Barrington Hall Steampunk Saturday

Barrington Hall Steampunk Saturday, a set on Flickr.

One foot in the past and one in the future, the lush and highly imaginative world of Steampunk invaded Roswell, Ga., on Saturday, April 28th. The elaborate architecture and aesthetics of Barrington Hall provided the perfect backdrop for this fantasy world. Attendees were graced with exhibits, demonstrations, and live music from Vauxhall Garden Variety Players.

Mushroom Hike at Blue Heron Nature Preserve

Mushroom Hike at Blue Heron Nature Preserve, a set on Flickr.

Images from my morning mushroom walk with mycologist Mary Woehrel, founder of the Georgia Mushroom Society, at Blue Heron Nature Preserve.

Essential Skills for Overcoming Life’s Obstacles

How resilient are you? How well do you react to unexpected challenges and conflicts?  Resilience is fundamentally underpinned by the concept that it is not so much the hard times we face that determine our success, or failure, as the way in which we respond to those hard times. In particular:

• the accuracy of our analysis of events;
• the number of alternative scenarios we can envisage;
• the ability to be flexible;
• the continued drive to take on new opportunities and challenges.

Although many of the external pressures on our resilience can neither be controlled nor reversed – the rain will continue to fall, the market will often be slack, and we will never be able to regain those lost hours spent in traffic jams – evidence suggests that our internal thinking processes can both moderate the impact of these adversities, and provide a valuable resource in moving forward from them, focusing on the things we can control rather than those we cannot.

The key to resilience is the ability to recognize your own thoughts and structures of belief, and harness the power of increased accuracy and flexibility of thinking, to manage the emotional and behavioral consequences more effectively. This ability can be measured, taught, and improved.

There are seven key skills proven in both clinical and corporate settings to boost resilience.

1. Emotion Regulation – the ability to manage our internal world in order to stay effective under pressure. Resilient people use a well-developed set of skills that help them to control their emotions, attention, and behavior.

2. Impulse Control – the ability to manage the behavioral expression of thoughts emotional impulses, including the ability to delay gratification, as explored in Daniel Goleman’s work in Emotional Intelligence. Impulse Control is correlated with Emotion Regulation.

3. Causal Analysis – the ability to accurately identify the causes of adversity. Resilient people are able to get outside their habitual thinking styles to identify more possible causes, and thus, more potential solutions.

4. Self-efficacy – the sense that we are effective in the world – the belief that we can solve problems and succeed. Resilient people believe in themselves and as a result, build others’ confidence in them – placing them in line for more success and more opportunity.

5. Realistic Optimism – the ability to stay positive about the future, yet be realistic in our planning for it. It is linked to self-esteem, but a more causal relationship exists with self-efficacy, and involves accuracy and realism – not Pollyanna-style optimism.

6. Empathy – the ability to read others’ behavioral cues, to understand their psychological and emotional states, and thus, build better relationships. Resilient people are able to read others nonverbal cues to help build deeper relationships with others, and tend to be more in tune with their own emotional states.

7. Reaching Out – the ability to enhance the positive aspects of life, and take on new challenge and opportunity. Reaching out behaviors are hampered by embarrassment, perfectionism, and self-handicapping.

More than education, more than experience, more than training, a person’s level of resilience determines who succeeds, and who fails.

Know Your Value

A well-known speaker started off his seminar holding up a $20.00 bill. In the room of 200, he asked, "Who would like this $20 bill?" Hands started going up. He said, "I am going to give this $20 to one of you but first, let me do this." He proceeded to crumple up the $20 dollar bill. He then asked, "Who still wants it?" Still the hands were up in the air. "Well," he replied, "What if I do this?" And he dropped it on the ground and started to grind it into the floor with his shoe. He picked it up, now crumpled and dirty. "Now, who still wants it?" Still the hands went into the air. "My friends, we have all learned a very valuable lesson. No matter what I did to the money, you still wanted it because it did not decrease in value. It was still worth $20. Many times in our lives, we are dropped, crumpled, and ground into the dirt by the decisions we make and the circumstances that come our way. We may feel as though we are worthless. But no matter what has happened or what will happen, you will never lose your value. Dirty or clean, crumpled or finely creased, you are still priceless to those who DO LOVE you. The worth of our lives comes not in what we do or who we know, but by WHO WE ARE. You are special--Don't EVER forget it."

Do pass this on, you may never know the lives it touches, the hurting hearts it speaks to, or the hope that it may bring. Count your blessings, not your problems...