Jenny and Erin

In love we all desire similar things - to be cared for, to be understood and to find safety and companionship. The lens through which we view our experiences, or Center, determines the means to meet these needs. Different Centers provide dramatically different views of how life should be lived and love expressed. This does not only apply only to romantic relationships, in fact it can be translated to all of one’s relationships.

Our Centers provide the basis for how we view the world. Through them we interpret our experiences, find motivation and determine our goals and dreams. Personal Centers are explained in more detail in a previous article, Girls Just Want to Have Fun. Understanding your Center provides clarity to all aspects of your life ranging from why you react the way you do to the frustration of feeling compelled to behave in a certain manner that causes you pain over and over ad nauseum. If you can learn to see and understand your center it is easier to see and understand other’s centers as well. It’s humbling to realize just how driven we are by oftentimes deeply buried motivations and beliefs.

Oftentimes it comes as a bit of shock when you realize that you are not the only person with a Center driving their thoughts, beliefs and actions. When the realization hits that everyone around you including your mate has a Center driving his or her choices it is an ah-ha moment. You can begin to play detective and through observation learn quite a bit about just what is driving the people around you, and the person you love. How do they view the world? Figuring this out will help you deeply understand their motivations.

Let’s look at two people, one who is Pleasure-Centered and the other Relationship-Centered. A Pleasure-Centered individual:

• Becomes bored over time by things that used to bring them happiness and excitement
• Is happiest when doing something fun and exciting and easily frustrated when denied fun and excitement
• Views their partner as either part of the fun or as holding them back from what they want to do and boooring!
• Has many friends and spend a lot of time seeking fun with these friends
• Finds serious discussions about the relationship or your alternative views as distasteful and frustrating, as there are better things they could be doing with their time

Likely this individual feels loved through a partner who is fun and supports their pleasure seeking desires - financially, emotionally and physically. Someone who understands the importance of dinners out with friends, Sunday game days, parties or shopping trips. Their life is near perfection when their partner wants to partake in all of these activities with them.

A Relationship-Centered individual:

• Happiness is dependent upon how their partner is treating them or the mood their love is in
• Expends much energy trying to appease or gratify their love
• When their partner is unhappy with them there is a great deal of fear and sadness and concern that they will withdraw their love for good and you will do nearly anything to stop this from happening
• All other things in their life from family to job take second place to their love or are done excessively in an attempt to take care of their mate

Just being with their partner is happiness for a Relationship-Centered individual. When the relationship is good so are they. It doesn’t much matter if they are spending time together out with friends or at home doing yard-work as long as they are with the person they love and this person is happy.

Do you see how these two can either compliment one another - or worse, complicate things for one another? For a Pleasure-Centered person the “good” life is through fun and a mate who supports their pleasure seeking desires - financially, emotionally and physically. For a Relationship-Centered person this is through a mate who longs to spend time with them, puts the relationship at the top of their priorities and considers the impact of the relationship first and foremost on any and all decisions from financial to family. Oh, oh! With these two very different drivers a collision is ahead!

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if all it took to have both a successful personal life as well as relationship was to see and understand both your and your partner’s Center? You could plan around it or adjust for it – maybe just explain what’s going on and things would change, right? Unfortunately not as much as one would expect. When you are entrenched in a Center it is difficult to see the negative consequences that are heading your way even when they are blindingly obvious to others around you (or at least those with a different Center!) and quite easy to overestimate the control you do have over both yourself and your partner’s behaviors.

The reason that understanding your and even your partners center doesn’t create a healthy relationship or at least a relationship in which the both of you can happily exist with both of your needs being completely met is because the centers we have been looking at so far are based on weakness. They don’t provide solid foundations. Strength doesn’t come from adding together two different sets of weaknesses and problems which you no doubt understand if you’ve ever personally experienced the collision of two Centers for the worst. The resulting confusion, pain and misunderstandings are painful to watch and you might begin to wonder if there just isn’t a better way to approach life – and there is – that of living a principle centered life.

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Challenging Our Mental Maps

I have a confession to make. Not a big, earth shattering confession, but a confession none-the-less. The true reason I started reading Stephen Covey had nothing, not a single solitary thing, to do with personal development. No, it was all because I was interested in character development - I’m not talking about the development of my character - but the development of fictional characters. I’ve been re-reading the campy Travis McGee series by John D. MacDonald and have been awed by his ability to write characters that flow in and out of the series as comfortable as old friends. I got my first glimpse of just how MacDonald might bring his characters so alive that their growth and foibles seem sincere, often inevitable, while thumbing through Covey‘s The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.

I was intrigued by Covey’s description of people’s personal Centers and imagined the concept an excellent way to understand characters in my head, especially their motivations, internal conflicts and ultimately their actions. I decided to see if this theory held true, so I tested it on myself. “Ouch!” The truth was blinding. He’s had me in his grasp ever since. I haven’t been able to pull myself away instead looking deeper and finding his book a treasure. I have in fact learned a whole lot about character development, funny though, despite my intentions it’s been primarily about mine…

What are Centers?

Stephen Covey’s concept of Centers are fairly interchangeable with mental maps , filters and so forth. Each of us has a Center, or more often a combination of several Centers, through which we view and experience the world. Centers lie at the core of our identity and are a driver of our choices, where we find security and guidance as well as influence how we relate to and view ourselves, family, friends and even our jobs. In short, our Centers provide a base for the majority of our day-to-day decisions, actions and beliefs. They are also sources of our greatest strengths or most damaging weaknesses.

Since I tend to view the world as one big unfolding fairytale (or murder mystery or sci-fi novel depending upon the day) this is precisely where we are heading - back to a childhood staple - the story of Cinderella. Through understanding Cinderella and her Center(s) we can learn how to find the clues to our Centers that drive so much of our lives.

Cinderella, A Pleasure Centered Gal

Once upon a time, there was a lovely lady, dealt a very unfair hand by fate. Cinderella had everything, looks, smarts and a devoted Father who gave her, well, just about anything her heart desired. Unfortunately, he died and without anywhere else to go she found herself living with her quite overbearing Stepmother and equally unpleasant Stepsisters. Her status in the house was reduced to that of a poorly fed servant, clothed in rags and responsible for all of the cleaning and household chores.

Hmmm, Cinderella’s description of her life presents a bit of a problem as Stephen Covey doesn’t appear to have a Center for victims. However, he does explain that taken to extremes, any Center can leave you feeling like a victim. Well, this description does give us some clues to follow. Cinderella doesn’t complain about not having a successful job, lack of true love or a beautiful new carriage. Nope, Cinderella complains about not having any excitement, never going on social calls and having very few friends, except a few mice and birds. She does try to reach through the self-pity to create a little fun in her self-described sad and pathetic life. She sings, make believes and tries her very best to pretend her reality is entirely different from what it is. Yep, sounds rather like the unfortunate consequences of someone living from a strictly pleasure orientated center, wouldn’t you say?

Oh, a party?!?

One day in the midst of this very dreary existence an invitation arrived announcing a big party! Everyone was invited! Oh, of course Cinderella wanted to go and soon the ball was all she could think of. After a great deal of pleading her Stepmother saw how relentless Cinderella was going to be and agreed to let her attend if she finished all her chores first. Seriously, Cinderella wondered, how mean could someone be? She was already at a disadvantage because she didn’t have nice party clothes, but then to have to do chores first as well?!? Besides, do you know how much time getting ready for a party can take… Work always gets in the way of fun, doesn’t it?

Poor Cinderella! Held Back by Obligations

Skip ahead and the day of the party has arrived and Cinderella is finished with her chores; however she is devastated to find that her Stepmother has “rigged things” so she still will not be able to attend the ball. Cinderella is devastated. While I am certain Cinderella did complete her tasks, one must wonder how well they were really done, as cleaning up after others just isn’t much fun, especially when distracted by thoughts of a party! Many things can become barriers to achieving fun when your world is centered on pleasure - family, work and rules simply get in the way. Excitement, adventure and laughter are more important to Cinderella than family, keeping her word, saving for the future or even friends (unless, of course, they are part of the fun).

What Great Friends She Has

Cinderella was absolutely brokenhearted (some might say full of self-pity and sulking) about missing the ball. Lucky for her this is a fairytale not real life. Her fairy godmother appears, hooks Cinderella up with a killer dress and a sweet ride (really, how much more dramatic and exciting an entrance could she make than in a horse drawn carriage!?) and asks only one single thing; that Cinderella leave the party by midnight. In the bliss of looking good and heading out the door for a night of fun Cinderella whole-heartedly agrees to oblige.

Oh, Cinderella muses, what a great friend that Fairy Godmother is! Hanging around laughing, chatting, lending her clothes and then letting her head off to enjoy the night on her own - why couldn’t everyone be a bit more like this? Plus she didn’t ask a single, solitary question as to why evil old Stepmother said no in the first place. Why can’t I find more friends like her? This is going to be so much fun! Cinderellas does not stop to think about her family, authority, the chores she has left to complete or anything else, she just is focused on the fun.

The Happiest Girl Alive!

Once at the ball a happier girl could not be found. Not only was she having fun and looking good she was being noticed! They danced and laughed and made goo-goo eyes at one another and nothing much mattered to Cinderella besides this heady feeling - until she heard the clock strike midnight.

Woops! Cinderella‘s entire sense of self was derived from those oh-too-brief moments when she was on a pleasure “high“. When you are feeling this way, nothing else much matters, even promises you have made. In fact, Cinderella had completely forgotten her promise to leave the party BEFORE midnight - until she heard the clock strike midnight. Even as she ran, her thoughts were filled with the fun she had had. Hmmm…what did Covey say about consequences again? Good and bad? Well, we’ll soon see.

Who Are You?

Thankfully, Covey identifies many of the common Centers people operate under and gives “clues” to help identify which Center(s) might be driving you. This will make much more sense if you click on at least one of the links and read it through… They include:

Spouse
Family
Work
Possession
Pleasure
Friend
Enemy
Self

Did you recognize yourself or people around you in any of these centers? I did. Erin did too. It’s important to remember that each center is linked to consequences (some good, some bad) and although the exact consequences can’t be determined ahead of time we usually can get a pretty good idea once we understand enough about the center. Funny enough, it doesn’t seem to much matter whether or not our centers ultimately help or hinder us. Either way they just seem to feel “right” or natural. This natural feeling associated with your center is why it is easy to go through life unaware of why you act the way you do and why the things that just keep happening happen only to you.

Conclusion

You can figure out your own the center the same way we just did with Cinderella - acting as a detective and examining your own life. Look deeply and you’ll be surprised at what you see in both yourself and others. Remember each center has resulting consequences and impacts how we ultimately view the world and others in it. Consequences can be good or bad - they are nothing more and nothing less than the end result of your thoughts, words, actions and deeds. As you grow in awareness of your own center and observe both it and the associated consequences you will gradually be able to shape it as you see fit.

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How to Have a Beach Ready Body in Six Months

Can you envision your biggest goal in life? Do you truly know what it will it take to get you there? Answering winning the lottery doesn’t count! How many times have you set a goal only to fail? Maybe you even failed during the first week, or as many experience, on the very first day. Perhaps you’ve been going about achieving your goals in the wrong way.

Stephen Covey writes in The Seven Secrets of Highly Effective People that one of the keys to reaching a goal is to achieve it twice. Twice? But isn’t once hard enough? This isn’t exactly as it appears. You see, your goal must first be brought to reality through identifying it, visioning how you will attain it and by believing in your ability to achieve it. Only after this is accomplished, can you reach your goal the second time, in physical reality.

Let’s say you are going on holiday in 6 months and you want to look GOOD in your swimsuit. It doesn’t matter if you’re a man or a woman, if you have weight to gain or weight to lose or are trying to impress the girls, the guys or a special someone. What ultimately matters is that when you put your swimsuit on you believe you look good. It’s the kind of goal you know is only possible with hard work. Great, you’ve identified your big goal. Next you need to figure out how to attain it.

Unfortunately for most of us, Covey believes it is in this planning stage where most failures occur. This may take the form of unrealistic planning (I will go to the gym 2 times a day), not truly believing in ones dream (I’m such a loser I’ll never be able to do this) or setting unrealistic expectations (I will gain 30 pounds of muscle). Before you know it, the 6 months have passed and nothing has changed. What you focused on is what you got. If all of your mental energy is spent focusing on the barriers to your goal can you really, honestly be all that surprised when you fail? You never really bought into the dream in the first place.

Why do so many of us fail here? Covey believes it is because we are focusing on the wrong thing. In an earlier post (click here to read it in full) I introduced Covey’s concept of our circle of influence (the things we can control) and our circle of concern (the things we care about but can’t directly control). Covey argues we must create the goal twice (one time in thought and plan and another time in reality). In order to accomplish this it is essential we act within the circle of influence and let go of the things in the circle of concern.

So if I want a wicked beach body in 6 months I am much more likely to succeed if I focus only on the things I can control, such as what I eat and how often I work out. The more I focus on the things I can’t directly control, such as how to come up with money to hire a personal trainer, a slow metabolism or whether the guys at the gym are going to laugh at me, the more I lessen the likelihood I am going to reach my goal.

So, if having a swimsuit ready, beach body in 6 months is your goal you can have it if you dream big, plan well, work hard and don’t quit until you attain it.

To see other posts about Stephen Covey’s habits, click here.

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Have you ever groaned watching someone on a reality show self destruct? Or cheered on a contestant surmounting seemingly impossible obstacles? Well, so have I. As I re-read Stephen Covey’s The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, it hit me that many of the causes of the contestant’s struggles and victories are explained in the pages of his book. Interestingly, the contestants who incorporate Covey’s concepts are the winners. Sometimes they’re not the grand prize winners, but they are the ones who win our hearts. They are the contestants whose actions continue to inspire us after their season ends.

The first of Covey’s seven habits is living proactively. One of the most important aspects to a proactive life is understanding what you can and can’t control. Just like Monday’s post, How to Hold On To Success, I’m going to use more straight-forward terms to describe the concepts and use a story – this time the reality show The Amazing Race – to explain them. Even though I’m going to be talking about a reality show, keep in mind that this applies to you, only bigger, because after all your life matters more than any old TV show!

The Amazing Race (shown in the U.S.) is a reality show based on a competition to see which team of two individuals can follow clues and complete challenges the fastest while traveling around the world. The losers every week get sent home and the season winners receive one million dollars. Many of the factors that go into winning the race are the same as winning in life, such as limited money, tough time constraints and a partner who either brings you up or drags you down. The show, like life, gives the players varying degrees of control over situations, resulting in teams winning a portion of the journey while losing the entire race or vice versa.

Most situations in The Amazing Race fit into one of two categories; (1) factors contestants want to change but can’t (at least directly) and (2) factors they can change. Covey calls the factors contestants want to change but can’t the Circle of Concern. In The Amazing Race this may be a missed airline flight, a tired teammate, or an opposing team with a better geographical knowledge. Covey calls the things the contestants can change the Circle of Influence. This may be a contestant choosing to push through a muscle cramp or quickly overcoming a fear. The contestant’s ultimate success in the game is best predicted by how they respond to both the things they can’t control and those they can.

The teams that get sent home quickly spend a lot of time focusing on the things they can’t control (Circle of Concern). For example, they get a flat tire in a rainstorm. Rather than focusing on fixing the tire, they first spend 10 minutes yelling about why they chose that particular vehicle, then they watch other teams drive past them and finish by arguing over the correct way to change the flat, all the while complaining about how cold and wet they are from the rain. This makes great TV; horrible teams. The more they focus on the things they can’t change (either directly or at all) the less they seem to notice the things they can change (Circle of Influence). They are so busy yelling at each other over the flat tire, they don’t see the cab driver slowing down to try to help. When this team eventually gets sent home, and they always do, it is just as often is for something they could control (how long it took to change the tire) than something they couldn’t (getting a flat tire in a rainstorm), but you could never tell them that!

The more successful contestants spend the bulk of their time on the things they can control (Circle of Influence). They act as if every second is the most important part of the race. Because they are effectively working on the things they can control, more opportunities arise in which it is possible to act indirectly on the things they can’t (Circle of Concern). When these teams meet obstacles they can’t control they accept it fairly quickly and move forward. If they get a flat tire in a rainstorm and all of the other contestants are driving past (Circle of Concern), they fix the flat quickly (Circle of Influence), barely mentioning the rain. In fact, after determining who is best able to fix the tire the other teammate flags down a taxi to ask for directions. It is this ability to let go of both the things they can’t change and their past mistakes that influences their success. The more time they spend focused on what they can control the more successful they become.And when these contestants (as they sometimes do) get sent home by something they couldn’t control they don’t look like losers.When you’ve given 100% and it just doesn’t work it is much easier to live with than when you gave 80% and failed.

To be successful these contestants (and you) must focus on the things they can control – themselves. The more they focus on what they can do the more opportunities they see. Life isn’t treating them differently - both teams got a flat tire in the middle of a rainstorm - but only one team won. They had to choose -were they going to be victims or winners. This choice is what creates success, in reality TV, and in life.

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In Stephen Covey’s classic The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People he describes a universal truth called P/PC Balance. Brilliant as Stephen Covey is, I always get stuck trying to remember what P equals (what is produced), what PC equals (the ability to produce what is desired) and just exactly how they balance. Covey’s lingo leaves me feeling back in a high school algebra class; just wanting to lay my head down on my desk and fall asleep. Unfortunately it can be painful when life is the teacher waking you up and the pop quizzes come with real consequences. So, let’s look at the P/PC Balance in a different language – one of stories and fables.

Covey briefly illustrates the P/PC Balance Principle with the classic fable of the goose that laid golden eggs. For the sake of not so mathematically inclined story lovers, let’s expand his analogy. There once was a farmer with a beautiful farm. She had rows of corn and wheat, fresh vegetables and lots of animals. One morning the farmer found her goose had laid a golden egg. The farmer nearly threw the golden egg away, as it didn’t look how goose eggs are supposed to look. However, a small voice inside told her to get another opinion. So the farmer finished her chores and trudged to town carrying the golden egg. And trudge she did because gold is heavy! Once in town it only took a few minutes to confirm her goose hadn’t laid any ordinary egg. In fact, this egg was solid gold.

As you can imagine, the farmer was overjoyed thinking of how improved her life would be from the fortune of this one golden egg. Imagine her delight when the goose continued laying golden eggs every morning! She bought extra feed for her animals and new seeds to plant, certain that the miracle of the golden eggs would transform her life. And it did. Over time, the farmer started living differently and the farm no longer seemed so important. She ate at fancy restaurants and bought only the finest goods. Sometimes she was so busy having fun and buying clothes that she forgot to bring feed home for the goose. Again, she heard that small voice inside her head reminding her of how important her farm was. But she assured herself that she had an endless supply of golden eggs and the money would never run out. Just in case, she hired people to tend to her farm. However, she was so “busy” that she failed to check references or their work.

It didn’t take long until the farmer depended on the goose’s daily golden egg. She did have expenses after all! And as her expenses grew so did her desire for more. Soon the money from a daily golden egg was not enough to meet her bills. After a lot of thought and shushing the pesky voice inside her head she decided to kill the goose, convinced that once she cut it open she would find enough gold to live comfortably for the rest of her life. Unfortunately life doesn’t work that way. Upon killing the goose the farmer looked inside to find, well nothing. She placed her head in her hands and wept, realizing her mistake. As she stopped weeping she remembered that at least she still had the farm. She dried her eyes, but as her gaze shifted to the fields all she saw were weeds where the crops once stood. She looked to the barn and realized it was empty. In her pursuit of all the things the gold bought she neglected her farm. She would have to start again at the beginning.

If all you do is read this fable literally it seems pretty stupid; geese don’t lay golden eggs after all. But dig deeper and you will see how this story might hold clues to the thing you desire. What is this one thing? I don’t know exactly, as it is different for each of us. It might be a high paying job, fitting into your perfect size jeans, or having a loving relationship with a special someone.You may even have had it once in your life, but were unable to maintain it. What “it” is really doesn’t matter. What matters is can you get it, and once you’ve got it can you keep it?

In order to create effective success - effective being the operative word – the success needs to be sustainable. The only way to do this is to balance your golden egg with the health of the goose and to never, ever jeopardize the farm. If your golden egg is money, then your goose would be things such as your job, savings and investments.

If your primary focus is on the golden egg (the money), it is easy to get impatient and greedy and start hurting the goose (the source of the money). This may include charging daily purchases on your credit cards, tapping into the principal of your savings or not giving your all at work. Taken to the extreme you lose your job due to a lack of productivity, completely empty your savings and max out your credit cards. The goose is now dead.

If, on the other hand, your primary focus is taking care of the goose (the source of the money) to the exclusion of the golden egg (the money) you can end up with an empty life. You’ll get a great paying job, your savings account will grow large and it won’t take long to be debt-free; however to keep feeding the goose you’ll work 120 hour weeks and perhaps your spouse will leave because of your “frugality”.

Neither the goose nor its golden eggs are sustainable in the long term without balance. Although it takes practice, you can learn to understand how to balance between the goose and the golden egg by focusing on the difference between instant and ultimate gratification. You’ll learn to feed the goose healthy grain, appreciate each golden egg and practice some restraint when spending the bounty.

This principle stays true not only for money but for people and things. Work and work to buy a Corvette (your golden egg) and then drive it without regular maintenance (the goose) and it won’t be long before you have a Junker. Forget to treat the person you love (your golden egg) with kindness and consideration in the little things (the goose) and it isn’t long before you are fighting over everything. The importance of balancing your golden egg with the goose that creates it is a natural law and is true whether you acknowledge it in your life or not. You can use this knowledge to help or hurt yourself; ultimately the effort is the same and time passes either way.

Anyone can kill a goose. The real question is - are you willing to do what it takes to raise one?

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