My Riffs

If you want to know what someone thinks, ask them. You may actually hear what they think. Or you may hear what they think you want to hear. Or you may hear the watered down version. Or you may hear the specialized version for just you... If you really want to know what someone thinks, plug your ears and just watch what they do. You will learn a lot more about what someone really thinks by observing their behaviour. Your behaviour is a dead giveaway for what you think.

Given time talent Earned skill success responsibility trust respect honour We are given a little, but can accomplish a lot if we use what we're given correctly.

Time and Trust. You cannot do anything worthwhile without the two. When either of these two resources break down, everything beneath crumbles.

Small people define others by their mistakes. Mature people define others by their responses to their mistakes.

Venturing out into something unknown will always give the feeling of being lost. Being lost is when our brain hasn't encountered something before and doesn't know quite how to process the situation. Our brain works in the way of using the past to explain the present. When we don't have a recollection in the past to explain the present, we feel lost. Slowly the brain will start to fill in the blank spots and things will begin to make sense. But in the moments in between, we may feel lost. Trust the process and know that eventually you will figure things out. Anything new requires this process. Venturing out into something new requires the uncertainty and fear associated with feeling lost. Once the feelings of being lost are worked through, something new and better can be found. But you can find something better without a certain degree of feeling lost.

When someone is proving their importance they don’t feel important. People who feel important are generally quiet as to their importance.

When things get tough it often means a lot of good things. (sometimes we bring tough on ourselves because we've haven't acted in ways we should, but the resulting bad situations still apply here). It means we are moving, not being stagnant. It means we're venturing into something new. It means we are pushing things. It means we are about to get stronger. As the saying goes, "when the going get's tough, the tough get going". In times of hardship and when things get really tough, take comfort in the fact that you're only getting pushback, because you yourself are pushing things. And that's a really good thing. And if you've been pushing in the wrong direction, it's still a good opportunity to course correct.

If you’re working hard, examine your reasoning. Make sure the things you're working hard for are long lasting and deeply impacting. We can work hard for things that feed our ego. Those things are a complete waste of time. Examine your hard work, make sure the reasons have long impactful tentacles.

Technology is providing anonymity that never used to be there. Just peruse any comment section on your favourite news site, or if you dare, YouTube. The comments are something else to behold. Many of them are only said because of the anonymity. Many comments are filled with hate, vitriol and vulgarity. Access to harmful imagery, video and information is nothing more than a seconds reach away. And can all be done completely incognito. This "cover" of anonymity requires a greater level of self discipline than we have ever seen. It used to be you would physically have to achieve anonymity to do something that may be deemed wrong or dubious. Now all you need to do is go online. Going online is much much easier and convenient than trying to cover our actions out in public. Self discipline is more critical than ever in our history. There's probably many more, but one great general rule for online conduct is: Don't say or do anything you wouldn't say or do i...

No two people stand in the exact same place. Some people see things very similarly, but never exactly the same. Appreciate other people's perspectives. Appreciate but don't feel obligated to have to agree. But we can appreciate other perspectives. The other person is standing somewhere you can never stand, so appreciate their view from that perspective. It's a glimpse into an area you yourself can never go.

An activity is just an extracurricular activity until it becomes part of your life. Extra curricular activities are just that. They’re fun often, but they’re outside your normal life. For things to change you and make an impact, incorporate them into your life.

Every doer needs a dreamer and every dreamer needs a doer. Dreamers team up with a doer. Doers team up with a dreamer. It’s hard to do both well.

The toughest behaviour to handle and fix is when we do something and our behaviour has unintended consequences. Sometimes we do something that makes someone feel a way we didn’t intend. Sometimes we will never know how we made them feel, but when we do learn the unintended consequence of our behaviour, we must own it. Even if it wasn’t intended. Being quick to say “sorry, please forgive me’ is a major key to good relationships. Owning our behaviour, whether we intended it or not, is the right thing to do. I’ve hurt people completely unintentionally. We’ve all done it. And it’s best to own that behaviour and make amends.

The quest for perfect in life is futile. Life becomes easier when we drop the notion that things shouldn’t be as they are and they should be perfect. Perfect doesn’t exist in life. Better exists, but perfect doesn’t. Push for better, push for acceptable sets of cirumstances, but drop the notion of there being a perfect situation or set of situations, cause they don’t exist, and you make life a whole lot tougher on yourself holding that ideal.

Find your priorities and make everything else secondary. Without priorities we don't have focus. Priorities bring focus. Don't be afraid to say no if you have your priories right and something will detract from them.

The longer you live, the more you start recognizing patterns. You can often see where things are heading, long before they get there. That's the beauty of old age, wisdom. That's why in theory we should make fewer mistakes as we get older. The problem with recognizing patterns, is assuming the outcome will always be the same. We can tend to make patterns truths, when in fact they are just a pattern. And patterns do change. Recognize patterns, and know the probable outcome, but don't view the pattern as an immutable truth.

Don't be so obsessed about what happened. Or what you did, both good and bad. Be obsessed about where you’re going and what’s going to happen. You can’t move forward when you’re looking back.

If you can measure it, chances are it’s not the most important thing(s) you have. How do you measure happiness, health, opportunity, fulfillment, love? Why do we grow flowers? Why does art exist? How can you measure and value your favorite song, place, painting, poem or book? How can you measure your favourite bench next to the river? Or your favourite place for a walk? You’re favourite chair to read in? How do you buy one caring friend who reaches out to you when you really need it? How do you buy a caring pat on the back and knowledge somebody is there for you? How do you measure your child smiling at you and telling you that they love you? How do you measure a spouse or any other close relationship that brings love? How do you measure one tear of joy? Don’t cheapen your existence by reducing it down to the measurable things. Stop quantifying everything. Because the things you can quantify don’t really matter. If  your worth can be reduced to a number, you’re p...

Happy Mother’s Day to all the mothers out there. The strength of a mother cannot be measured. The worth of a mother cannot be measured. The best measurement of a mother is the love in a home.

Are going through some tough things you know nothing about... Have endured some hardships that are impressive... Have experienced pain and survived... Have experienced loss... Have experienced a broken heart... Know some things you don’t... Have needs the same as you... Aren't much different from you...

HUGE life hack here: stop blaming. It doesn't matter what happens or has happened. Stop blaming. You give power away when you blame. The more you blame, the less power you have. You want power? Take responsibility for the bad things that have happened to you. Don't blame people, don't blame circumstances. Own it, and thereby gain power to change it.

Our quality of life is directly tied to the quality of relationships we have. True quality of life isn't finances, geography or material possessions. Your best and closest relationships are where you best quality of life can be measured.

How many times do we repeat the same mistake. It's often because not enough learning happened. And learning only is good if it somehow informs our behaviour for the future. Learning can help us learn better behaviour in order to have a better outcome than previous. Repeating a mistake is a sign the learning either didn't happen or what was learned was never put into action.

You can tell the size of someone's ego by what they celebrate. The quote I read said: Ego celebrates self, humility honours others". Humble people celebrate and honour others, egoistical people celebrate themselves.

Young people, find your why. Then figure out the how. A good why will make any how easier. Every individual, business or group must find their why to be successful. Start with the why, not the how. To find your why, ask yourself questions such as the following: - What inspires me? - What can I create or fix? - What is it that when I'm doing it, I lose track of time? - What am I passionately interested in? - What is the highest aim I can choose with this passion?

Are we asking the right question(s) should be the first question. You won't get the right answers if you don't ask the right questions. The most valuable questions to ask are often the ones that are the hardest to ask. The easy questions don't often provide valuable answers. Find people asking the right questions. They are going to be the ones who figure out the future.

We’ve all heard the interview question where someone is asked what they would tell their younger self... This video is something I would for sure tell my younger self. I believe I have posted this before, but it deserves being posted again.

What I've done today means so much more than what I've said. By no means am I discounting words and speech. They are powerful tools. But sometimes they are cheap. Especially when words aren't backed by actions. Actions mean a whole lot more. Actions speak a lot louder. Tell someone you love them, but make sure your actions love them. Tell those in your influence what's right, but DO what's right even more so. You can say all you want, but it only means something if your actions back it up. What you did matters more than what you said.

Probably the best life skill to work on is strength. Life requires great strength. If you're not going through something extremely challenging, someone close to you is. And if neither of those are happening, you can be sure it will be happening very soon. This isn't a negative thing. These challenges make us better people, so long as we allow them to. So work on being stronger above almost any other life skill.

Humans are capable of some extraordinary feats. As a race, we have accomplished some absolutely astounding, amazing things. Feats of love, feats of discovery, feats of building... But as with everything in life, if it can go to one great extreme, there is another equally bad extreme. Humans are also capable of believing in and doing some absolutely bizarre things. Things much beyond what we would think a rational mind could believe. Be careful what you tell yourself. You are capable of believing some absolutely bizarre things as fact and reality. There have been times in life where I have told myself some pretty negative things, and also started to believe them. You have to be extremely careful what you tell yourself. The negative things you tell yourself, probably aren't truth. And even overwhelmingly positive things you tell yourself may be a bit off base too and can be destructive in a different manner. Be honest and balanced to yourself first. Then you can live...

Just over 100 years ago people who were connected spoke either face to face or by letter. The letters required much thought and effort to write, and often much time to arrive to the recipient. Then the phone came along and strengthened those connections, people could now speak with ease. These connections were meaningful because they required more of the individuals. Today, we are hyper-connected to people. I know where my closest friends are in real-time. Many of my friends I can see where they had lunch, what they did after work and I can ping them just as fast as my hands can move. But the level of awareness and closeness doesn't match the level of connection. We are hyper-connected to people, but not equally hyper-aware. Why? I believe because the hyper-connectedness has caused the depth of relationship to be more shallow. A like, a comment and a follow just cannot match, a pen and paper, a phone call or a real relationship. We now see what people are doing, but...