Did you know that Benjamin Franklin argued passionately to select the turkey as the American symbol over the bald eagle?  Franklin believed that the turkey was a better choice because the eagle was a coward while the turkey, although “vain and silly” represented the birth of a new nation.

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, more than 45 million turkeys are cooked and eaten in the U.S. at Thanksgiving. That translates to a lot of birds going from farm to table.

Of course there are turkeys and there are turkeys. Will your celebration of this uniquely American family holiday be filled with overeating and joy or will you overeat and withdraw from dysfunctional interactions with the human “turkeys” at your party?

First, it needs to be noted, that being a turkey is in the eyes of the beholder. While you and I can classify others as turkeys, we must recognized how others may visualize us with feathers, funny sounds and would elect us to spend a few hours in the hot oven.

There are many ways to make this week’s celebration time with friends and family joyful or joyless. You get to choose. There was a time when I believed the turkeys were most other people. Maybe they were or maybe they had other qualities that I had not yet explored. My choice today is to engage and embrace with people at the event. There is so much to share and so much to learn with others. Football games and parades are fun and so are people.

How about you? Lift up yourself and all around you by sharing this time of being thankful for life. Is that hard to do? If yes – then it is time to change you (I can help your change process). This is one more opportunity to transition from where we were to where we are going. I highly recommend that eating turkey, stuffing, gravy, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, vegetables, cranberry sauce and pumpkin and pecan pies is way better than being a real or perceived turkey.

Have a Happy and Joy Filled Thanksgiving

Richard Oppenheim

The Transition Professor

“Because we can now conceive of ‘the mind’ as the flow of information through the nervous system and this flow of information can be conceptually separated from the biophysical matter that makes up the nervous system.”

You can search and investigate on every facet of the mind and how we use it. My point here is to ask a simple question – Is your mind open or closed? A few related questions:

• Do you allow content from multiple sources to get past your filter set?
• Are you willing to engage in reasonable dialogue with people who disagree with your view?
• Can you accept being on the losing side of a contest or debate?
• Will you support a consensus opinion?

These questions and so many more have to do with how you, I and all 7 billion are willing to engage and embrace differences and similarities. Perhaps we both like Chinese food. Perhaps we root for different football teams. Perhaps we are related through family connections that neither of us is close to. Perhaps we can get out of our very own private sandbox long enough to share the planet with others.

My Point? Move to the world of being OPEN and away from the world of CLOSED. Many speak different languages, like different music, drive different cars, and watch different movies or no movies. In every single case, your mind has an unending stream of information flowing through and all around you.

Absolutely, the world will continue to spin and revolve around the sun whether I am on this planet or not. My mind is curious, it wants to learn things that you know, share information and ideas with you, help you help me to grow. How about it? Is your mind open to this idea, or have you closed your mind to the discovery of more?

Richard Oppenheim

The Transition Professor

1. Where have you been?
2. Where are you now?
3. Where do you want to go?

There is little that can be done about #1 and #2 except as education. #3, where you are going, is what life is all about.

Your life should contain family, friends, co-workers, neighbors, social connections and more. The world of the Lone Ranger hiding behind a mask and shooting silver bullets no longer exists.  A life of value translates to living the way that the inner you is reaching out to pursue.  We all need to learn and understand that our lives touch other people whether through conscious effort or just being nearby.

The counter side of this life sized coin is that other people’s lives touch us. There are lots of people who do not even know us that impact our lives, such as entertainers, politicians, pundits, athletes. Smile at someone and most of the time they smile back. Avert your eyes and any connection opportunity is totally missed.

If your morning starts with awakening, you might as well do something before you return to sleep. The world, or at least that part of the planet that includes you, needs your participation. Yes, the planet will continue to revolve and circle the sun with or without any of us. Being an active contributor to our joy, happiness, sadness, emotional highs and lows, and all of the other components of life is essential.

So, where do you want to go? If you are struggling with locating an answer, it is time to get out of the slept-in bed and finding others to talk with, share, and figure things out. The key, of course, if to move forward, take action, head in a direction that has the possibility for more of what your life can be and what life can deliver to you.

Please, put your mind in gear and your body in motion. Heading out on a path of doing and exploration is way better than staying one place waiting for the lightning charge to find you.

Richard Oppenheim

WATCH THIS SPACE AS CHANGES ARE ON THE WAY

I have workshops that include “Write to be Read” and “Speak to be Heard.” What this all connects to is that when it is time to be a student seek a teacher. On the other side, when choosing to be a teacher you need a willing student. Just because you decide to teach something, does not always translate to a student that wants to learn.

Throughout all time there are examples of teacher / student disconnect. Many years ago, I taught a course in Argentina. It required translation because my Spanish was never very good. There are many fans, some sitting in the very top row of the stadium, shouting instructions to the quarterback what the next play should be. The message does not get received. There is also the fan watching the game in a bar or at home shouting as if there were 2-way communications down to the playing field

Currently, we are all deluged with political supporters attempting to teach us how we should vote and who we should not vote for. I, for one, do not consider these people qualified for a teacher/student relationship with me.

You may ask, therefore, how can good advice be bad? It is bad when it is not wanted, not requested and not appreciated. It makes absolutely no difference how good the advice is, the teacher/student relationship does not exist and the teacher is making things worse rather than better. That makes good advice bad.

Please think about this advice. If good, keep it. When bad, discard it, toss it away, get rid of it and seek a teacher or student at another time.

Richard Oppenheim

Your GPS Navigator – contact me when we share ideas and advice.

Communication is not just about text messaging and social postings – even for the young of any age. We need to speak and write words that can be recognized and have meaning for the recipient.

Therefore, whether your communication is labeled as a conversation, chat, talk, discussion, debate, dialogue, argument, banter, or some other term, words need to pass muster for understanding. If you speak Greek and I stumble along with English, communicating will be very difficult if not impossible.

How you speak demands that someone is around to listen. If you want to talk about rocket propulsion formulas, the audience size might be reduced by anyone who does not care about advanced mathematics and engineering. The same result can happen when one communicates about any specialized subject from accounting to zoology.

The lessons here include making sure that as sender or receiver, you participate in setting the ground rules for conversation. If you do not understand words as they are spoken, it is imperative that you ask for clarification. The best conversations occur when everyone is willing to share knowledge that delivers a message and not just noise.

I do not listen to rap music as I rarely come close to hearing the words. At this time of year I decline any phone calls that seek to discuss politics from any side, angle, or vertical height. I deliver workshops about communicating and focus on using words that are acceptable to the audience. I have also learned to slow down my New York accent.

Speak to be heard, write to be read, be silent when listening. Exchanging words really helps your information exchange on the job, at home, with friends and everyone else.

Richard Oppenheim

Your GPS Navigator

Wednesday, August 8, approximate start 10:42am MDT

Listen on KLZ radio - http://www.560thesource.com/

Watch & Listen – http://www.experiencepros.com 

Replays on UStream, http://www.ustream.tv/ and iTunes

Tune in, listen to replay, send me a question. Actions will enhance all relationships, especially the ones you want to keep.

Richard Oppenheim

Your GPS Navigator – talk time is available

Transition is a popular term used for as an element careers, jobs, video production, PowerPoint presentations and so many more.

• People transition from single to married to single
• Babies transition through stages of growth from newborn to senior citizen
• Companies transition as new products/services supplant old
• Politicians taking over a new office have a transition team
• Family owned business must have a transition plan as generations shift responsibilities

Handling transition is a required for whatever choices you are facing. This is not a time to pull the blanket over your head and believe you can hide. Everybody knows who is under the blanket. Therefore, this is the time to step up and be an active participant in the transition process.

Transition can be from where you are to something better – new job, pay raise, more responsibility. These events will lift your spirits and give you opportunities that will impact your life. Ride the wave and share the good times with others.

Transition can be from where you are to something worse – loss of job, bankruptcy, medical ailment. These events will add stress and emotional pain to your life. You do not want to ride this wave, but you have to. It is time to do what it takes to end the downhill and start in another direction.

As you go through transitions, there are common steps that must be part of your actions:

• Research and assess what change is needed
• Evaluate how you want to participate in this change
• Know the results of change are you seeking
• Evaluate the gap of skills needed and determine how to bridge the gap
• Create a map for you to take action – for you and  others that are part of your plan

It is time to determine the transitions that are ahead of you. After all, there was a time you did not walk or drive a car. Transitioning in your personal and business lives will never end, so you might as well do all that you can to transition well.

Need assistance, someone to chat with, get you over the hurdles, contact me.

Richard Oppenheim

Your GPS Navigator – ready to help take actions as you transition 

It is time to exit from the dark space and into the light of the world. This light provides illumination of people, places and things that can help us move forward and pick us up when we fall down.

There is no one magic way to escape the self-made orphan disorder. Finding people can be accomplished by anyone. The Lone Ranger of 20^th century fame had Tonto and Silver. Whatever you do, other people are in the process of assisting you – the airline pilot, the farmer, the UPS driver, the grocery store cashier. All types of people can guide and help you fly. All kinds of people can obstruct and hinder your take-off. Self-made orphans have decided that there is no place to go and no one can help. Typical actions by the SMOs:

• Avoid contact, follow up or any conversation that leads to a connection
• Build walls that stop people from finding out about you
• Construct a very large box that stops people from being in touch with you
• Play emotional mind games – “I am all alone” “No one can help me” “I am useless”
  • When you think it – you are it
  • Resist every opportunity to be connected
  • Display an arrogant and aloof style that repels and rejects connecting
  • Conversation Monopolizing – one-way monologues get old fast

We can no longer just go up into the mountains and live only by our wits, cunning and a sharp knife. Others can help grow food, build cars, deliver electricity, provided fire and police services. There are so many ways that people provide without ever meeting or directly connecting. I do not know who attached the buttons to my shirt.

Your life must include people who can assist your exit from the trap of being a self-made orphan.  It is never about how many, it is all about your willingness to be lifted by others. As you go out into the world you will meet differing types of people – those who want to and can help and those who look the other way.

3 Keys to help you avoid being a self-made orphan

• Answer questions / Ask questions
• Tell Stories / Listen to Stories
• Care about others / Allow others to care about you

Being a Self-Made orphan is wrong – Tell people who you are. Let your actions demonstrate who you are. Who you are enables you to find others and be discovered by others.

Richard Oppenheim

Your GPS Navigator – ready to guide you out of the dark orphan cave

OK, which are you –

• The procrastinator who puts everything off to another future date and time
• The procrastinatee who is waiting for someone to finish some task or has not yet returned your email, phone call, or LinkedIn message.

These two choices end with a very similar result, something does not get done, finished, completed, or allow for the next steps to be started. When faced with procrastination, understand that is just an excuse for not doing what is needed to be done.

If it is you as the delay agent, get going and finish the task. If you are the victim, find ways to encourage, support and motivate the procrastinator. Yelling and threatening rarely works. Cooperation, collaboration, mutual accountability helps move all things further along the path of completion. Whether it is one step or many steps, each step moves you along the road on the journey.

Be neither a procrastinator nor a procrastinatee, your journey requires activity, not stagnation.

Your GPS Navigator

Does a choice have to be made?

When driving anywhere, there are lots of choices – avoid other cars, traffic light signals, stop signs, directional turns, speed limits and so much more. If you want dinner before the restaurant closes, you have to make a selection. Know that many choices can be made without lots of contemplation, worry and any sense of feeling bad about choosing incorrectly. Of course, life at risk choices should take time – surgery, marriage, moving away to a new location.

Do you have sufficient facts, resources and information?

It would be wonderful if we can be assured that we always have 100% of all the information about all of the choices to be made. Sometimes we do, most of the time we do not. Making the choice is based on our experiences – driving to a friend’s house, answering a child’s question, selecting the wine to accompany dinner, etc. Risk is often defined as making a decision when not all the facts are known.

How you make choices and decisions will say a lot about how you combine knowledge, experience, research, confidence and courage. You made it to where you are making lots of choices. Go ahead and make the next one and the one after that.

How many people will be affected by your choice?

Is the choice for you alone, just your friend, your spouse, your family, the department or the entire organization? Confidence and courage are required for any of these choices. The more people that are affected should lead you to engage with others before the choices are made.

Will you take full responsibility for the outcome(s)?

Take responsibility for your actions or inactions will guide you forward. Do not duck and hide from taking responsibility. The consequences of NOT taking responsibility are far worse than lying. When you unlock your courage and stand up for your actions and who you are; the path to the next decisions in your life gain clarity.

Your comments are welcome. I will be writing more about choices and the process of decision making – stay connected.

Your GPS Navigator

When you are stuck, the first thing you notice is the wet and dirt that decorates everything. Being stuck locks you into a dark place that grips tight and keeps you within its trap. Whether you are in up to your knees, your waist or your neck, the darkness squeezes you making it hard to breathe. It is even more difficult to focus on what has to be done in some logical sequence. The goal, of course, is to escape the darkness and get on with your life.

This book is for people who are already in or getting close to a chaos filled mud hole. Whether it is you, a family member or a good friend, who are trapped, the mud hole is never a place for permanent residence. It is time to implement a process of extraction from that sticky mud and move towards where you want to go.

How you arrived at today’s chaos is not as important as how you want to exit to a different tomorrow. Those memories will always be tucked away in some internal file cabinet. Now is the time to focus on the tasks of getting out of the mud and exiting chaos.

To get unstuck requires action. Action requires planning. Planning requires understanding of what needs to be done. Your personal road map starts from where you are today because no one can time travel with a handy reset button. Your location, in the mud hole or looking into it, is your ground zero. From this starting point, the book provides insights for you to regain your balance, get out of the hole and move down the road towards a destination you select.

There was a time my travels improved from crawling to walking.

There was a time walking improved with a 2 wheel, 1 speed bicycle.

There was a time I learned how to drive a car.

There was a time is a phrase that recalls memories good, bad and ugly.

How is your memory storehouse? How we recall all things, no things, only the bad, only the good only short term or only long term gives us momentum for how we move ahead. Memories can motivate us or they can paralyze us. They can be shared or held private. They will always be part of our history and can never be changed for what they were. They are facts. How we deal with these facts will help lay out our plans for tomorrow next week, next year, next decade and so on.

Look ahead – 2011 is coming and no one can stop its arrival. Embrace the New Year with a stand up posture and head held high.

First comes Christmas – a time for joy and merriment. Take the time to find joy with one or a lot of people. This is not a time to allow your seat belt to squeeze you too tight. If you had a recent loss of a loved one or good friend, spend the time to reflect on the wonder that the person brought to your life. It is a time of sadness for the loss. It is a time of knowing that the memories will never be lost.

Your Getting Unstuck Coach

Send me your thoughts, questions

Rich

Countless numbers of people like the above sequence of events. Family, friends, strangers gather round a holiday decorated table to share stories while eating turkey and fixings. The even luckier ones get the joy of eating leftovers for one or more days.

Turkeys lose their head and people rejoice. How about you? Are you losing your head, or anything else, because things are not going just the way you want? We may have a few things in common with Turkeys, but the concept of losing your head should never be one of the possibilities.

Are you facing holidays without heat, without a kitchen, without a job, without a family, without hope? Head loss does not make any of these conditions better. When you suffer from any of these conditions, keeping your head attached is complicated, hard and painful. Turkey heads cannot be reattached. When we lose our heads, it takes a long stretch of rehabilitation.

If you have your head attached and do not suffer the above conditions, this is the time to do something to express your thanks. Think about it. You are worth sharing. People can benefit and receive value from what you are able to accomplish when your hand is out and stretched. Someone sure could use it.

Whether your head is firmly attached or hanging too loose, I wish you much joy from sharing this Thanksgiving with family, friends, strangers, people you know, people you never met. It is one more time to get the right heads stuck on top of the right necks. Lift a drumstick and be thankful.

And, remember to thank the Turkey for its involuntary participation in your celebration.

Happy Thanksgiving!!!!!

Rich

What about your life at this time? Are you surrounded by turkeys that do not respond to your emails and phone calls? Do you feel like a turkey that is getting stuffed, cooked and carved? These turkey style feelings do not taste like a Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner. They provide indigestion that is not the same as eating too much.

Here are a few suggestions to follow at this time of year:

• Do not walk around with feathers on and shouting gobble, gobble.
• Do not lie done in a roasting pan.
• Stay away from ovens, especially hot ones.
• Do not stick your neck out, especially when sharp knives are in the vicinity.

This is not the time to feel like a turkey being led to slaughter. You are not going to be the centerpiece of the holiday dining event. You do have to consider how to keep your spirits high and looking ahead. You can participate and not hide. You can share with family, friends and strangers. Putting yourself in the background at this time of year delivers the wrong message, especially to you.

If you want to stay stuck, act like a turkey and hide.

If you want to get unstuck, eat the turkey with others.

Happy Thanksgiving

Before you continue, think a little about the last question. Do you tell people about:

• What you were, where you are from
• Your kids, your spouse, status of your health
• Who you used to be, what you did, where you used to live

Or

Do you respond to the question by telling people about you? Would you talk with people about some good or bad in your life? Are you willing to share your opinions about a specific topic? Will you remove your mask and speak with truth?

The subject of your life should be interesting. It is filled with real stories about where you traveled and hopeful stories about where you are going and what you want to do.

• If you have kids, would you lie?
• If you are dating with the possibility of finding a spouse, would you lie?
• If you are applying for college entrance, would you lie?
• If you are seeking a job, would you lie?

If you do any of the above, the subject of your life is not honest. It fails the key test of relationship with other people – family, friends, coworkers, future boss, et al. When people find that you are dishonest, they will remember and most often just ignore you. This is a stressful and discouraging way to live.

First, you have to be willing to recognize that you are false and not capable of sharing who you are. Other results come from the incredible stress of remembering what lie you told to whom. You will try to sustain in memory the truth and whatever number of lies that you told. This is difficult for most. People with addictions will lie most of the time. Their addiction masks what is the truth and what is not.

What is the subject of your message to people? Can you answer the question – Who are you?

How about that work question – What do you want to do?

Check your subject line today. You do not have a whole lot of time to be evasive, obtuse or in any way deceptive. Setting an accurate subject line will deliver results that move you forward.

Your comments and questions always answered

Do you have a plan for going somewhere tomorrow? Here are a few suggestions:

• Now is the time to get going. If you stay indoors, answers will NOT knock on your door.
• Now is the time to enjoy where you go. Tell stories about where you were but live for tomorrow.
• Now is the time to stop dreaming, wake up and go do.
• Now is the time to live. Just thinking about it will not work. Doing tops planning.

Go ahead, Get Going GetUnstuck and enjoy the air from a different location.

A long, long time ago, when a school student did not go to school just because they wanted a day off, the student would be described as “playing hooky.” Hollywood made “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” about the success of a hooky day. For full disclosure, I did play hooky occasionally, never like Ferris.

This weekend I played hooky and it was better than I remember from my school days. The past year has not been sufficiently profitable so that more work time was needed to replace better rates. My off-time moments were measured in hours, not days. Therefore, my wife and I agreed to take a full day – 24 hours – without telephone, email, text message, web site search interruption or distraction. Mission accomplished.

For many years, I have written about the impact of our increasing access to technology wherever we are. Everywhere technology resources have been embedded inside our lives forever. We all need to know, as I have said for years, that we need to use a key feature of every device – its off switch. It was about time for me to take my own advice.

This weekend, from 5 pm Saturday to 5 pm Sunday, no technology was touched, caressed, or used. And – I am here to write about it.

There was a time when making a local phone call required speaking the number to a switchboard operator. I have lost contact with all of those operators. I have also been at the forefront of lots of technological developments. The available products and the new ones coming out at least monthly will continue to expand how we access and relate with entertainment, business operations and, yes, making phone calls.

• What are you doing with your time?
• Are your Smartphones and laptops used as an asset supporting your life?
• Are your Smartphones and laptops a controlling force, enabled to interrupt whatever it is you are doing?
• Are you making plans to play hooky? (Perhaps I could join you.)

Your Getting Usntuck Coach

Rich

There are many terms that are used for the hero sandwich. Depending on what part of the world you reside, the  sandwich on an oblong roll and filled with some collaboration of meats, cheeses, vegetables, seasonings, and sauces can be called a sub, submarine, grinder, hoagie, Italian sandwich, po' boy, wedge,  torpedo. And the length can be a few inches to many feet so you can serve a crowd. A quick search disclosed that the longest hero from one continuous loaf is 1058 feet 8 inches created by Chef Franz Eichenauer. That is more than 3 football fields.

No matter what you call it, or how long it is, the hero sandwich provides nourishment. How we eat it is our choice – from the right, the left or the middle.

Heroes are a lot more than a sandwich.

Living in these turbulent times is assisted by encountering the hero within. Oh sure, there are lots of heroes to imagine that we have become a super hero – Superman, Batman, Iron Man, even Wonder Woman. There are the athlete heroes – Willie Mays, Michael Jordan, John Elway, and Wayne Gretzky. There may be a few political heroes; there are lots of spiritual heroes, and family heroes are a lot closer than they appear in your view.  

The hero shows us that there is a road ahead. They show us that the way to travel on that road is to get up and get going. There are obstacles. There are delays. There are doubts. The hero faces all of the reasons for not making their way and discovers how to move on down the road. The result can be whatever the goal is: Catch the bad guy, Win the game, Vote for the law, Guide people in their faith. Family heroes frequently help, guide and support family members for no other reason than the simple fact that they are descended from the same DNA pool.

What hero characteristics do you have? Your answer can be long or short, but it is always something other than “none.” Cardinal Newman said – “Fear not that life shall come to an end, but rather fear that it shall never have a beginning.”

David Brooks of the NY  Times, opined about the well-planned life vs the summoned life. Are we doing things that we have planned to do? Or, are we doing things that we have been called up to do because of circumstances?

Whatever your internal hero decides, there is that road ahead. Find your ways to get going past that pothole, rock, traffic and keep going. Your goal awaits.

More about “Getting Unstuck” can be found at www.gettingyoupastgo.com

Rich

Things happen – some we want, some we do not want, some we plan for, some are unexpected, some are good, some are bad. Lots of us work very hard for things that we want to happen. The batter wants to hit the ball, the pitcher wants the batter to miss the ball, the student wants to graduate, the teacher wants their students to succeed, the owner wants the company to be profitable and so on.

There are times, however, that we are very lucky when some things do not happen. Some of these things were based on our efforts and some just showed up unexpectedly. Here is my latest example of a happening that could have been a whole lot of bad.

It was about 6 pm on a very hot day. I was doing a little repair on our back patio. My wife was out of town and I was home alone. The task was finished successfully (yeah me). I got up from a sitting position and the unexpected thing started to happen.

Here is what happened:  I stumbled. I was unable to stop myself from stumbling to the concrete patio. I did manage to connect with an object on my way down. The object was the wooden fence bordering the small patio area. Sometimes connecting is good – not this time. The part of me that connected with fence was the left side of my face. For the squeamish, please know that all is OK. The end result of the fall was that I was prone on the concrete patio. The fall did not take more than a few microseconds. A few things did happen:  my glasses were knocked off and landed on the other side of the fence;  the only bleeding was from the bridge of my nose where I had a minor skin scrape; there were 2 bone bruises near the outside of my eye; there was puffiness and a deepening red-purple color surrounding the eye.

Here is what did not happen:  I was never unconscious. My glasses did not shatter and push glass into me. My eye was not punctured or gouged by anything. My nose was not broken. My ear was not injured. I have no headaches, dizziness, blurred vision or any other indicator of medical risk. Bottom line analysis shows that I was very fortunate.

The moral of this tale is to recognize that when things happen there are at least two opposing results. Some we want, some we do not want. As I tell my coaching clients – ‘expect the unexpected’ as life continues to happen as much as we try to plan and control it. We need to be able to deal with things that happen along with the things that do not happen. In this way, we can take advantage of really good results that allow us to keep on our journey to explore the things that will impact what we do and who we are.

Getting Unstuck requires actions. These actions are not short sprints, they are long distance running with a start line and a not yet determined finish line. Along the way, there are people and things to see, ideas to absorb and reject, planned and unplanned interruptions, joy and sadness, celebrations and sorrow.

Twitter is NOT: for everyone, for the weak, for the uninvolved.

It is absolutely OK not to tweet. When one uses Twitter, it id best when there is a purpose. The younger folks use twitter as a communication, annotation, declaration for who and where they are. Hey – I am at Mario’s or I just saw the silliest movie or I have no energy now, and so on.

Companies use Twitter for many things, such as marketing, sales, new products and customer support. Individuals use Twitter as a means to alert people about who they are: job seeker, sales person who has products, company spokesperson for sharing information, telling people about good ideas, ranting about things one does not like, expressing opinions, and so much more.

The bottom line for me is that Twitter is all about communicating with the assistance of the web. For me, it is not about telling someone what pizza I am eating, or the line that I am standing in, or my concerns for next week’s weather. Twitter should be used for sending messages that are for the most part – useful, usable, something to ponder, some data to know, and an opinion to share. Why? Because you need to explore ways to deliver messages that can create and sustain contact with customers, employees, prospects, friends and family. And, there is no fee required or stamp to attach.

Twitter is one of the options available as you address what is best for your web presence. Whether individual or company, a web presence is significant. There is a need for more than just one category of web communication – email, website, blog, Twitter, Linkedin, Facebook, et al. There is a never-ending supply of messages and noise clamoring for someone’s attention. Getting pushed away with everyone else’s noise, makes it even more difficult to sell the company, the products and you.

PLEASE. This suggestion to Tweet has nothing to do with telling people what you are wearing, eating, seeing the sunrise, etc. Lots of people use Tweets to deliver a daily journal – good for them. Terrible idea when you want to use Twitter for business or something to contemplate.

Look around. Do a search on how to get started with Tweeting. Learning how to write and publish a Tweet takes just a little time, reading other tweets and practice. To reject Twitter just because you do not have the time or do not know what to say is self-defeating and will keep you stuck. Applications like HootSuite and TweetDeck will provide assistance for managing Tweets.

Go to www.twitter.com and create a useful and usable Twitter name. The maximum for a name is 15 characters. So find one that works to describe you, your company or what you are about. My Twitter name is “richinsight.” It is not so cryptic as to be confusing. Do you have a name in mind? Better check quickly because, with the number of people signing up for a Twitter account, possible combinations of letters will dwindle. My blog name and my twitter name are the same and not by coincidence.

Think through how and where Twitter is or is not for you. Make the choice and then proceed to the next item on your to do list.

Actions are a good thing. They will help you Get Unstuck.

Rich

As George Carlin opined – we all have stuff. Today that stuff is more than old textbooks, collectibles, souvenirs, clothes, watches, cuff links, ties and scarves. Today ‘stuff’ includes volumes and volumes of data.

How much data do you deal with every day?

How much data do you need to have available?

How much data do you want?

How much data do you want to discard?

I have moved several times in my life. Every time I have made a place of residence move I have discarded lots of stuff before the actual move date. Then, and I am not alone in this, after a few days in my new location the discarding process starts up again. This means that I moved stuff that I did not want and I went through the efforts and costs of moving it anyway.

Let’s focus on data stuff. How much data is stored on your hard drive(s)? You may need to actually look at the contents of your hard drive to see. Have some fun – sort the contents of a few folders by date. How much is in there from _______ (you fill in the blank).

Sure there are photos and the first emails from your children and grandchildren. How much of the documents, images, PowerPoint presentations, early drafts and so on are still there taking up space in your computer’s closet? If you are a keeper, the first step of this program is to admit how much you keep. Go ahead, be honest, you are either a public or private keeper.

Accumulate translates to suffocate. Memories, pictures, family archival information is important. Just because you have a 1 terabyte drive, does not mean it has to be filled with stuff from the 20^th century. The retention of all this extra will slow down any search through your files, add costs to online storage, and bother you when you cannot remember anything about the file by its name.

Your goal is to make life better for yourself. Consequently, at least annually, make the effort to go through your hard drive files and let go. Your mantra – documents, programs and leftover junk be gone. Keep what you must or think you must. Do not get stuck in the quicksand of superfluous data.

Your getting unstuck coach

Richard Oppenheim

Part of being stuck lies in the simple reality that we do not know everything. As much as read, as much as we study and as much as we can communicate and learn from others there is always a gap between what we know and all that there is to be known.

One view is that we possess insufficient wisdom. That is part of the glass half-full, half-empty view. Over a lifetime we learn a large amount of information – useful, usable, trivial, nonsensical, or fun. All of this learning gets inserted somewhere in the synapses and connections of our memory. Recall is optional.

There will always be a gap between what we know and what we do not know. This underlies why I call an electrician when the repair task is more than fix a plug, reset a circuit breaker or change a light bulb. What you do not know about getting that job, making a decision to move or figuring out how to describe your goals is your STUCK GAP.

This gap could be insufficient wisdom. It could be insufficient money. It could be that you are indeed in quicksand and have not yet found the help you need to get out of that mud hole. To bridge that gap is your purpose. Some gaps are too wide and will not be crossed. Other gaps will give you a choice of which bridge do you want to go over and how fast do you want to get to the other side.

Not all gaps are meant to be traversed. I have not won the lottery. I will not be a professional football player. I will not win an academy award, starring in a movie would have to come first and I am not looking for the location of that bridge.

Learn more. Learn more every day. Make sure that some of that learning activity will assist with your ability to find the bridge, cross over the gap and keep moving towards your goal. Stuck happens. What you do when you are stuck is a choice.

What is the pursuit of wisdom? If you can read these words, you already have some knowledge. IQ tests and the grading systems in schools identify our ability to retain facts, read the alphabet, calculate with numbers and so on. Wisdom goes deeper than merely the retrieval from our storehouse of information. It is what we do with that data, information, color recognition, depth perceptions, verbal skills, and calculating capabilities. How we measure what we know, no one can determine

The pursuit of wisdom has already begun within all of us.

We have been accumulating from before we breathed air. Whether in our DNA, gene pool, or brain synapses, there is a constant accumulation. Our bodies reacted to food as it is introduced to our bodies. We learn about the hot stoves, we collect favorite singers or comic book characters.

The pursuit of wisdom is always in progress.

In life our formal education pursues more details at any grade level we choose to attain. After school, information and data keeps flowing. So, whatever age we have reached, this wisdom pursuit has occurred even if we think otherwise. We continue to gather new information, new sports scores, new years, new names of friends and neighbors, new weather conditions, new movies and TV shows and so much more. Whether our pursuit is fast or slow, whether consciously seeking new data or it just comes our way, like the weather. Wisdom shows up in our resource banks.

The pursuit of wisdom descends from generations eternal.

We stand on the shoulders of those who have lived before us. Our knowledge starts with all the collected facts, data banks and descriptions of what they have learned. They are the explorers, guides and teachers for the platform of our wisdom.

The pursuit of wisdom has no finish line.

Wisdom has no boundaries. We do have capacities for how much we can learn at any one time. The key is recognizing that there is always another piece to learn, another factual data element, another source to review. We cannot know everything about everything – that would take multiple lifetimes. Consequently, we do not have to apologize for having limitations for what we know and for what we do not know. We are who we are, where we are right now. If we need more wisdom, we can expend time – to learn how to play music, speak a new language, recite poetry, play better golf, study persons of history and so much more.

Our individual pursuit of wisdom makes us unique.

What others want of us is what we know today along with our unique ability to take what we know and apply it to the building of a lifetime of wisdom gathering and wisdom sharing. Never stop the pursuit of wisdom, it has no end point or boundary in any direction from where we are to where we are going.

How do you do? 

Are things getting done?
Do things stay on your famous list seemingly forever?

The world of “To Do” has to migrate to the stage of “Doing” and then “Done.” This is not impossible, but it does require your active participation. Just thinking about your To Do list is a start. Thinking should never be the only action.

There are, of course, lots of statements made that identify why the To Do list remains that symbol of being overwhelmed. A few of my favorites are: The list is too long; I never have enough time; I cannot do one more thing.

With overwhelmed as your goal, you will be. How about getting rid of the “over” and sticking with just “whelmed”. Remember my 4-step plan:

1.    Make a list of things to be done

2.    Pick 2, any 2, of them

3.    Do these 2

4.    Go back to step 1

Getting unstuck from your overwhelming To Do list requires first getting started and second doing things. It will become a habit when you begin to see results from doing as opposed to worry and lists. Everything in its place refers to being an active doer rather than a passive list reader.

Comments or questions are always welcome.

Rich

Your Getting Unstuck Coach

www.gettingyoupastgo.com

• Does what you are doing make sense?
• Are you in the right company?
• Is your location satisfying?
• How are you dealing with family?
• Did your football team make the right draft choices?

 Do your answers to the above make any sense?

Sense is that word we use to determine whether we agree with what just happened, did happen or will happen in the future. There are many things throughout our lives that can make sense along with a large number of things that make no sense at all. For example: traffic jams, a team losing the game, not getting the promotion, getting the promotion, the price of food, an argument, and many, many more.

Sensing what is happening as it is happening is a valuable skill. This skill is not part of your birthing DNA, it develops over a long time period. Moreover, it is something that you need to keep learning, modifying, and letting go of what was. Jane Austen’s book, “Sense and Sensibility” is only one example of how people view good sense, bad sense and nonsense.

What sense do you have for this week?

How about your sense for next month or for the rest of this year or for your life?

Use your senses to recognize how to keep moving ahead. Getting Stuck never makes good sense. After all, you have control of your senses and can assess the good and bad of any action.

If this makes sense to you, put your senses to work and keep going.

Watch for an announcement of my new book: ABCs of Getting Unstuck. It will be listed on Amazon in the next few days.

Your Getting Unstuck Coach,

Rich Oppenheim

info@gettingyoupastgo.com

www.gettingyoupastgo.com