Monday Moments

Last week we spoke about how to use regret to your advantage—to use it as a tool, and transform it from harmful to helpful.   This week, let’s speak about how you can prevent regret in the first place.   Remember, there are two reasons for regret:   1. We say or do something we wish we didn’t2. We don’t say or do something and wish we did   There are a variety of reasons that could cause this. Let’s address two of them.   When you lose controlWhen you feel attacked, or when you get pushed over the edge,…

This week I want to speak about a powerful word:   Regret.   Regret is defined as a feeling of sadness or disappointment about something that you did—or something you did not do.    Maybe you regret something you said to a colleague, a loved one, or even a stranger—and wish you could take it back.   Or, maybe you regret not speaking up, or not taking advantage of an opportunity—and wish you had.   Regardless, the feelings that come up because of words, actions, or inactions can be formidable.   They can be paralyzing.  Painful.  Debilitating.    But I…

I just had the most amazing conversation with neuroscientist and bestselling author Anne-Laure Le Cunff.    Anne-Laure spent an hour with members of the Lighthouse, and we spoke about her experience working at Google, followed by a failed startup, and how her learnings led to a new approach—and a new book.   Anne-Laure also shared a useful tool called a “consequence cascade”—but I like to refer to it by a different, simpler name:   So what.   How to use “So what” Here’s how so what works:   Whenever something goes wrong, you use the phrase “so what” to go…

How stressed do you get about time?   Let’s see if any of the following scenarios sound familiar:   You get a late start, and the whole day you’re running behind You always feel rushed, to the point that you start to get panicky You look at your task list at the end of the day, and you’ve only finished half (or less!) of what you planned  You constantly feel that time is slipping away    In other words, you always think…   There. Is. Not. Enough. Time.   But what if you could reframe the way you think about…

A few weeks ago, I was struggling.   No particular reason. It was more like a thousand things all at the same time.   As I finished up work for the day, I put on some headphones and put on some music.    Suddenly, something interesting happened…   I felt all this pent up emotion. I didn’t know what to do with it. But I knew I had to let it out. So…   I did.   I know what you’re thinking…   Let it out? How?   First, I re-queued the song I just heard—it was a song I…

I’ve made a lot of mistakes.    This isn’t a secret. Despite having spent years coaching executives, managers, teams, and therapists on emotional intelligence and communication, I’m not perfect—not even close.   That’s not horrible. It just means I’m human.    The key is I’ve learned from most of those mistakes…and that’s given me valuable experience.   They say experience is the best teacher. What they don’t tell you is which kind of experience.   What I mean is, it’s much better to learn from others’ experience when you can. That way, you get the helpful lesson, without going through…

Want to know how you can be a better:   leader teammate spouse parent friend   There’s one thing you can do for others, that almost no one else does.   It’s a way to help others become the best version of themselves. A gift that keeps on giving.   What is this gift?   See their potential In a classic study by Harvard psychologist Robert Rosenthal, students from 18 different classrooms (ranging from Kindergarten to the fifth grade) took a cognitive ability test, which measured skills deemed critical to learning and problem solving.   Afterwards, Rosenthal shared the test…

“But, why would you do it that way?”   For the life of me, I couldn’t understand why my wife would possibly load the cup saucers toward the front of the dishwasher. They seemed to be such an obvious fit towards the back.    And besides, putting them in the front totally messed up the system…You know, the system that made perfect sense in my head.“Well, look, these slots are skinnier so they fit perfectly here,” my wife calmly explained. “And then you can put bowls here, and cups here.”   What madness, I thought to myself.   Yes, my…

Last week we spoke about the value of delivering emotionally intelligent feedback—feedback that the recipient sees as helpful, not harmful.   But what if we’re on the receiving end of feedback? What if that feedback is negative? Or, what if it’s, gasp: criticism???   Criticism. Just the thought might send chills down your spine.   Why?   Because criticism feels like an attack—and that attack causes a small almond-shaped part of your brain known as the amygdala to spring into action.   In a sense, when you feel under attack the amygdala “hijacks” your brain and causes you to respond…

When I was a young manager, I hated the thought of giving negative feedback to my team.   “What if it doesn’t go well?” I’d ask myself. “What if they completely miss the point? Or, worse yet, what if they get upset?”   Those were valid concerns, because most leaders and managers use one of the following methods:   The (rotten) sandwich method (praise, negative feedback, praise) Super direct and don’t care how the feedback is received Too subtle OR wordy so the point of the feedback is lost   Because of this (and other reasons we’ll talk about next…