Growth mindset

How Professionals can Grow and Learn at Any Age

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This is a guest post with edits by Lei Han

Whether you work for an employer who encourages growth or you’re on your own when it comes to professional development, it’s possible for you to continually evolve at any age and in any job.

Professionals Should Develop a Growth Mindset

No matter if you are an employee, entrepreneur, or freelancer, you can develop a growth mindset. A growth mindset allows you to always recognize and take advantage of learning opportunities by purposely seeking them out. You can commit to growth in a number of ways: ...  read more

Is it Better to Be the Fastest in a Slow Group or a Slow one in a Fast Group?

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For the last 5 years, I have been running the 15K hot chocolate run with a friend. We have been late to start the race for the last two years so ended up running with folks that are much slower than our speed. As soon as I crossed the start line, I started passing people left and right. At first, it was a great feeling, but then I started getting blocked to run any faster as there were simply too many walkers. ...  read more

New Year Inspiration – 5 Ways to Become a Better Version of Myself

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Happy New Year!  Wow, its already 4th week of January.  Where did the time go?  I have been meaning to write about my new year aspirations.  I am sharing them to help me be more committed.  I hope they can also help you.

Last week, I saw this great article – In the New Year, Become a Better Version of Yourself.  It inspired me to come up with these five way to  become a better version of myself.  All of them are hard for me, but they are also great aspirations for the year – how to evolve who I am as a professional and a human being. 🙂

Be Patient with myself and others – I am not a patient person.  I tend to interrupt people in discussions.  I get impatient when people are slow to understand or respond.  I like to rush my kids when they are slow to shower, clean up, brush their teeth. You get the picture.  This will be one of the hardest one to adhere to..  I think deep down I believe if I just rush others and myself, I will get more done.   It sounds silly now that I have articulated it :-).   This year, I will try to work on the following:

  • Interrupt less and listen more.
  • Remember to pause before I react to an unexpected situations.   Let things cool.  Sometimes they resolve on their own.
  • Accept mundane things will take time.  Dedicate the time to get it done right.   This one stems from an experience I had just last week. I upgraded my work phone.  It probably should have taken about an hour.  It took me about 7 hours over 3 days instead.   It was however completely self-inflicted.  I was trying to save that hour by multitasking this while working.  Let’s just say I learned the hard way quickly rushing has unintended results :-). C’est la vie
  • Be judicious about what I must do right away.  As a productive person, I tend to want to do many things a day to feel accomplished – a “hamster” on a never-ending “hamster wheel.” Need to remember that less is more.
  • Be patient with my kids.
  • Allow myself to slow down and enjoy the journey – I am trying to ramp up on a big role this year. Even though I have until April to do it, I can tell I am rushing to do it faster.    I will enjoy this journey much more if I pace myself.

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    Aim Low and Get Somewhere – Aiming to Write the Crappiest Article Ever Written :-)

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    This video clip motivated me to write and finish this article.   It is from a Netflix movie I just watched called “Set it up.”  While the movie is so-so, this 1 min clip is funny, practical, and inspiring.  It helped me get over the writer’s block I have had for a month.  More importantly, it will help you get unstuck if you are feeling overwhelmed at the moment.

    I have had trouble finishing any articles in the last month.   Partly it’s because work has been all consuming, and partly it’s because I have been putting too much pressure on myself to write the perfect article.   I have rewritten the intro to a few articles for a few weeks now.   Every week I didn’t publish something just made me pressure myself more to make sure the article I finish is extra insightful and helpful.   I was literally over-analyzing every sentence.

    I realized now that I was trying too hard to please when in fact the reason I started writing this blog was because it is therapeutic.  The reason these articles may help you is because my stories are like yours – fulls of up and downs – mistakes and learnings.  

    It is exhausting to try to perfect anything.  it is never an inspiring goal and actually makes everything we try to do feel like WORK we never want to do.   This blog is not supposed to be work for me.  It is supposed to heal me and perhaps you if you can relate.  So the timing of this movie clip was perfect for me.

    Once you see this 1 min clip – you will understand the title of this post.    Here is some context.

  • Harper, the one crying in the clip, wants to become a sports journalist.
  • She has been working day and night for 3 years as an executive assistant for Kirsten, the most accomplished sports writer in the industry.
  • Harper wants Kirsten to help her with her writing but Harper hasn’t written a single article since she started work there.
  • Now that she has time, she still cannot finish her first article
  • Becka in the clip is Harper’s best friend who gives her some very sound advice to get Harper unstuck.

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    Are You on the Right Career Path? Ask Yourself These 4 Questions

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    right career path

    I just found out a close friend has cancer.  I was shocked by the news.  Although her cancer is highly treatable, it was a complete surprise.  She will need to go through 6 months of chemo and hell to recover.  I share this with you to help you step back from the daily grind and see the big picture.  Life is short and finite.

    • Are you on the right career path?
    • Are you doing what you are suppose to be doing?
    • If you were told you have cancer today, would you make different choices in your career and life?

    Our life is a gift.  Don’t wait until you have shocking news in your life to reexamine.  It’s never too early to reassess or take a different direction altogether.   Today, I want to help you answer these questions.

    Many of us work long hours, forgo time with family, friends, and skip vacations, so we can get ahead in our career.    But do we know why we do it?  The superficial answer is to make more money, or get promoted, or be recognized.   But I would argue none of that really help us feel fulfilled.

    Our career path must have a deeper meaning for it to be worth the effort and the time away from our families.   That meaning will also help ground us if we receive sad unexpected news like this from a friend or from a doctor about our own health.

    Here are 4 questions to help you examine your current career path and trajectory?

    Question 1: Does my job & career make a difference somehow?  I have shared the definition of success before.  It’s not about material status, and much more about our level of contribution to others.  Making a difference comes in all forms.   For example, it can be about

  • earning money so I can support my family and my kids’ education
  • making a positive impact to the customers my company serves (whether with a new product I launch or solving service issues painlessly)
  • coaching those on my team so they can learn from my experience and skills

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    5 Most Common Regrets in Life & How to Avoid Them

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    no-regrets

    Last month, I heard this great talk by Jyri Engestrom, a successful Internet entrepreneur on the topics of happiness.  He said, most people have five regrets in life – all of which resonated with me.  And you probably would agree these are the most common regrets as well.  If so, then I ask you – why not address them now before you are dying so you can live life with no regrets.

    Here are what these five regrets mean to me and what we can all do to live life without them today!

    I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me – It’s amazing how hard this actually is.  The more of an overachiever we are the harder this is.  This is because we instinctively like to compare our achievements and career progression with that of others (e.g, my former classmates, siblings, even friends) or what others we care about may expect of us (e.g, my dad).  While common, the act of comparison is destructive and the more we do it the more we move away from knowing how to live a life true to ourselves.
    What to do to live life with out this regret:  Stop comparing!  Whenever you catch yourself comparing, stop and move on to more important things in life.
    I wish I didn’t work so hard – I worked my butt off the first 12 years of my life and it affected my health.  So I already got this message from the universe that working too hard may not be worth it.  Luckily my healthy issues were temporary.  I think I grew up with the concept that if I am not working hard, then I am lazy and that’s bad.   It sounds a little ridiculous when I write it down.
    What to do to live life with out this regret:  Create a new concept that replaces the one above – Working hard will lead me to miss out on life, so don’t miss out. Work smart instead and make time for life as well before it’s too late
    I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings – Many times we repress our feelings only to hold on to the hurt, frustration, etc.. too long.  It’s not good for us.  I am glad to say this is one that I actually do often at work and in life.  I hope you do too.  It’s liberating.
    What to do to live life with out this regret:  Learn to express yourself and then let it go.  This does not mean blurt out whatever you think.   Express yourself in a constructive way takes practice and finesse.   The first step is to let yourself do it and overtime, you can improve on the finesse.  This also doesn’t mean expecting others to agree with you.  It’s about feeling complete. Once you had a chance to say your piece, accept that you at least tried whether the outcome is what you expect or not.
    I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends – As I get older and have a family, I am finding less and less time to stay in touch with friends.  It just seems like a year would go by and I would be busy everyday with work, family, blog, etc..   Well, I decided to change this and make keeping in touch with friends a priority as well.
    What to do to live life with out this regret:  Here is how I am doing it without too much effort.

  • I created recurring lunch meeting requests on my work calendar to stay in touch with friends and contacts.  They may be every 4-8 weeks and sometimes gets cancelled or pushed but at least it’s set to reoccur, block out my time on the work calendar, and ensure that I take a decent lunch break once in awhile.
  • I call friends when I am walking to or from work.  It takes me about 10-15 min each way.  I am sure you can think of other ways if you put your mind to it. 🙂

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