It may seem kind of funny coming from a Man who was a teenager when the Viet Nam war was happening. I have some advice for young women. Having survived the male side of teenage life, growing into adulthood, and now talking about Grandkids, I may have a few thoughts you may want to take time to read. You may have heard it all before, but give me a few minutes anyway? You have a lot more time ahead of you than I do.
Somebody has to be something. You can decide what something is. Someone has to be everything you are thinking about. It does not matter who is what, or how you fit in. It is not important if you are not the prettiest, funniest, or best dressed. A few years from now these things won’t matter to you very much. The only thing that really matters is you like the young woman you see in the mirror.
You are in such a rush to look older. Companies are stealing from you. Helping you look ten, fifteen, possibly twenty years older than you are is theft. Take a minute or two and look at the older women shopping the same cosmetic aisles you are next time you are shopping. You know what older women want? They want to look like you without makeup! It is true, I guarantee it! A few of the women standing in the aisle with you have already wasted thousands of dollars trying to look as young as you. You will never look this young again, so don’t hide yourself with makeup you do not need. Perfect faces are for fantasies.
No matter what you do, you can only do so much with the body your parents gave you. Take care of your body by eating right, getting good exercise, plenty of sleep, and don’t worry about things you can not do anything about, which is about everything you worry about.
 Most young men have two heads until they are in they reach their early thirties. Around thirty something, they start to think more often with the one their shoulders. No matter what a young man tells you, or how he makes you feel, he wants sex; and not a lot else from you. This is the way we men are made. We do not have deep emotions when we are young.
He will make you laugh, buy you trinkets, and spend time with you. All he really wants is sex. I imagine you do not believe this is true, especially if some young man is doing all the things for you I just mentioned. He will tell you this is not true. Which of his two heads do you think is thinking with?
I offer you a challenge if you do not believe me. Go to Walmart, or your favorite large discount store for an hour or so. Look for young women with small children in tow. As you find them, look at them closely. How are they dressed. Do they look happy? Look at their left hand and see if they are married. Most of those women believed what some young man told them because he made them feel good. He’s now long gone, and a dim memory.
It is hard to know what life will be for you. If you make good decisions, you have a better chance of it being a good life. You will find work you really want to do. You will have fun with your friends, do new things, go on dates, see new places, eat new foods. In general you will have fun.
Your life will slowly evolve. What other people think of you will become less important. You will start to learn about yourself. You will figure out you really are not feeling lonely for some guy. No man will complete you. You are feeling distanced from something you can’t define. If you a observant, you will notice others around you feel this way too. You will see it in them when they are not wearing their public face. Being married, having children, or having a serious relationship does not make this feeling go away for long.
Eventually when you are not paying attention, someone will slip up on you. You hopefully will fall in love, get married and start a family. If you married for reasons that go deeper than he has cute dimples, or he’s good in bed, your marriage has a chance of surviving more than a few years.
On the other hand, if you let your emotions run your life, and believe what young men are telling you, your life will be a little different. Go to Walmart again and look at the miserable, single, poor young women with children, trying to make ends meet on a Friday night at Walmart that you saw. Soon you will be one of them.
You want to make good choices based on reality, not emotions, what your friends are saying, or what some guy is telling you. You are my future, and I want your future to be one filled with happy adults who know what is important in their life. Happy adults have happy children. Happy children need all the help they can get, so they too make good decisions.
I didn’t know. Nobody told me. Do you ever hear these phrases? Ever hear yourself using them? Almost every time I hear them, they are used as a defensive response or a way to avoid responsibility. Nobody told me, I didn’t know.
When phrases like these are uttered, someone is generally given a free one time use pass. They are forgiven or excused for not knowing. Used more than once in a while, the utterer is not well thought of.
For a few people, these phrases and others like them, are over used excuses. While exceptions occur, exceptions should be the exception and not the rule.
What is your common response when asked why you are or are not doing something? Are you one of the few, guilty of uttering not being told, or not knowing? Do you find yourself uttering these phrases a little too often?
 Not knowing, is a sign or symptom of more going in the background than the few words each phrase contains. No one told me, for example, has hidden meanings other than the obvious one. No matter where you work, no one has a job to make sure you know what you need to know after you are trained.
When something changes in your workplace, some form of communication is used telling you what has changed. If you hear yourself using these phrases more than once in a long while, below are some ideas you can use to ensure you rarely utter them again, if ever.
The key to knowing is to be proactive. Being proactive is a very effective tool you can use in your work and personal life. Being proactive, you always learn or know about changes that are important to you.
One of the best ways to be proactive is to pay attention. Some way, somehow in your place of work, there is a system in place of how information is passed on. Learn how important information is passed on.
Find out if your company uses email, a bulletin board, a formal shift meeting, or the person you relieve is supposed to tell you. Make your first job of the day reading, listening,or asking about: “What is going on, anything new today?”
Asking a simple question like this and actively listening to the answer will save you from ever uttering a hollow excuse again. Once you get used to reading, and asking questions, you will know what you need to know. You will know about any changes, and you will look sharp, and become more valuable at work.
Occasionally something changes and you really had no way of knowing. Instead of reaching for a new way of saying you did not know, or were not told, you can use a much more powerful tool.
You can say: I read, listened to, or checked for changes, and there was nothing posted, sent, or mentioned. I asked ‘somebody’ who I took over from, and they did not mention any changes.
If the power of response escapes you, go back and read the first paragraph of this post and compare the two responses. Which reply would you rather give, and which reply would you rather hear? There is a lot of power in words used correctly.
If you are new on the job, and you truly did not know, be honest about it. Follow up honestly with a good question. “I was not aware of this, how and where do I find out about these changes?” Phrasing your reply like this, you will be way ahead of others, who automatically fall back on those old, worn out, ‘I didn’t know’ type phrases.
Now you know how to be on top of your job and your life, you can identify how important information is not being passed on to you. If you find that there is no formal way information is passed on, suggest a way! Using your new proactive way of being, suggest a new or better way of passing on information or changes. Think of a method that is easy and everyone see, hear, or read and let someone know in a professional manner, who can make it happen. It may get you a raise!
If you have taken any business classes, work for a corporation, or enjoy strategy games, you probably have heard of Sun Tzu. This little treatise of approximately sixty-two-hundred characters has been studied, taught in war college, business classes for many centuries.
Sun Tzu’s writing is a good asset for business because it lays a foundation a business can follow to thrive and survive in their appropriate market(s). Sun Tzu’s, “Art Of War” provides a focusing lense leading to success for any size business. It has been said that Sun Tzu and Niccolò Machiavelli are all the only business partners one needs for business success.
Unfortunately these business partners have found themselves being used in areas where they are ineffective and self defeating. In arenas of friendship and cooperative work towards a common goal, Sun Tzu and Machiavelli ruin more friendships and joint efforts than they help.
Some people in todays overly competitive society have discarded appropriate and accepted forms of personal interaction and instead create for themselves a world of thinly disguised guerilla warfare and subterfuge.
 Competition holds a valid place in business. Healthy competition between areas of a business helps competing groups reach a higher level than would be possible without competition. Competition among employees in the same work group, where some are waging war against their coworkers to promote themselves is destructive for the group and the parent company.
Utilizing Sun Tzu and Machiavelli for whole life management is not only destructive, it is dangerous. It destroys friendships, relationships, and families, leaving one isolated and alone. Family life and friendships are just that. Friendship and family life is a place where one can go to leaving the outside world behind.
Life is a series of battles and struggle, but as with an army, there has to be a place where one can go and relax and recuperate. A place where one can be themselves without worrying beyond good manners about what is happening around them.
For anyone living a life comprised of total personal war and continuos competition I suggest a new direction. I propose, “The Art Of Friendship”. Create a life where the Art of Friendship can survive and thrive makes everyone more effective in other areas of their life.
The Art of Friendship is a way of dealing with people around you who share your interests, either business or personal and benefits everyone by making everyone more effective and prosperous. Instead of planning assassinations of coworkers or friends who’s interests are a little too close to our own, look for ways to work together and share in the glow of excellence instead of the the false glow of simply winning.
Allowing those around you to work jointly towards a common goal, is not only more personally satisfying, it is powerful. Instead of working as a single entity, having more people to work together towards the same goal increases the chance of success, and reduces failure from something not considered by an individual.
These days to many people see themselves as a lone warrior out battling the forces against them. What they are really doing is creating is a vacuum, where everything that could be accomplished with help can not be done because no one is willing to risk helping.
Same as a single stick being easily broken, whereas a tied bundle of sticks can not, working together in friendship and trust creates environments where everyone wins more than any individual can alone.
Business in many respects is a game of chess, consisting of moves and counter moves. Although chess is played by one individual competing against a second individual, the individual pieces on the chess board are acting as a team with a common goal. The complete team of chess pieces wins the chess match, not an individual chess piece. Try working with your coworkers and friends instead of trying to better them, and see what you can conquer as a complete functioning team, and not a single chess piece.
In two earlier posts on pride in the workplace, I wrote about some obvious reasons why having pride in your work, not only makes you a more valuable employee, but workplace pride also is a reflection of how one’s personal life is managed. If you are managing your personal life well, keeping everything moving the way you want it to move is reflected in how you perform your job. The opposite is also true.
There are other reasons for having pride in your job which many people do not appreciate because they never thought about from a different perspective. The more pride in your job, the more pay attention to the small things. Huge financially devastating lawsuits have happened over neglect of minor details.
 Attention to minor details while you are working is noticed by your boss when they compare the quality of your work to that of your peers. It is the little things that get noticed by your boss as the big things take care of themselves. Your boss may see you cleaning up your work area, or taking care of something that needs to be done others have ignored. It is a good idea to make it a point to be seen doing little extras things others ignore.
What about when you are walking to your job. I have observed an untold number of people who think they are too important to bend over and pick up a piece of paper in their path ten feet from a trash can. I have seen heads of business, who make more in a restroom break than many people make an hour, take the time to stoop over and pick up an errant piece of paper on the ground on their way to the building entrance.
I was taught by a dinner chef, that it is the little things that hurt a business. Someone not paying attention to what they are doing with food could result in a correctly unhappy customer. Or worse, a handful of people become sick as a result of improper food handling procedures. A few unhappy customers can easily destroy years of building a good reputation.
One of the noted restaurants in town who enjoyed the major market share in their specialty, were discovered to be reserving food from picked up plates. This happened not once but twice in a short period. The company almost folded because their reputation lost through greed and neglect. Whatever the person who started reserving food thought they were saving in expenses, was not as much as long term customers who never returned to that establishment.
If you are in sales such as sales in a clothing store, a little pride and two simple things you can improve both your image and increase sales more than you have previously managed. All you need to do is look busy and smile. It does not matter if you redo something you did ten minutes earlier. Your customers appreciate the fact that you stopped doing whatever you were doing to help them a lot more than if you were standing frowning in the corner, and then come striding over to see what they want. As a customer, who are you more likely to ask for help, someone who looks like they are doing something who stopped to see if you need assistance, or someone who is standing in a corner looking bored staring at the floor.
These are only a few ideas of many that are available for you to use in your workplace. The sad truth is most of us think we are worth more than we are being paid, and we try to make up the difference by doing less. Reality is different; doing more has a better chance of balancing the scales of work verses pay than loafing will.
If you work with the public doing more has even higher dividends. It is quite possible that each and every day someone who your wait on or help is looking for an employee. While they can read resumes and listen to self promotion pitches all day long, another saying applies, “Actions speak louder than words”. You never know if the next person who sees you doing something extra will be your next employer. If they are who do you want them to see, you working with pride, or you loafing around, doing as little as possible.
Even when it seems that those little extra things you do are not helping you, they really are. Making it a habit to do those little extra things in your present job, is on the job training for your, “Real Job”. Take advantage of every opportunity to learn how to be effective for the future. While you are practicing, you will start taking more pride in your present job too. You boss will notice too, and perhaps you will be stepping out ahead of your coworkers and winning the next opportunity for advancement or more pay.
Related Posts:
Taking Pride In Your Work
Your Job Is Your Life
One of the most important things we want from our life is to enjoy it. No matter what we are doing we want to be able to enjoy doing it, have fun while doing it, or receive some sense of accomplishment from doing it. In some jobs doing any of the above things is not possible for any number of reasons. One of the biggest factors in not being able to do something we enjoy is we have to have an income and we can’t earn enough doing what we want to do.
As the old saying goes, beggars can not be choosers. There may not many jobs for you that both pay the bills and give job satisfaction too. You have to choose what is most important; generally paying the bills wins out. What do you do when the job you have is not the best job in the world and you can not leave it?
Disliking your job, and not trying very hard to do your job are common complaints. Promoting that behavior yourself is not a wise choice. Like it or not, the job you have at the moment is a job you need. It is nice to think you will just quit because you are tired of doing it, but for anyone out of school, quitting because you want to is more of a pipe dream than reality. If you feel this way it is time to take control of your thinking and start to see your job in a positive perspective.
 Our job is a large part of us and who we are. If we choose poor behaviors at work, those poor behaviors eventually spill over into the rest of our life. Choose a positive behavior at work, and our life will be better for it.
Your job takes a large portion of your waking life. It may not seem like it, but add up your working time, getting ready for work time, your commute time, and leaving work to get somewhere else time. That time added up is a large part of your awake time each week. Making the most of that time makes you feel better and makes that time go by faster.
Your job is you. Whatever you are doing, what and how you do your job is a reflection of the person you are. If you do sloppy work, and do the minimum, chances are you are treating your life the same way. Life rewards you with what you put into your life.
Your job is everything you own. Whether you own a few changes of clothes and a pair of shoes, or you have a flashy toy filled life, chances are money you earned from your job is responsible for what you own.
Your job keeps you healthy. You get paid money to live on. If you have a higher level job, you receive benefits too. Your job helps keep you healthier than if you did not have money or health benefits.
Your job is your charity. Whether you tithe through your church, occasionally give change to the needy, eat at certain fast foods, or buy certain products, your job is what keeps you on the giving and off the receiving side of charity.
Your job is your contribution to your community. No one lives or works in a vacuum. Your job is your contribution to your community no matter how you define it. How big of a contribution you make in your community depends on how much pride and energy you put into what you do. Whether you run large city, or sweep a sidewalk, you are needed by your community, and you help make your community what it is.
Your job is important because _____. You fill in the rest of this paragraph. Only you know what more personal reasons your job is important. Perhaps it is a social reason, maybe something more personal.
I used to listen to a teacher tell us kids, “Take care of your job, and it will take care of you.” That Teacher I discovered knew what he was talking about. I have a related post here if you wish to read it too.
Every city, every state, every nation has one or more pockets or areas where life for those living in that particular area is a lot less than the norm. People living in these areas, namely a ghetto or slum do not have the option of moving somewhere else and living a better life. They are glued in place for many different reasons and can not simply leave to a better life.
For most of the world governments or cultures, this is acceptable. In every large city I have been to, one or more areas exist where no one goes unless they have to because unemployment is high and violent crime is higher. Drugs and those things that follow drugs are rampant. The level of violence is extreme and the presence of any meaningful authority is lacking.
 It is a human condition for people living outside of these areas to allow those conditions to exist. As long as they do not exist to close to where one is living. When the sprawl of run down neighborhoods, rampant drug use, and gangs get too close for comfort, those that can pack up and move to somewhere they consider safe.
For those people who can not pack up and leave, they are forced to adjust or adapt to the new reality of what their neighborhood has become and new conditions where survival takes on a new meaning.
No child is born anywhere in the world where the parents warmly announce their child is going to be the most powerful drug lord in the city. No parent dreams of the day when their child is the leader of the most vicious gang in town. No parent looks forward to the day when their child moves out to the street beaten down by life and hard drugs, or possibly maimed or murdered before adulthood arrives.
What about the other places in the world where some of these problems are not present in a form we recognize? For Iraq, Iran, anywhere in the Middle East, Africa, South America, and other places not mentioned? Most of these areas have something the rest of the world wants. Oil is the obvious want, but there are also diamonds, gold, cheap labor, or timber.
In these places in the world same as the bad neighborhoods there are people who want a better life. Perhaps, as in the case of the oil rich countries more people enjoy a lifestyle beyond that of their parents or grandparents. It does not take a lot of imagination or foresight to understand that in the case of an oil rich country that wealth and wealthy life style is finite.
What will these areas do when the worlds focus turns somewhere else because the oil is gone? Oil producing countries are making desperate choices now hoping those choices will ensure their future when the oil runs dry. It is easy to condemn selling drugs, belonging to gangs, or prostitution. For people desperate for money to have a life that in a skewed way meets the idea of the american dream violence is the only way for them to have a chance at a life not comprised of grinding poverty in a forgotten wasteland.
Despite our efforts we have not managed to raise all peoples lives to a level where drugs, and violence exist for any purpose than creating some amount of wealth for someone disadvantaged. Taking this thought and applying it to the Middle East is the same situation in the making. People know the oil supply is finite, oil wells will run dry. People living in oil rich countries know they have little else to offer the world. Opportunity does exist due to climatic conditions to create alternate sources of income. There is not a whole lot that can be done with sand or salt water in the Persian Gulf that can not be accomplished closer to home, no matter where home is.
These people right or wrong are exhibiting behavior comparable to behavior forgotten neighborhoods. Gang have guns and knives, countries have rockets and bombs. Gangs thrive or survive by preying on the vulnerable. Gangs take by force what they can not acquire by any other means. No matter what the outward facade is, there is one reality for oil rich countries.
Oil is going to dry up, and a world supplying economic infrastructure for whatever reason is not present to shift the creation of wealth to another venue. It does not take a lot of imagination to look at the worlds lading countries, see how they manage their wastelands, and know that one can expect even less from them when dealing with you and your country.
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Most young men have two heads until they are in they reach their early thirties. Around thirty something, they start to think more often with the one their shoulders. No matter what a young man tells you, or how he makes you feel, he wants sex; and not a lot else from you. This is the way we men are made. We do not have deep emotions when we are young.
