#WorkItWednesday

For #WorkItWednesday I thought we could talk about working *it* when other things don't feel right. The *it* is whatever you are involved in that's working right now.

I don't know about you but I have a tendency to focus on the wrong things at times. I tend to neglect the stuff that's working out and tunnel vision focus on the stuff that isn't going okay. While I do think we have to give some attention to what isn't working we shouldn't push off what is. It puts us in a negative mindspace and that's no good for anyone. It might be obvious to point out but I'll risk the obvious, a positive outlook has powerful benefits. Plus, a lot of times what isn't working out turns out to be pretty unimportant.

In group situations - like workplaces, volunteer groups - often when change is needed the focus is on fixing the things that aren't going right. But studies show that to effect change, focus on what’s working.

Of everything you are doing now - and this applies as much to your personal life as to your career - identify the one thing you do really well and promise yourself you’ll do more of it.

If you do that first and foremost - you can still find time to fix what’s broken. Start with the most severely broken piece and try to make it not excellent but good.

But first, focus on what’s working. Work it!

Comments

Butter someone up

There are two probable origins for this idiom and I think both are equally plausible. The first one is that when you spread butter on bread you are buttering it up like one would do when trying to flatter someone. The second is in ancient India there was a practice of throwing balls of butter at statues to ask for favor, i.e. buttering them up. ( source ) When we use the phrase today we generally mean that extreme flattery is used to gain information or favor. It's not always necessarily a compliment.

A dime a dozen

"It's said that in the year 1796, the first U.S. dimes were produced for circulation. Hence, it would make sense for this phrase to originate sometime after." Read more here . Today the phrase carries the meaning that something is cheap or without value if it can be lumped in with other similar or exactly-like things. It's more of an insult than anything.

Life according to van Gogh...sort of

There are two ways of thinking about painting, how not to do it and how to do it; how to do it -- with much drawing and little color; how not to do it -- with much color and little drawing. Vincent van Gogh in a l etter to Theo van Gogh, April 1882 Life is a little bit like today's quote from van Gogh. Some of us live life focusing on the drawing - the details - and have very little color. Others of us go for the color and forsake, to a degree, the drawing - the details. Unlike painting, according to van Gogh, one is not wrong over the other but somewhere in between the two would be the best I would think. If you look at some of van Gogh's paintings I feel like you can see where he might have struggled between the "how to do it" and the " how not to do it" (as he admittedly loved color so much but knew he had to focus more on the drawing) and that seems to be reflected in his life as well. In the end he wasn't able to find the ...

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