August 25, 2025 What If You’re Not 100% Right? Lately I’ve noticed how quickly conversations snap into right/wrong. Certainty feels safe, and it rarely moves us forward. Progress usually happens in the humble space of “what if.” What if your way of thinking is just that—your way of thinking?What if other people approach the same thing differently—and validly?What if you’re absolutely convinced you’re right?What if you agree there are moral absolutes and still see gray areas where reasonable people disagree?What if considering viewpoints beyond your own makes you anxious because you “know” you’re right?What if you try—really try—to step into someone else’s shoes?What if you start to see their…
October 14, 2013 Positively Use Empathy OK, it’s not the most friendly Bob Dylan song ever (in fact, I’d hate to have been the person he wrote this about!), but Positively 4th Street has a lyric in it that really resounds. “I wish that for just one time You could stand inside my shoes And just for that one moment I could be you” This was written to a person with whom it seems Mr. Dylan was having a major feud. He was clearly angry and upset, and felt that communication was not working, since neither one could truly empathize with the other. If they could…
August 23, 2013 Simple Things Make Life Worth Living You ever overthink a problem? Hire consultants to help you figure things out? Go round and round with committees, dancing around issues but never coming up with solutions? Planning forever but never implementing? Pretty frustrating, huh? Quoting Derek Trucks and Susan Tedeschi from the song mentioned in this blog title, “I don’t claim to know all the answers.” However, I can offer a few suggestions. Often, the simple solution is the best one. Lots of sayings have sprouted around this one (i.e. KISS, if it barks like a dog, etc.) and for good reason. The straightforward answer is often the easiest and most…
