping mechanism” are always a short-term solution. Coping mechanism might help you get by today and tomorrow. But longer term, you need to find more permanent solutions.

In the case of pain, the most important goal is to stop the cause of the pain. In terms of emotional pain, the cause is probably YOU and not whatever you think the cause it. Yes, the original cause of the pain was very real. But the ongoing cause of the pain is probably your willingness to continue dwelling on it. Counseling, prayer, and meditation can help you understand the pain and diminish it over time.

But you need to be aware that that process will leave a space where your “old friend” pain used to be.

In the case of loss or loneliness, you will also have an empty space.

No matter how this empty space comes about, you need to find healthy ways to fill that space. But I really encourage you to take some time filling the space. It takes a great deal of self-awareness to leave spaces in your life and not give in to the urge to fill them with “stuff” (physical stuff, activities, hobbies, bad habits, etc.).

Daily quiet time can be an extremely powerful tool to help you with this process. Whether you use it for meditation, prayer, or some other means of being away and clearing your mind, the very fact that you spend time considering your life will help you to work on the spaces in your life.

You may legitimately decide that you want to take up a new hobby, buy some clothes, or do whatever. But with daily contemplation about where your life is going, you will have a much healthier perspective for examining your options.

You may also find that you’ve managed to create a great deal more contentment than you had before.

:-)

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My delightful daughter turned 18 this month and will be graduated from high school at the end of next week. And like everyone else, she has had a series of adventures that brought her to where she is today.

Over the Memorial Day weekend she had an interesting experience that represents an odd milestone for both of us. I went to a technology conference in New Orleans. She needed to find her way to another city, 150 miles away, check into a hotel, and take a two day class.

The organization paying for all this did not make the correct reservations and she had to fix a travel glitch at the last minute. So Daddy jumped in (from across the country), made the hotel reservations and paid for the room. In some sense you can say “what’s new?” but the whole thing is new.

My new reality is that my girl is going off into the so-called real world. We will rely on me when needed. That will become less and less frequent as time goes on. At the same time, she’s at that delightful stage of life when the most mundane things are an adventure. I don’t remember the last time driving three hours to stay in a Travelodge was an adventure for me. :-)

It was nice that she called me. She had a good class and a good adventure. She was a little scared in the hotel alone. But it was a very safe city and a very safe hotel. So in the end it was mostly an adventure.

Now she knows the glamour of travel! She also knows that she can do this again and what she would do differently.

In the meantime, I have a taste of what remote worrying is like. I guess when she goes off to college I’ll be doing more of that. I also need to get used to the new reality.

- – -

It is always good to slow down and take note of these milestones, no matter how small unimportant they are.

In this case I recognize that Victoria is mature and capable. I fully expected this to be as uneventful as it turned out to be. But a little “proof” of her maturity was very nice to see.

There is a sweet sadness in helping my only child to leave home. So far we’re both holding up well.

:-)

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Last week my daughter Victoria (age 17.9 years) embarked on an adventure. The plan was to spend three days in New York City just seeing the sights, then hop over to England and Scotland for a week. She has two weeks for Spring Break and this is her senior year.

We had plans for the first night and the last night in the UK, but nothing in between. We had Britrail passes and tube passes, so we were set to just go. Our plan was to wake up every day and figure out what to do that day.

In this modern era it is very easy to hop on the internet and find a hotel at a good price on short notice.

Note: This approach takes a certain willingness to believe that you will be okay and that things will work themselves out. I have been cultivating that spirit for some time.

Meditation helps, as does an actual commitment to being a low stress person.

I believe you can always choose how you will respond to your environment. Sometimes it’s easier than others. The more planning you have, the easier it is. But, as the saying goes, sometimes life gives you lemons and you have to make lemonade.

So here’s what happened to our vacation plans.

After three fun days in New York City, we went to the airport to catch an all-night flight to England and arrive at 8:30 AM. But my daughter could not get on the airplane because of a problem with her passport.

Stop. Vacation gone. Plane departing in two hours. Fix it or forget it.

At this point some people would add: Panic.

I was a little panicky, of course. But I decided a long time ago that I’m not the kind of person who blows up, yells and screams, abuses the person behind the counter, etc. I tried to stay calm, gathered the information I could.

It quickly became clear that I could not solve this tonight and we were going to miss the plane. Period. Nothing we could do about that. We could contact the passport office in New York or Connecticut. Quick phone call. NY was a seven day wait. No good. Connecticut might get us in within 8 business hours in an emergency. And might get a new passport within 8 business hours. But that means 1-2 more days in NYC with 1-2 days sitting around a government office, just so we could spend a day flying to England to continue the vacation.

We decided to do England another time. The next question was: Do we go home or reboot the vacation?

Important factor: My daughter only gets one spring break her senior year in high school.

So where do you want to go? The entire East Coast is at your disposal. Or we could rent a car and drive home, seeing the sights. Or take trains and see America. Or whatever.

We decided to catch the next flight to Florida and spend time in the sun. Went online and booked one-way airfare. Cheap, even at the last minute. Thank goodness for the Internet.

Total elapsed time since vacation destroyed: about 60 minutes.

Was I happy about the situation? No. But I had decided to NOT panic, NOT make it a disaster, and NOT focus on what I can’t control.

Yes, it will cost a lot of money. But we can use those Britrail passes another time. And we had almost no other out of pocket expenses except airfare. Called the airline and cancelled. They’re rebating a good portion of what we paid.

And here’s the key: We can’t control what we can’t control!

The mindset of not wasting energy on things you can’t control is a mindset that you can practice. You can create that approach to life.

The mindset of creating lemonade when life gives you lemons is a mindset that you can practice.

You get to choose how you will respond to the world.

I hope that my daughter will love the new vacation we are creating and that she will always take the attitude of slowing down and looking on the positive side when things go wrong.

“Stuff” happens in life. You can make yourself miserable and dive into the well of dispair, or you can pick up the lemons and start making lemonade.

Daily quiet time, meditation, and prayer go a long way to making this possible.

Status Report: We just finished three days in Orlando. We’re working our way through the Disney parks. On Sunday we’re heading to Church (It’s Easter) and then off to Daytona Beach. We got a nice hotel ON the beach for $46/night. Thank goodness for the Internet.

We’ll head home when we had planned. It won’t be the vacation we planned, but it’s been a Great vacation and a great adventure so far.

:-)

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No one is surprised when they see that plants don’t grow straight. Plant a squash or a vine and see what it does. If you want it to grow straight, you’ll need to use tent stakes to staple it’s tentacles to the earth.

If fact, it’s almost laughable when you see what people do with trees and bushes. In the “wild” they’re wild. They have a beauty and spontaneity of their own. But under the skilled hands of humans they spend most of their lives staked down and roped into place. They look alike, similar, and uniform — and boring.

But somewhere along the road we get the idea that other things should grow in a straight line. The economy should go up and up and up. Better every year. Faster. Richer.

And when the inevitable slowdown or “crash” happens, we step back and tell each other that it had to happen eventually. You can’t go up forever. House prices can’t go up forever. Stock prices can’t go up forever. Profits can’t go up forever.

Businesses have good years and bad years. Things go up. Things go down. Sometime things even go sideways.

And what about we humans?

Well, we certainly don’t grow in a straight line either.

When you set a goal, you’re eager to go right to it. And we all know you need to focus on that goal and always be moving toward it. But then you find out that there’s a stumbling block or detour.

Very often it’s the case that we need to stop and go get some education. Learn how something works, or who the players are. And while this detour is necessary, we’re not very patient with it because it draws us “off course.”

The truth is, when you’re evolving as a person or a business, you’re only off course if you lose sight of the ultimate goal. Side tours and missteps are part of the process. You can never go in a straight line. The longer you live (or are in business), the more you believe this truth.

In my business we have a philosophy about major projects:
“Something’s going to go wrong. We don’t know what it is, but we’ll find it and fix it.”

Basically, our philosophy is that we’re going to be 100% successful. Why? Because we never lose the big plan.

As individuals we would do well to take the same approach. You might think you’re going to go down a perfect path to a perfect goal. But you won’t. You can’t. Life steps in . . . and there’s nothing you can do to stop it.

We’re all going to grow in a twisting, turning, slanted way. Accepting that will help us to understand the path we’re on, and to forgive ourselves when we realize we’re not growing straight. Keep your “eyes on the prize” as they say and you’ll eventually grow to where you need to be. But don’t insist on a straight path or you’ll spend a lot of energy worrying about the path instead of the goal.

:-)

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I received this in a recent email from Brian Tracy:

Calvin Coolidge, a president who was so reluctant to speak in public that he was given the nickname of “Silent Cal,” will go down in history for his simple but memorable words on success. He wrote, “Press on. Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education alone will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.”

In other words . . . hang in there . . . stick to it . . . keep moving forward . . . Don’t give up.

Every successful person is persistent in pursuing a goal. Now that doesn’t mean that everyone who pursues a goal is going to be successful. But no one who gives up is successful.

Persistence is a necessary (but not sufficient) element for success.

These words really struck me because I’m a big believer in commitment. I don’t say I will do something until I’m ready to follow through. And I always try to project a time period that can be considered “giving it a fair shot.” In other words, if I try something new, I try to stick with it long enough to really see whether it will succeed or fail.

Many people say they’ll try something and then give up after one attempt. “I tried exercising but after a day my muscles were sore.” :-)

Persistence is one of the most difficult qualities to pursue. By definition it requires constant, relentless attention. How many times have I started an exercise regimen and then “something” happened and I got off my regimen? Recently I broke a toe. So five weeks later I’m getting back to walking. Still hurts. But I have to get back to it sometime!

When people are ready to give up they frequently say “I’ve tried everything” or “I tried so hard for so long.” But that’s usually not true. It feels that way, but it’s not true.

The normal pattern of effort for most things is a big push followed by a diminishing effort over time. So early on they put in a huge amount of effort – and they remember that. As their effort diminishes over time, they convince themselves that they are continuing to put out a high level of effort because they view their effort as cumulative.

Eventually they get to the point where they believe they’ve put out supreme effort “forever” when they’ve really put out almost no effort for a very long time.

Persistence means continuing to put out a higher level of effort. You may have heard the quote from Woody Allen: “Eighty percent of success is showing up.” There’s a lot of truth to that. But it’s not just showing up, looking around, and leaving. It’s showing up and putting in the effort. It’s really showing up ready to work.

One key element that helps me with persistence is to try a mental reset: I try to view things as current projects rather than one more step in a process that’s been going on for years. I’ve made a commitment and today I’m going to follow through. NOT: I tied this albatross around my neck and now I have to work at it again until it kills me.

Persistence is another one of those muscles of success: you exercise it a little all the time and it becomes a habit that propels you forward.

:-)

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