Thankful List
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Start the post with “I’m thankful for . . .” Then, start to list what you see, hear, smell, taste, and feel and, as a result, are thankful for. Post every day. You’re not a loser if you miss a day—you just miss a day. Get back on the daily rhythm of posting. I posted my list at the end of every day, so I could spend my day looking for and feeling thankful. Another key to this exercise is do NOT repeat yourself. You can’t say you love your family more than once. Continue to dig deeper. Be specific. Post what you love most about your cat.
Thank
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Here’s a sample of my thankful lists:
I’m thankful for . . .
Claudia, who was gentle with my flu shot.
Dr. Luna, who gave me my first-ever cortisone shot—ultrasound-guided—and I didn’t scream!
Those yellow, small-size needles.
Ice bags.
I’m thankful for . . .
The fall season.
The crisp air.
The light rain that dances off the surfaces.
The trees that provide us the vivid leaves.
Warmth-giving, glowing fire pits.
Portable heaters.
Chai.
I’m thankful for . . .
The engineers and technicians who build and maintain bridges so we can glide across rivers, lakes, and oceans.
The construction crews who have been working on the St. Regis curves for years, trying to make it a better road.
My willpower to say no to the best shake ever.
My new purse—when my willpower was on a break.
Kalispell family hugs.
I’m thankful that . . .
Watching my dad and brother walking together makes my heart sing.
My dad closes his eyes for most photos, and I don’t care.
Dan and I snapped a photo with Lawrence—the pharmacist at Walmart.
Lawrence takes good care of our dad—listens to him, does problem-solving, and genuinely cares—as we live miles away.
Every family has a “Lawrence,” or two, or three, or more.
I am and can be a “Lawrence” for others and their families.
Go ahead. Jump in and start living and posting in gratitude. It will make a difference in your life. You’ll come to fully understand that people are behind most everything that you see and touch. Someone had an idea. Someone is working to make the product. People are doing their best to deliver the product to you.
You’ll begin to look for gratitude. You’ll feel more gratitude too.
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Joy Meter™
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The Joy Meter™ is a tool to help you evaluate different activities, tasks, or experiences for what brings you the most joy to help guide you forward. Joy is measured in three dimensions—before the task, during the task, and after the task—to provide you with a deeper understanding of where your joy comes from. Joy can be scored in these three dimensions, which produces a total joy score for the activity, task, or experience. You’re looking to invest more time in things that score a 10 and above.
First, pick an activity, task, or experience. For example, facilitating a meeting. Write that down in the first column on the Joy Meter™. Now monitor how you feel before, during, and after the activity. How is your energy while preparing for the meeting? Give yourself a score of 1 if drained or 5 if endless joy. If you’re feeling somewhere in between a 1 and 5 give yourself that number.
How is your energy while facilitating the meeting? Give yourself a score. Now, how do you feel after the meeting? Once again, give yourself a score.
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In this example, you entered facilitating a meeting in the first column. Then let’s say you scored a 5 as you prepared for the meeting. Then you scored a 2 when you facilitated the meeting. Then a 1 after you delivered the meeting. Add up your scores. 5 + 2 + 1 = 8. Your total joy score for facilitating a meeting is 8. That’s not great. For those things that score a 10 and above–invest your time here–these are the things that bring you the most joy. Item description
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Complete your own Joy Meter here.
3D Communication Model
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Download the Four Pillars Here
Four Pillars of the 3D Communication Model
Consider these four pillars in relationship to your project before you begin inviting or assigning people to your initiative. Two pillars are the two standards that Can-doers hold themselves and others to–trust and accountability. The other two pillars–gifts and style–help everyone find the best role to play in the project or initiative.
1. Trust—The level of trust among the participants in every project, relationship,
or transaction determines the overall success. Without trust, you’re opening yourself up to a windy road filled with heartache and frustration. Without trust, nothing sticks. Everything is slippery.
Can the 3D Communication Model be used to repair trust? Yes. Depending on the level of mistrust. If trust is completely shattered, using the model will not further erode trust, but it won’t be enough to repair a complete breakdown in trust. How about using the model to establish trust? Absolutely. You’ll find that this tool works beautifully to facilitate transparent, clear communication—which builds trust. Trust is one of the two high standards that Can-doers hold themselves and others to.
2. Accountability—The second of the two high standards that Can-doers hold themselves and others to is accountability. To successfully complete a project or transaction, you need to collaborate with others you trust to get the work done—to be accountable. Relationships are no different. Accountability among the people involved fuels healthy relationships. Lack of accountability quickly turns into lack of trust.
What if the person on the project was accountable but is now falling short? First, you seek to understand. What’s going on with the person? Perhaps they are overwhelmed. Perhaps they have something outside of the project that is weighing heavily on their mind and time. Or perhaps you discover a performance issue. Regardless of the reason, you must talk with your colleague and seek understanding. How can you help?
3. Gifts—People want to give their gifts. Gifts are things like creativity, organizing,
communicating, building, maintaining, selling, singing, and leading. How do you know what people’s gifts are? When you work or live with someone long enough, you have a general sense of what gifts individuals have to offer. You can also ask people what their gifts are. In the next chapter, you’ll learn more about using a gift registry to record these gifts.
Here’s something else to consider when tapping into the gifts of others. Don’t automatically think people always want to give their gift. For example, if they are highly creative, but don’t have the time to offer their creativity given the timeline, you’re adding more stress to the person by assuming their participation. Can-doers invite people to participate.
4. Style—There are multiple dimensions to style. Here, we’re focused on three
primary styles. Little detail, some detail, and data detail. Your goal is to match the level of detail needed in the project with the right person. If the details are not critical, you can tap a little detail person or some detail style person for the task. If the project needs killer detail, you invite the data detail person—the one who loves the spreadsheets—to take the task.
In addition to the style of others, Can-doers know themselves—you are very clear what your gifts and styles are and, importantly, what they are not. For me, I’m a builder. Over time, it would be disastrous to put me in charge of maintenance. I’m in the middle on the detail scale.
With clarity around trust, accountability, gifts, and style, you’re ready to assemble the team and assign roles and responsibilities. Next, you complete the 3D Communication Model to ensure your communication is crisp and clear.
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Be a Clear Communicator: Using the 3D Communication Model for an Upcoming Event
Today, I’m announcing a new team event, which will be held in two months during our normal workday.
Why
So we can:
Recognize our current team for their collaboration in successfully launching our new website,
Welcome three new team members at this event,
And announce a new Q3 initiative, where we will focus on upgrading our internal project management system.
Where
The event itself will be held at our main office and provide a virtual option to attend as well.
DESIGN
Who
Patrick, I would like you to take the lead. And I’d appreciate a brief update from you directly to me each week.
How
We have a budget of $1,000.
I’d like time on the agenda for Kathy to set up the Q3 initiative.
I’d also like a brief pre-work component for the team prior to the meeting.
I’d like you to be creative and be sure that we have fun with solid takeaways from the event.
No crockpots please—remember that we had a fire last time!
DELIVER
Accountability
I’d like everyone to contribute and engage with this event.
Please include as many voices in the planning process as possible.
And please lean heavily on our team to play various roles in the event itself.
Rewards
When we look back on the experience of this event, we will all feel a sense of satisfaction from what we’ve accomplished, coupled with being energized and informed for what’s ahead.
If you spend the entire budget wisely, I’ll put another $200 in the budget as seed money for our next team event.
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Download the 3D Communication Model
With clarity around trust, accountability, gifts, and style, you’re ready to assemble the team and assign roles and responsibilities. Next, you complete the 3D Communication Model to ensure your communication is crisp and clear.
Gift Registry
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Everyone has a gift to give. And everyone wants to use their gifts to contribute. Consider building and maintaining an active Gift Registry. And use it. Every year, find at least twenty minutes with each individual where you can focus on the person. Be authentic. Don’t rush. Listen. Ask each person, “What's a gift you have and we haven’t YET had an opportunity to tap?” Listen.
The Gift Registry can take the form of a simple spreadsheet or an app much like a wedding gift registry that you’d find in retail. Essentially, you’re doing two things by hosting a Gift Registry. First, you’re demonstrating that you’re genuinely interested in knowing more about the gifts and talents that your team members have. Second, you’re creating a way to tap into those gifts—to fuel personal and professional satisfaction.
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You’ll be pleasantly surprised at what you hear: Song writing. Editing. Piano. Spreadsheets. Research. Analytics. Oil painting.
Informally, create an open invitation for team members to bring their gifts to your attention on a regular basis. When you have opportunities, look at the Gift Registry and tap the talent.
Take a Stand
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Draw an imaginary line right down the middle of the room. In the digital world, the line is the center of your screen, looking right at your camera. With this line in place, you ask closed-ended questions or give statements that have only three options for answers: Yes, no, or maybe.
Now, state the issue that you’re trying to confirm and ask people to take a stand. To move with their feet in the room or their face in the digital world.
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Download the Mark the Line Worksheet
Have everyone draw a line. The left side of the line is YES! and the right side is NO! The entire line is in the middle.
Now, prepare everyone with the information that you will pose a question or make a statement. The way for each person to answer is to place a dot on the line they drew for themselves. If they strongly agree with the statement, they will place a dot on the far left to indicate their answer is Yes! If they strongly disagree with the statement, they will place a dot on the far right to indicate their answer is No! If they place the dot somewhere between Yes! and No!, then they are indicating that their answer is somewhere between Yes! and No!
Next, pose a question or statement. For instance, “We have a can-do culture.” Or, “We have a great relationship.” Or, “Our communication with one another is outstanding.”
Give everyone enough time to place their dot (answer) on the line they drew for themselves.
Now, it’s time to compare everyone’s lines. The meaningful conversation is found in the gaps. Once again, if everyone is hovering on the YES! or NO!, easy. If some feel that the can-do culture is great while others are asking, “What can-do culture?” . . . then you have direction in the problem that you’re going to solve.
Problem Peeling
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First, start with a problem question or statement. Maybe it’s, “How can I earn more money?” If you start here, you’ll list things like a second job, a different job, and charge more for my services. When you start to problem peel, you take the problem statement and ask, “So I can . . .”
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Solve the Right Problem with Problem Peeling
They say that second-guessing yourself doesn’t pay off when you’re taking a test. But when you are problem-solving, step back and second-guess yourself—it does pay. I call it problem peeling.
Watch the Videos
Here’s a quick overview of our tools.