I’m back from my last round of travels and am taking time out this week for some much needed rest and reflection. What’s captivated my attention since I got home a few days ago is the difference between meaning and happiness. One of the questions I’ve been asked several times on my book tour is, “Do you have to be happy in order to thrive?” It’s an interesting question I’ve been pondering.

I define thriving as our capacity to unleash our power to grow, flourish, and experience a sense of trust and well-being in ourselves, our work, and our lives so that we may offer our greatest talents to the world and then help others do the same. Thriving is being in full bloom regardless of the season of our lives. Sometimes those seasons bring sunshine, and sometimes they bring rain. But what helps us keep flourishing despite the challenging circumstances we encounter is the commitment thrivers make to seek meaning in all the seasons of our lives.

There are two articles that outline the distinctions between happiness and meaning I’ve found very useful in reflecting on this topic. In The Atlantic, “There’s More to Life Than Being Happy” and in Scientific American, “A Happy Life May Not Be a Meaningful Life.”

In her article in The Atlantic, Emily Esfahani Smith shared research conducted by Gallup which claimed that 60% of all Americans felt happy without a lot of stress or worry, yet only 40% of us had discovered a satisfying life purpose (Center for Disease Control statistics). In her article in Scientific American, Daisy Grewal, PhD, shared a study by Roy Baumeister and colleagues in the Journal of Positive Psychology which explains the key differences in living a happy versus a meaningful life.
What was interesting in Grewal’s article was that people’s happiness levels were positively correlated to seeing their lives as meaningful, but that what makes us happy doesn’t always deliver more meaning. In my case, buying that cool pair of shoes at the airport in Chicago made me happy for ten minutes, but it didn’t make my life more meaningful. However, when I wear those shoes and they spark the memory of that lovely night at my book reading in Milwaukee last week engaging with new friends and family, it reconnects me to a deeper sense of meaning and purpose in my life.

These articles make the point that although happiness and meaning share some things in common, there are also important distinctions:

Seeking happiness is personally motivated because we believe that getting something we want will make us feel better. When we seek meaning, we focus on what we can give, rather than get. We seek to make a contribution to the greater good in ways that help us feel fulfilled. Another key difference is that happiness is experienced in the moment and it dissipates over time (like the purchase of my new pair of shoes). Meaning is longer lasting. It endures and connects the past, present, and future. Finally, feeling a sense of personal identity and being able to express oneself were linked to a greater sense of meaning, but were not connected to being happy.

Dr. Martin Seligman, noted author who is known as the father of positive psychology said that in order to live a meaningful life, “You use your highest strengths and talents to belong to and serve something you believe is larger than the self.” In our culture, we seem to have it backwards. We place a high value on chasing happiness, but often at the expense of living a meaningful life. Victor Frankl, concentration camp survivor and author of Man’s Search for Meaning said, “It’s the very pursuit of happiness that thwarts happiness.”

I’m certainly not suggesting we not be happy. In fact, the more happiness, the better. I’m only offering that there is much more than seeking happiness to live a living of purpose that’s fulfilling. At the end of the day, it’s the sum total of the meaning in our lives that defines us because it’s so deeply connected to the contributions we make to those we love and to the larger world. It’s living a life of meaning that crafts our legacy. Maybe it’s true that money can buy happiness, but it certainly can’t buy meaning.

Questions to Ponder:

When you look at your life, how much time do spend pursuing happiness? Seeking meaning? What is the result? When you look at the distinctions between pursuing happiness and seeking meaning in the table above, what, if anything, would you like to change in your orientation to your life and career? What shifts might you make that would allow you to experience being happy and fulfilled?

If you’d like to engage in the conversation on happiness and meaning, please join the thread on Facebook.

Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it.
— William Arthur Ward

A soft, sweet rain is falling outside the windows of the cabin in the Trinity Mountains in Northern California where we’ve been for almost a week, resting and relaxing after three of the busiest months of my life. Over the course of ten weeks, I traveled to New York three times, to Dallas twice, and to Philadelphia, Denver, Los Angeles, Chicago, Austin, Houston, and San Antonio. I had my book launch party in mid-May and then embarked on an eight-city book tour, while at the same time, keeping up with a very busy coaching practice in the days between.

So much has happened in such a short time, and having a week off the grid has given me time to rest, reflect, and appreciate the many gifts I’ve been blessed to receive. But what I value most among these gifts is the treasure of friendship and support from the many people (family members, old friends, new friends, clients, and colleagues) who have offered such love and support. Interestingly, I read today in the latest World Happiness Report (2015) about the prime importance of family and friendship at the individual and community levels on our sense of happiness and well-being. I can say without a doubt, that due to each of you, my well of happiness is full.

Everywhere I’ve traveled these past few months, there have been friends, colleagues and loved ones willing to lend a hand, fix a meal, take me to dinner, provide a bed to sleep in, or a ride from the airport. The true gift of the journey of birthing this book has been reconnecting with friends from college, including sorority sisters who came out to the bookstores with friends in tow to fill the seats, to old college friends who made me a guest in their homes, to former boyfriends I hadn’t been in contact with who surprised me with their presence, to childhood friends I hadn’t seen in many years.

And to my family, I’m deeply grateful. To Julie, who took time off work to accompany me on several stops on the tour, to my niece and nephews who met me along the way, to my eighty-five to ninety-four year old uncle, aunts, and mother who came to cheer me on; to my sweet cousins who gave me a place to stay, held a party, and a place to host my friends. To my clients, colleagues, and former coaching clients, I’m deeply grateful for your words of encouragement and gifts of appreciation. And finally, to my fellow authors from She Writes Press, you’ve been an amazing source of hope and encouragement and it’s been an honor to walk beside you on this journey. I recently joked with a friend that everywhere I went on the book tour, I felt like I was going to a wedding because of how it reconnected me to all the love and support I am blessed to know in my life.

And I will always be grateful for the strangers I met along the way and for the many lessons they taught me. After a very slow day of sales at the Book Fair in Chicago, I was bemoaning the fact that I’d spent precious time and money to be there that weekend when I had so much on my plate. A man dressed in tattered clothes who looked like he might have been homeless came over to the table and kept touching my book. I started talking to him, sharing what the book was about, and he said, “My feet won’t move. I have to buy this book, and I don’t even know how to read.”  When I asked him who he wanted the book inscribed to, he said, “Make it to my friend Susa. She is just getting out of prison next week after 25 years.”  Thank you, my friend, for reminding me that often all I need to do is to get out of my own way.

I define thriving as being in full bloom no matter what season of life you are in. And gratitude is the nectar that makes that flower bloom. The French Novelist Marcel Proust expressed my feelings well: “Let us be grateful to people who make us happy, they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom.”  I thank you, one and all, for all you have done to help me thrive and blossom these past few months. The memories of your kindness and love are forever etched like a precious diamond in my heart.

• What is one thing that you’re deeply grateful for today?
• Who are the charming gardeners in your life that help make your soul blossom?
• In what ways might you express your gratitude to those people?
• What is one step you could take today to help you bloom where you are planted?

Happiness is the absence of the striving for happiness.―Zhuangzi

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the delicate balance between striving and thriving.  In a culture where we measure success by how much money we make, by how many twitter followers we have, or by the status of our title or position, it’s easy to lose perspective about what’s most important.  Then one day, we wake up and realize that our striving is what’s gotten in the way of our thriving.  We keep looking for the next mountain to ascend, and believe when we finally get there, then everything will be perfect.  But when we finally reach the top, the only thing that’s really different is how exhausted we are from the climb.

As we enter the final quarter of the year, I’ve been looking at the places where my own life is out of balance between striving and thriving.  By all accounts, this has been a stellar year.  My business is flourishing.  I’ve completed my dream of writing a book that will be published early next year.  I’ve gotten the opportunity to work with some amazing clients doing work that I love that allows me to use my gifts.  And I’ve had the opportunity to travel to the other side of the world and meet some very inspiring people.  And for those blessings and experiences, I’m very grateful.

Yet as I reflect on the past six months, my life feels like a blur.  I’ve been moving so fast to get to the next destination, to make it to the next appointment, to design the next project or meet the next deadline, I haven’t been as present as I desire to be in my life.  At times, I’ve felt more like a human doing than a human being.  This has caused me to question whether I’ve been as focused this year on thriving as I’ve been on striving.

Recently I watched a wonderful movie that addressed the tension between striving and thriving well.  It’s called, “The Hundred Foot Journey” and spoiler alert, if you haven’t already seen it, you may want to stop reading this post, because the points the movie illustrates require revealing the ending.

The main character in the movie, Hassan, is a fabulous chef, whose mother taught him to cook as a child when his family lived in India. Fast forward following a horrible family tragedy which resulted in the family’s move to a small village in France. Hassan’s family open an Indian restaurant across the street from a renowned French restaurant and a rivalry of epic proportions ensues.  The owner of the fine French restaurant, Madam Mallory, realizes Hassan’s talent and offers him a job as her head chef.  She is hopeful his talent might gain her another Michelin star, an achievement coveted by restaurateurs throughout the world.

As a result of Hassan’s efforts, Madam Mallory achieves her second Michelin star.  Shortly thereafter, Hassan is whisked off to Paris to try for a third star at another high-end restaurant.  He remains in Paris for a year and becomes the toast of the town, but also begins to drink too much because he’s so unhappy.  We watch as our protagonist sadly reflects on the people he’s loved and left behind.  One day, he packs his bags and returns home to his village, where he decides to earn his third Michelin star at the restaurant owned by Madam Mallory that he’d left behind a year before.  As he cooks his signature dish and is reunited with his family and the woman he loves, we see Hassan again joyful, surrounded by all he holds dear.

Hassan’s journey is a reminder that we don’t have to give up our goals (which often require some striving) in order to experience thriving.  Hassan didn’t sacrifice his goal of attaining his third star, but he redefined how he would get there on his own terms, rather than doing it based on society’s expectations.  He made the decision to chart his own course, set the boundaries he needed to make the changes that served his life, and he gathered people around him that he trusted would help him thrive.  He created the proper balance between striving and thriving in his life.

As I think about that balance in my life and work, what becomes apparent is the need to create more spaciousness.  This includes setting better boundaries that will allow me more time in my days for reflection, for writing, for exercise, for rest, and for quality time with friends and family for play―for all the things that bring me joy and restore me.  It’s about making certain I hold sacred the time and space in my life to slow down and appreciate the gifts I already have and becoming more mindful of when striving interferes with thriving.

As you reflect on the balance between striving and thriving in your life, are you satisfied with the balance you’ve created?  If not, how do you need to shift that balance and in what ways?  How would you know you’d been successful?  What would be different in your life than it is now?  What’s one step that you could take today to begin to make that shift?

“Wherever you are, be there. If you can be fully present now, you’ll know what it means to live.” 
― Steve Goodie

I’ve been on a recharge vacation for the past five days. Every summer, we go to a ranch in the mountains for a week with our dogs. We stay in a sweet little cabin that looks out on a seven acre lake. We swim, hike, read fiction, cook delicious meals, sleep in and take naps every day. In a word, this place is paradise. It’s an oasis from the busyness that fills so much of the rest of the year. It always takes a couple of days for me to shift into a lower gear and adjust to the quiet simplicity. And then it takes another couple of days to feel like I’ve finally caught up on much needed rest.

Several times a day, we take a half-mile a walk around the lake and I always take my camera. I’ve shot the same scenery now for the past five years, but every year, every day and even different times throughout the day, it always looks different. When I stop long enough observe how the current of the lake changes as the wind shifts direction, how the interplay of light varies as the sun moves across the horizon, and even how the one lone duck always maintains a lap of distance from his family, I’m reminded of what’s possible when I’m not rushing―when I’m able to be more present. I am struck by nuance I don’t appreciate unless I make the time to be still, attentive and mindful of the beauty all around me.

Yesterday, one of my friends posted a question (yes, unfortunately we discovered there is internet service here this year). His question was, “What is one word that describes the first half of this year for you?” I responded, “Busy.” He wrote back, “Busy doesn’t count. Write something else.” So I responded, “Full.”

As I thought about my second response to his post, what I should have said was, “Too full.” I’ve had the most fruitful year in my business I’ve ever had, but I’ve also crowded my life with so much work, travel and activity, that as I notice the reflection of the tall pine trees mirroring themselves below in the lake, it reminds me I need to course correct and reflect on my own life: To focus on being more present to the beauty around me every day. To not let increasing demands crowd out what’s most important. To make sure I get the rest, play and contemplative space I need to thrive. To be as grateful for the life I have now as I am for the one I’m creating.

Being too busy is a good problem to have, but it can be a problem nonetheless. It’s easy to get caught up in the trance of busyness for its’ own sake, without being mindful of the cost it can extract. So today, as I gaze out at the ripples dancing in the lake inviting me to be here now, I invite you to do the same. To take a few minutes and take a break from the busyness of your life wherever you are, to reflect on and commit to being present to the things you hold most dear.

If you’ve felt the busyness in your life crowding out what’s most important, what’s one step you might take each day that would help you be more present: To yourself? To others? To what you hold most dear? How could taking this action improve the quality of your life and relationships? How could being more present help you know what it really means to live?

You will never be happy if you continue to search for what happiness consists of.  You will never live if you are looking for the meaning of life.  — Albert Camus

Last weekend we worked in our garden in our annual outdoor spring cleaning ritual.  Call me crazy, but I always love that first foray into spring―pulling weeds, preparing flower beds, pruning trees, cleaning the deck for summer barbecues―because it always represents that life begins anew after the long winter’s rest.

One of the things I noticed as I pulled weeds from the garden was how the flowers always reappear in the same spot, year after year.  They’ve learned to bloom where they’re planted.  That’s a strategy Mother Nature invented that many (including me) could learn from.

In a culture where we pride ourselves on progress and acquisition, there are five words we repeat far too often that can lead to distress.  These words are:  IF I COULD JUST GET.  We’ve all said these words in one context or another….If I could just get a promotion, then everything would be better.  If we could just get the kids to behave, then everything would be easier.  If we could just get a bigger house, then our family would be happy.  You know the drill―the grass is always greener in someone else’s garden.  We spend so much time focusing on getting the next thing we want that it’s easy to lose sight of what we have.

I’m not advocating that we shouldn’t try and better our conditions or change what needs improving, but if we channel all our energies on reaching the next destination or on seeking the next acquisition, we can completely miss the gift the present has to offer.  As the writer Albert Camus said, “You will never live if you’re looking for the meaning of life.”

One of my coaching clients, Larry, figured this out early in his career.  Larry was a Director and project manager extraordinaire, but he had a history of leaving a job and moving to another company every two to three years.  The problem was that Larry kept making parallel moves.  He wasn’t getting promoted because he hadn’t yet discovered how to grow his people and leverage the talents of his team.

One day, I asked Larry if rather than focusing all his energies on managing complex projects, what if he also focused on developing complex people.  Would that change his “two year itch” to leave, I asked?  What I wanted him to consider was whether he was willing to bloom where he’d been planted because there was fertile soil for growth right there underneath his feet.  Larry ended up staying at his company for a five years and spent the last three learning to become a master developer of people.  His reputation in his industry grew and he was offered a position as a Vice President at another company with a larger team and greater responsibility.  But before he left, Larry had learned a critical skill of leadership. He’d learned how to bloom where he was planted.

So what if instead of asking the question that begins with, “If I could just get….,” we asked ourselves something different:

If I could learn to be content with where I am and with what I have, how might that shift in perspective enable me to bloom where I am planted?  How would it allow me to contribute more powerfully?  How could it help me feel more gratitude?  How would that change the way I interact with others?  How could learning to bloom where I am planted help me grow into the leader/person/parent/friend I am seeking to become?

I would rather be ashes than dust! I would rather that my spark burn out in a brilliant blaze than it be stifled by dry-rot. I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet. The function of man is to live, not to exist. I shall not waste my days trying to prolong them. I shall use my time. – Jack London

This morning I read about a live art installation called “The Orbit” that’s being staged in Brooklyn, NY.¹ It consists of a 60-foot human hamster wheel and the two men who built it, Ward Shelley and Alex Schweder. These men have made a commitment to live on the wheel for ten days. Their temporary home is equipped with a kitchen, beds, chairs and a toilet.

But here’s the catch. These two men are living on opposite ends of the hamster wheel, so in order for them to maintain balance and keep from falling off, they have to be keenly aware of the other person’s movements. When one man walks forward, the other must walk in the opposite direction. Their exhibit is the ultimate experiment in trust and collaboration. They built the hamster wheel because they wanted to demonstrate that we “all have to work together to get through the daily grind.”

When life is insanely busy and we’re plagued by multiple demands, it can feel like living on a hamster wheel. I often hear this complaint at the beginning of a new executive coaching engagement. “I feel like all I do is work and sleep,” my new client will say. “I have very little time left over for my family, my friends, for exercise, or for anything else but work.” They’ve allowed themselves to be captured on the hamster wheel and have lost sight that they have other options and the power to create healthy changes in their lives. They’ve forgotten the art of balance and have gotten stuck in just trying to survive.

The sad fact is that we can have more money than we’ll ever need, the highest pedigrees or roles we could ever attain, and more power than we’ll ever use, but if we’re only existing and not really living then what’s the point? We’re not, as Jack London said, using our time to support the lives we want to lead. We’re allowing life to manage us rather us managing life. We’re multi-tasking our way through our days and losing the joy of the present.

So what’s the antidote? Our human hamsters’ (Shelley and Schweder) theory makes sense. Trust, collaboration and support are required for both a sense of safety and for leading a meaningful life. We need to trust that we don’t have to be the ones in control of everything―that others’ can not only handle things in our absence, but that providing them with those experiences helps them learn and grow. We have to trust that when we take the time to meet our own needs for connection, nourishment and rest that the people we serve and care about will benefit from those actions, because we’ll be able to be more present and attentive when we’re with them.

We also have to understand that everyone needs a village to live a meaningful life. We weren’t meant to do this work of being human alone. We all need networks of support, people we can count on and relationships that lift us up to help us become our best. We have to learn how to work effectively together.

As one of my neighbors said, “After open heart surgery my focus was to survive, but now that I’m healthy again, I want to thrive; I want to do more, be more, and experience life to its fullest. Life is too short to do otherwise.” His vision of the kind of life he wants to lead is what many of us yearn to experience, yet lack the courage to consciously create. To thrive, we have to be willing to climb off the hamster wheel and change the way we live our lives.

If you’ve been living on a hamster wheel, how committed are you to climbing off? What choices could you make today that would enable you to live a fuller, richer life? Who or what do you need to trust to help you get there? Who might you rely on for support? How could making these changes improve the quality of your life and relationships?

1 http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/NYC-artists-live-on-human-hamster-wheel-5289840.php

Work is love made visible.
And if you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work and sit at the gate of the temple and take alms of those who work with joy.
For if you bake bread with indifference, you bake a bitter bread that feeds but half man’s hunger.
And if you grudge the crushing of the grapes, your grudge distills a poison in the wine.
And if you sing though as angels, and love not the singing, you muffle man’s ears to the voices of the day and the voices of the night.  ―Kahlil Gibran

Happy Valentine’s Day!

In the spirit of Valentine’s Day, I offer one of my favorite passages from the Lebanese poet Kahlil Gibran’s book, The Prophet.  Even though these words were written nearly 100 years ago, the message is more vital than ever because a Gallup Survey in 2012 determined that 87% of workers in the world and 71% in the United States feel disengaged at work.¹  

Why is that?  According to Susan Sorenson, a writer and editor at Gallup, workers feel disengaged when they don’t feel a deep sense of connection to their work and to their organization. Feeling linked to those two things, Sorenson says, “…is what drives performance, inspires discretionary effort, and improves wellbeing. That’s what keeps people coming to work, makes them excited about what they do, and inspires them to push themselves and their companies forward.”²

No wonder organizations can be so dysfunctional.  It’s like throwing a party for 100 people, and 69 of your guests would rather be somewhere else!  These engagement statistics are so alarming because untold potential is being squandered that if harnessed, could literally change the world.  The good news is that as leaders, we have the power to change this condition.  We can work to model engagement with those we serve and strive to create workplaces where people can thrive.  But it takes effort, time and energy, and it has to begin with ourselves.

Think about it for a minute.  Recall your best experiences in work situations where you felt the happiest and most engaged?  Compare those to the ones that rank at the bottom of your list.  How much of your level of satisfaction, engagement and commitment had to do with how you were treated by your managers and leaders?  What about the way they made you feel that you were valued and your opinion mattered?  What was different in the level of time and interest they invested in your development, in helping you identify and leverage your talents and strengths?  Did they help you see your contributions as part of a larger, significant effort, rather than making you feel like you were a cog in a wheel?

The person who showed me that “work was love made visible” was my first corporate boss.  After spending several years working in not-for-profits, in my mid-twenties, I was lucky enough to be hired by Jessie Glass.  From the day I arrived there, Jessie “got” me.  She saw what I was capable of becoming, even when I couldn’t see it myself.  She had a knack for sizing people up quickly and then pointing them to opportunities where their strengths could be used and displayed.  Time after time she shined the spot light on her people, never taking credit for joint accomplishments.  And she did this with everyone in the office, from the receptionist on up.  She charted a course for me that accelerated my path to leadership. And the day I left her tutelage three years later to accept a job at her same level in a different part of the country, she said, “Always hire people who are smarter than you because they make you look good.”

What enables people like Jessie to be such powerful models of how to create engagement?  First, her primary goal as a leader was growing her people.  She knew if she focused on that, the results would fall into place.  Yes, the numbers were important, but they weren’t the emphasis.  Her people were.  Second, Jessie loved her job because she loved her team.  She was passionate about her work and about her people.  Third, she helped us connect to our mission―to why what we were doing was so important.  Fourth, she allowed her team to make mistakes and learn from them, so we felt empowered to make decisions and take action.  She expected us to walk beyond our comfort zones as far as we could climb, but always interceded before one of us fell off the cliff.  And finally, we all knew Jessie would go to the mat for us anytime and anywhere, so we never wanted to disappoint her.  We became what she beheld.

So as you think about the work you do, and especially about your work as a leader, what are you most passionate about?  What enables you feel engaged and to express that engagement with others?   What one shift could you make that would allow you to be an exemplar of “work as love made visible” in your workplace?  What is one step that you could take today that would make a difference and raise your personal level of engagement as well as the engagement of those you lead?
____

¹ Worldwide, 13% of Employees Are Engaged at Work: Low Workplace Engagement Offers Opportunities to Improve Business Outcomes, Gallup® World, October 13, 2013, by Steve Crabtree

² Don’t Pamper Employees, Engage Them, Gallup® Business Journal, July 2, 2013, by Susan Sorenson

A garden requires patient labor and attention. Plants do not grow merely to satisfy ambitions or to fulfill good intentions. They thrive because someone expended effort on them. -Liberty Hyde Bailey

Though thriving requires personal effort, it doesn’t occur without the care and attention of others.  We all need leaders and allies willing to nurture and help us optimize our talents, while providing constructive feedback that helps us make course corrections.  We all need people who demonstrate their belief in our capabilities and value our contributions.  These are things that great leaders do well.  They are gardeners of people.

Several years ago, I coached a leader who had a tendency to change jobs every couple of years.  He’d enter a new organization, design a new system and then grow bored when the work was done.  Then he’d find another company and repeat the pattern.  One day I asked him, “What if instead of focusing solely on the systems you built, you focused that same energy on developing people? How would that change your level of engagement?”  He took that question to heart and spent the next several years doing just that. He became a gardener of people.

There’s an old adage, “People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.”  It may sound trite, but in most cases, it’s true.  When I think about the great leaders I’ve known, this trait of expending effort on others without expectation of personal gain was at their core.  And the person who taught me the most about being a gardener of people was my grandmother, Linnie Shannon.

It may seem like an odd choice, because my grandmother never worked for a corporation or ran an organization.  She had a small team that consisted of nine children and twenty-two grandchildren.  She only finished eighth grade.  Her corporate headquarters was a three room clapboard house on the Texas panhandle.  Her role was making sure her kids were fed, the crops were gathered and that her family survived the dust bowl and great depression.  Yet despite her lack of corporate savvy or managerial experience, my grandmother taught me so much about leadership because she was a true exemplar of how to be a gardener of people.

Linnie knew how to pay attention. She was able to “uni-task” and focus on what was right in front of her.  She was always present to those around her.  She listened, offered advice when needed and was always deeply interested about what was going on in your world.  She was the most humble person I’ve ever met, but her strength radiated through her humility.

My grandmother had a knack for instilling the confidence that you could conquer any challenge that came your way through words of encouragement and appreciation.  Her mission statement was exemplified in the way she lived the golden rule by treating others the way she wished to be treated.  She was patient and compassionate.  She knew how to imagine another’s plight and put herself in their shoes.  She taught by example and focused on what she could give, rather than on what she might get.  Her greatest ambition was to be of service, and she made a difference to others’ lives in simple ways.

My grandmother had strong principles, but she never needed to try and convince you of their importance because she lived them.  There were no surprises in her character. What you saw was what you got.  She was trustworthy.  Her temperament was steady.  She had a positive attitude and always had faith that no matter how stormy the skies, the sun would rise the next day.

I was very fortunate to have been tended by such a gardener of people in my early years.  And have also been blessed to know and work with a number of leaders with many of her traits in my adulthood.  As you think about the concept of being a gardener of people, who are the people in your life who’ve helped you become that for others?

What qualities did your exemplars demonstrate that inspired you?  How have you sought to emulate what you’ve learned from these people in your life and leadership?  What difference has this made to others?  To you?   What qualities, as a gardener of people, do you still seek to grow in yourself?  How will you know you’ve been successful? 

The poet Mary Oliver offers a powerful question in her poem, “The Summer Day.” She asks, “Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?” Quite a fitting question to ask ourselves, particularly at the dawning of a new year.

I’ve been thinking about this question a lot these past few weeks. I spent the better part of the month of December traveling on a medical mission in Nepal and then on to India for the remainder of my trip. I stayed in Varanasi at a guest house on the Ganges River with a friend who’d come to India to write a book.

The things we saw and experienced in Varanasi broke my heart wide open. There was death, suffering and poverty all around us. There was simply no way to sanitize or deny what we saw and experienced. The suffering was raw, unfiltered and in your face. We witnessed bodies burning, corpses being carried through the streets on their way to the burning Ghats, children begging for rupees for dinner and hundreds of starving dogs foraging through garbage to survive.

And yet, in the midst of all the squalor and suffering, on our last morning, while eating breakfast on the rooftop terrace of our hotel, we noticed a little girl about nine or ten dancing with glee on a patio of a house a few hundred feet away.  She was in a pure state of bliss, and her joy was contagious.  In the midst of the misery all around her, she’d made a choice to really live, to discover a sense of beauty in the tragic.

When I arrived back in San Francisco on the final flight of my trip, I had a call that our dear friend Jay, who had battled cancer for over four years, had passed away.  I interviewed Jay last Easter for the final chapter of my book.  I wanted to capture his story because despite very challenging circumstances in his life, he was someone who’d learned how to thrive.  I coached Jay about 12 years ago and since his cancer diagnosis, I’d marveled at how he’d used his illness to express his purpose and make such a difference in so many lives.  As a buddy for people with cancer, as an advocate to resolve the shortage of generic drugs, and as a brother, uncle and friend, he had touched so many people.

In that interview when I asked Jay what thriving meant to him he said, “To me, thriving means to continue  learning, being aware and being engaged with the communities we are part of (family, friends, work, etc.) and to be optimistic in your view of life.  I also think that people who thrive have a general sense of contentment.  Being happy fluctuates, but contentment doesn’t have to.  Being content on a regular basis is what’s important.  Being of value to someone, to something or to some cause and expressing your purpose in life also contributes to thriving.”

He continued, “If you asked me whether I’d have chosen to go through this journey I’ve been on over the past few years, I have to say the answer is yes.  Of course, I’d prefer not to have cancer, but from both a personal and emotional perspective, it’s been a gift.  It’s forced me to let go of expectations and desires and live in the present and appreciate life in a much deeper way.”

Jay continued to speak about how deepening his sense of trust had been so instrumental in his journey.  He said, “I believe this journey is what I’ve been given and I trust it’s for the good.  I will probably die sooner than I’d like to, but I trust it’s for a reason.  Almost the minute I got diagnosed, I believed it was the path that I’d been given.”

What enabled Jay thrive was his commitment and focus on living fully, regardless of the time he had left.  “I’m pretty realistic,” he said, “That a cure probably won’t happen in my lifetime.  But I’d rather live two more great years than five crappy ones.”  And that, he did in spades.

The little dancing girl in Varanasi and my friend Jay are wonderful examples of people who made a choice to thrive, despite their conditions.  I am honored to have been touched so deeply by their wisdom.  And I am committed in 2014 to try not to waste one moment of this marvelous gift of life that I’ve been given.

As I close these thoughts today for the first blog post of the year, I’d like to leave you with a question ad an invitation:

What is one choice you can make or action you can take in 2014 that will help you thrive and more fully experience your one wild and precious life?   What difference do you want to make this year in your work, your family, and in the communities you serve?