Little Things That Matter

Learn From The Past, Live The Present and Have An Open Mind to Face Tomorrow

Inflexibility Is All In Your Perspective

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Photo Credits : Lalita Raman

Photo Credits : Lalita Raman

Though I have been doing yoga for almost 10 years, each day is different in that some days it is easier to be in the moment, feel more flexible and be in the flow whereas not so on other days.

When your muscles are sore and you are trying to bend forward and touch your toes you feel the pain, the frustration and more often than not your mind is agitated.  When you are not that nimble, you feel the pain, the discomfort and the difficulty to breathe and to ease into that moment.  This is most felt whilst trying to do any yoga pose which your body is not able to do because of being inflexible.

Flexibility is the ability to move muscles and joints through their complete range. We are born with this ability but something most of us lose over time because of our life styles. We lose the agility on our muscles. The activities we engage in or not leads to muscle atrophy. Stretching is thus necessary to help muscles rebuild.

Flexibility, however, is an attitude that we need to take in that challenging moment, that transforms our mind as well as our body. The more we get entangled in our moment of pain and frustration in not being able to stretch with ease, the more difficult it gets to become unstuck.

One of my favorite yoga instructors reminds the class each day that in doing the asana we should seek to do our best but not let the eagle in us take over. Today is not the same as yesterday. Let us take each moment as it comes.

Whenever I hear this I am reminded of this quote by Pema Chodron.   “The Buddha taught that flexibility and openness bring strength and that running from groundlessness weakens us and brings pain. But do we understand that becoming familiar with the running away is the key? Openness doesn’t come from resisting our fears but from getting to know them well…”

Inflexibility is felt during a stretch or whilst doing yoga, but what about life and at work ?

Have you ever considered the impact of not adapting to change ? Click To Tweet

What about not listening to another person’s ideas because of your ego?

Flexibility starts from our attitude be it in yoga or at work.  What are the common causes of lack of adaptability at work?

1. Fear

Command and control form of leadership fails to motivate employees and keep them engaged. Fear of breaking the barriers is a common cause of adhering to the top down control based hierarchical structures. How long can you keep your team from breaking apart?

2. Trust

Defensive thinking and lack of trusting one’s own judgment on instincts creates bias in favor of status quo. What is the direct impact of this on employee and tram engagement ?

3. Habit

Habits are first cobwebs then cables which deter you from adapting or initiating change. Mindset and attitude are the biggest enemies which dictate our behaviors. Does this cause stress in your work and life ?

4. Inflexible policies and practices

When policies and practices are used as a garb to defend long-winded procedures, it is often a case of inflexibility.  Are you taking excuse under policies?

5. Lack of Diversity

Diversity starts from thoughts and flows into behaviors, words and actions. Any organization whose systems value conformance and cohesion at the expense of diversity and divergence limits the ability to welcome new and diverse ideas. How are you adopting diversity in various parts of your organization?

You and your teams ability to react to, manage, control, and introduce change controls the rise or fall of organizations that you are part of. Change starts with You and your attitude determines the process of navigating the change.

Key Questions to Ask

1. How willing are you to promote a culture of flexible working hours ?

2. How enthusiastic are you in your communication whilst listening to new ideas and changes ? Click To Tweet 

3. What are the different ways you can overcome the various hurdles that you fire fight every time ?

4. How adaptable are you to trying out different methods to achieve the same goal ?

5. Do you have a flexible work environment to promote a higher diversity and engagement among your employees?

BlackBerry failed to anticipate that consumers — not business customers — would drive the smart phone revolution. This lack of adaptability is possibly one of the top reasons for their downfall.

And research has indicated the preference for flexibility versus face time.

If you can gain insight into your and your teams’ behaviors that make up adaptability and being flexible in your approach it will help you face change and transition.

Are you being adaptable in your approach to detect and respond to changes? Click To Tweet

Rapport – Key To Building Trust

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Rapport is one of the first steps in building trust in a relationship. Talking in terms of other person’s interests, being a good listener and encouraging others to talk about themselves enables us to make that connection to others and build a rapport.

Rapport however is not static.  Even in a trusted relationship rapport is a continuous process.
“Every cell in the body is continuously changing. Thoughts and emotions rise and fall away unceasingly. When we’re thinking that we’re competent or that we’re hopeless — what are we basing it on? On this fleeting moment? On yesterday’s success or failure? We cling to a fixed idea of who we are and it cripples us. Nothing and no one is fixed. Whether the reality of change is a source of freedom for us or a source of horrific anxiety makes a significant difference. Do the days of our lives add up to further suffering or to increased capacity for joy? That’s an important question”. Pema Chodron
Life is a roller coaster and sometimes we struggle with accepting what life throws at us. People and situations are unpredictable and so is every moment that is unpredictable. An essential part of continued rapport is the attitude we take to each moment. We know that change is part of us and everything around us is fleeting and impermanent. Yet we take rapport in the relationships so much for granted. Isn’t rapport essential to continued trust ? How do you build sustained harmony and trust ? Read on from the Archives Do You Value Trust?

How Close Are You To Your “Ideal Self”

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Photo Credits : Lalita Raman

Photo Credits : Lalita Raman

We have our ideal self, the self we want out of life – the motivational core that focuses our hopes, aspirations, dreams, purpose, and calling.

It is our source of positive affect that helps the drive for intentional change. This is the self we want to be.

How many of us are close to our ideal self?

We have our actual self or real self and there is our ought self.

Our ought self is our understanding of what others want us to be and do. Actual self is who we are and what we do. The actual self over time, right from childhood, changes.

What happens when our actual self doesn’t match the ideal self? That is when the process of reflection and retrospection begins.

New Year is a formal step to grow, develop and continue the path of learning and an improvement on our-self versus where we were.Yes, this should be a continuous process but I think New Year is a good time to take stock. A time to ask ourselves how close are we to our ideal self. No, this is not about New Year Resolutions.

So how do we get there? 5 key questions to ask

1. What are you grateful for in life?

Be compassionate to yourself. You don’t need to be perfect. Be grateful for what you have achieved and where you are. Cut yourself some slack and strive towards excellence.

2. What do you need to change ?

Is the change that you feel you need or because others around you want you to change ? How enthused are you to make this change ? How much do you believe in this change ? What is the worst that can happen if you don’t change?

The path of Intentional change is not a linear one. It is about making small improvements and something that is sustainable.

3. Whose support and encouragement do you need?

Whom can you rely on to help you on this path of development and growth? How can you surround yourself with positive people and those who believe in you ?

4. How can you change your thoughts and emotions to be more aware?

Your thoughts dominate your emotions and words. How can you control your thoughts and encourage yourself to be positive on a day-to-day basis?

How can you face fear? What is the worst that can happen? Once you have determined that, ask yourself is there a way to improve from there and how can you get there?

Emotional Intelligence is one of the toughest in times of challenge and adversities. What is the thought or word that will inspire you ?

5. What are you passionate about ? What are you driven to do and how do you get there?

In answering this, it is important to let go. Let go of people who have hurt you, things that quite didn’t work the way you wanted. Forget the excess baggage and de-clutter your mind. Your mind is not a dumping ground. Take a break and lead from your heart.

Our brains are geared for rewards along the way. Reflect, renew and reward yourself. The journey of getting to your ideal self should not be an ordeal but a path of learning, and growing. It should not be filled with regrets and not feel like a burden on your shoulder.

Live more in discovery and less in judgment about yourself and the world around you.

For Coaching, Facilitating and Speaking Connect. About Lalita Raman

Habits are at first cobwebs, then cables..Do Your Habits Determine You?

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Lalita Raman

Lalita Raman

A friend of mine, Jane, a senior manager with a FMCG company, manages six direct reports who in turn manage four to five people each. Jane to us, is one of the most enthusiastic, authentic and a gregarious person. When she started leading a team, about 4 years back, she faced issues of underperformance from her team. She did not realize that this underperformance was mainly from her leadership skills or rather from one of her age-old habits.

She initially attributed the reasons for underperformance to pressures of time and lack of resources. She decided to hire a coach after reflecting on the consistent underperformance of her team. It was only then that she realized that it was her habit of assuming that her team understood and bought into every change that was introduced, was the key reason for the disconnect.

We are all creatures of habit, good or bad. Some of these habits we are unaware of just like Jane, till we start reflecting, and making ourselves aware and then looking at the consequences.

We become what we repeatedly do. Did you know that our subconscious mind is much more powerful than our conscious mind?

It is our subconscious mind – the habitual mind that dictates most of our thoughts and actions. What does this mean?

Most of us spend our time on an autopilot mode in the way we behave and act. This could be unconsciously competent or unconsciously incompetent part of us. Take the example of someone who has been driving a car for years. This person is almost on an auto pilot mode whilst driving. Most people whilst driving are engaged in a conversation. When you think about this, it is scary.

Our subconscious mind is like a fertile soul that accepts any seed planted. Thus our habitual thoughts, feelings, and actions are a result of what we sow in our subconscious mind. So be it eating dessert after every meal, or acting like a bully in every situation of life, or making yourself loud and known no matter where you are, are habits and they result from our subconscious mind and what we have sown there.

Do we need to get rid of all our habits ? Absolutely not

We manifest good and bad habits and it is some of these bad habits that affects our health, our relationships, our behavior as a leader in day-to-day life or within organizations.

How do we get over bad habits? FOR THE FULL POST PLEASE CLICK ON LINK

 

10 Leadership Lessons From My Mom

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Today is Mother’s Day and normally I don’t write blog posts on my mother on this day. A mother, I believe is someone who needs to be honored, loved, cared every single day and not just on Mother’s Day. Why did I decide to write a blog post this year?

I was having a chat with a business colleague yesterday and we were discussing leadership, qualities of a leader and people who have inspired each of us. On the topic of inspiration, many have inspired me but none better than my mom and my dad. Since the discussion is fresh in my mind and Mother’s Day is today, I thought, why not translate these thoughts into a blog post.

My mom has never considered herself as a leader and even if you tell her she probably doesn’t understand how she can be a leader.

My mom is in her 70’s and she comes from a conservative background. She got married when she was 19 and she has always been a housewife who always found pleasure in looking after her home, her family and in building a temple of values.

Why do I consider my mom as a leader ?

For the full post refer to the LINK

Coach: Why You Must Hire One AND Top 12 Questions to Ask

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With the information overload that we have on a daily basis from Social Media, and the Internet, many times you find it difficult to get to where you want to go.

Let’s say you are a top performing executive in an organization and have consistently surpassed your targets. You have never shirked responsibility nor have you disappointed in your commitments. However, you feel you are reaching a saturation point and are not able to grow. You speak to your boss and he tells you to enroll in a leadership and motivational course. He also sends you some web links to read. You attend the course for 2 days, you read all the links he sent you and add some of them to your other regular reading sources.

Yet, you feel that you are not able to make the progress you want to make. You have tried to tell this again to your boss, Human Resources and other seniors within the organization but to no avail. You don’t want to leave the company but sometimes you feel that is probably the best option available.

On line, group trainings will not be able to help you in your transition because they are not tailor-made to address your individual roadblocks. Most leadership programs are too general to provide opportunities for intensive personalized work.

A Coach is someone who can help you. No, the person doesn’t need to be in your field of expertise.

Coaching is a process to unlock a person’s potential to maximize their own performance. It is essentially a conversation, a dialogue between the coach and the client which focuses on improvement of skills and concrete results.

Steps to take before you hire a coach and the questions to ask…

For the full post click on this LINK

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10 Reasons Not To Give Up

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Many of you who follow me on Twitter may know that I have the following statement on my Twitter bio “Don’t believe in giving up no matter what happens,not to shrink back but to move forward in life.”

Persistency is something I believe in and my friends and colleagues know me as a very tenacious person. I persist because I hope, I believe and I see potential.  While the path to achieve my final goal may change with experience that I gather during my journey, I believe in not giving up on anything that appeals to my within.

However, don’t each of us at some point in our journey of life, get to a part where we feel like just throwing it all away and walking away? Sometimes we stop trying even before start and other times we give up just before we are about to make that huge break-through. To keep trying be it at work or in a relationship does not necessarily mean allowing yourself to feel devalued or trampled.  But you need to evaluate options of achieving your end goal and change the course or methods to fulfill the same.

 10 Reasons Why You Should Not Give Up 

1. Choices – there are always possibilities and sometimes we get so frozen by what we choose to see that we block ourselves from looking at other alternatives.

2. Inspirers – every time you feel like giving up, be inspired by people who have achieved their dreams despite the odds – e.g. The man who lost his legs as a child scales Kilimanjaro with hands.

3. Failure – we allow failures and rejections during the course of our journey to become our self-limiting beliefs. However there is no one right path. What may have worked for me may not work for you and vice versa.  Success is not achieved in a day.

4. Mindset – we need to learn from our mistakes rather than just fold and walk away. Choose to walk away from the methods that have nor worked rather than away from your ultimate passion or goal.

5. Believe – we allow our surroundings to control us. We live in moments and many times allow that to dictate our beliefs and value systems. What has helped me in some of my vulnerable moments is to believe in myself, and be strong as difficult as it may be.

6. People who matter – accept critique to improve but don’t allow negative attitudes and haters to surround your life and dictate what you do. Learn to stay with people who challenge you but yet support you and care for you.

7. Evolve – always have a questioning mind. Ask yourself is that the best method, what are the options, if I started on a clean sheet of paper would I still look at the same options or choose something completely different.

8. Innovate – Our mind plays games and we need to control our mind rather than the other way around.  You may need to take the lead from someone else who has done it before. Listen to their success story and determine which of those you could apply to yourself.  Don’t reinvent the wheel but innovate on previous experiences where necessary.

9. Change – you should not be stuck by the alternatives that you have chosen.  Embrace change to the pathway to get to where you want to be.

10. Be your own friend – No one in the world is going to look at you if you are going to be miserable. Be your own best friend and be an optimist.

So Why You Should Not Give Up…

I’ve always been inspired by Pema Chodron and her thoughts…I quote.. “Every time we are willing to let go at the end of the out-breath, that’s fundamentally renunciation: learning how to let go of holding on and holding back”.

“The river flows rapidly down the mountain, and then all of a sudden it gets blocked with big boulders and lots of trees. The water can’t go any farther, even though it has tremendous force and forward energy. It just gets block there. That’s what happens with us too; we get blocked like that. Letting go at the end of the out-breath, letting the thoughts go, is like moving one of those boulders away so that the water can keep flowing, so that our energy and our life force can keep evolving and moving forward. We don’t, out of fear of the unknown, have to put up these blocks, these dams, that basically say no to life and to feeling life…Link

We hurt ourselves the most by giving up. We live but once and you and I have a calling in life… why give up?

For  Inspiration… Watch the Movie 127 Hours 

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Change – The Process And 4 Essentials

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Change is an integral part of our life. Our physical body undergoes change every day, our cells undergoes change and the very process of growing up from the time we are born to where we are today is Change. The environment around us is changing all the time. Some changes are within our control and yet others not so. There are yet other changes which we need to make consciously – the ability to be present and move between reflection and action. It is our ability to establish and maintain the appropriate attitudes and behaviors in both our professional and personal lives, that are conducive to goal setting, achievement and constructive feedback.

What is involved in the process of change

A Reason to change; A Desire to change; A Commitment to change; A Way to change; The Support for change

If your change goal was to lose weight, the reason to lose weight might be health reasons, desire is to feel and look healthy and lead your life more effectively, Commitment comes from a reward – reward in losing weight for you might be to participate in a triathlon which you have been putting off due to health issues, a way to would be to improve your fitness regime and restructure your dietary habits.

What are essentials to change

1. Action 2. Social Circle 3. Mindset 4. Doing

Click on the following Link for the Full Article

What have been some of the changes in your life which you worked towards and made it happen. Please share in the comments section below.  Thank you