Dealing with Doubt/Live It!

One of my most memorable Christmases was the bicycle Christmas. It was the year my two brothers and I all received new bicycles. Until that Christmas, I had only ridden a tricycle.

My bike was dark green with hand brakes and tall like a ten-speed, but I don't remember having any gears to shift. I do remember that my feet could barely touch the peddles and that there were no training wheels. I had no idea how to ride it.

My dad was confident--not that I could ride it, but that I would learn. You see, my father was a graduate of the John Wayne school of parenting. Remember the western where John Wayne finds out a boy doesn't know how to swim, so he throws the boy into the middle of the lake and encourages him to kick and paddle until he makes it to land?

Dad took all of us to a huge field, set us on our bikes and pushed us until we were going fast and then let go and encouraged us to peddle. Imagine a slow motion crash with two or three pumps to the peddles, an arching curve to the left, and a really bad landing. And then imagine about a ninety-nine trial runs before I finally made it.

But make it I did, and I wore the wheels off that first bike.

Some life lessons when you face a new and challenging situation:

• You can use a mentor. Someone who's done it before. Someone who can help you gain and build momentum. Someone who can encourage you from the sidelines. Someone who can help you get back on the bike when you fall.
• It takes time to learn. Take the time to learn. Learn by listening. Learn by studying. Learn by doing. It's hard work, but lessons well learned are lifelong possessions.
• Concentrate on what's in front of you. Don't waste time in fear and doubt. Neither will help you accomplish the task. Save your energy and brain capacity for the work in front of you.
• Persevere. It can be discouraging to not get it the first time. But nobody gets it the first time. You're doing something new, remember? Keep trying. Until I succeeded, ALL my first attempts at riding a bike ended in a crash. But each ride was longer than the previous ride. Eventually, there was no crash and I was off and running.

One last thought. What would life be like if we didn't have these challenges? Awfully boring, I think. My greatest growth, my deepest learning has come during times of change. We don't need an absence of change, we just need a better attitude when we face it.

Victor Frankl said it better: "What man actually needs is not a tensionless state but rather the striving and struggling for some goal worthy of him. What he needs is not the discharge of tension at any cost, but the call of a potential meaning waiting to be fulfilled by him."

Dealing with Doubt/Go Deep

Doubt comes on strong when you're faced with a new and challenging situation, which is like, what, maybe 95% of our lives these days?

New technologies are being introduced all the time. There are constant realignments in the workplace. Realignments require new procedures and processes to get the work done. Typically, restructures result in fewer people doing more work. Stress levels rise. Doubt, fears, and uncertainties move in.

In the middle of it all, it's so important to remember the things that got you where you are in the first place:

• Your in-born talents--those natural giftings that make you who you are and that come through for you with each task. Those talents helped you get the job you have now and, as you've engaged them in your work, they've helped you succeed. You own these. They don't go away with the changes.


• Your learned skills--the expertise you've gained by doing the work. As you encounter and manage each new situation, you obtain new skills that make you more and more valuable. Not only do you have more skills to engage as tools, you have patterns of learning that will serve you well in a changing future.


• Your earned experiences--the maturity that comes from scraped knuckles and bruised ribs. This includes not just the knowledge of new situations, but the seasoning of facing trials, persevering and coming through successfully to the other side.

You have a lot on your side that will help you in times of change. So keep your head about you and remember what you have.

Here's an appropriate thought from Ralph Waldo Emerson: "Don't waste life in doubts and fears; spend yourself on the work before you, well assured that the right performance of this hour's duties will be the best preparation for the hours and ages that will follow in the future."

Dealing with Doubt/Think About It

Do you have difficulty with doubt?

I do. If you're a man and you're breathing, you struggle with uncertainty about your ability to cope with not only the knowns of life, but the unknowns as well.

I found this notable quote from Tom Peters on a Web site called wisdomquotes.com:

"If you're not confused, you're not paying attention."

How true! Doubt is partially a by-product of an active mind. Think about how much information we take in each and every day. Consider how, in the midst of our incredibly busy lives, we have to catalogue and categorize all this information and then do something useful with it.

Then count all the nonsensical information we take in as well. Is it any wonder that we can't cope with it all? To some extent, uncertainty is an outcropping of our inability to resolve everything that's on our mind.

But doubt is also something that comes from within the heart. Doubt is a fear that emerges from deep inside us when we're faced with a seemingly insurmountable challenge--either real or imagined--and we forget all of our own in-born talents, our learned capabilities, and our earned experiences. And if we let doubt win out, ultimately our own will, our desire to persevere, fades.

Consider this thought from Jane Addams: "Our doubts are traitors and make us lose the good we often might win, by fearing to attempt."

How do we face the fear within, persevere, and win? Think about it and we'll talk more on Wednesday.

Lawn Lessons/Part Three

When I met the new husband of one long-term customer, he had a white bandage around his neck. Having lost his larynx to cancer, his words came in laborious gulps. Apparently noticing my questioning look as I strained to understand him, he said, "Don't...smoke...or you'll talk...like...this." I didn't and still don't to this day.

From the retired fire inspector and his wife, I learned that a mix of idleness and alcohol creates a deadly toxin that can dissolve a respected life into a soup of sloppy silliness.

And if you haven't heard, life's not always fair. Sometimes people will take advantage of others--a hard lesson to learn for the first time.

I once accepted a job to mow a vacant lot owned by one of my new customers. He described the size of the lot and, sight unseen, I quoted $5 for the job. When my father drove me up to the location, I realized I had been had. The lot was used for junk storage, with pieces of rusted equipment strewn all over and only partially hidden by the three-foot-tall weeds.

It was my dad who taught me that day. Keep your word. But there's no reason to be taken twice. I worked for the better part of a full day to finish. I received my $5, but quoted four times that amount to do the same job again--and only if it were done within a month's time. It wasn't surprising that I never heard from that customer again.

I look back on those as productive days. The spending money and sunshine were only part of the good I received. Each encounter left me with something new. It built my character and prepared me for life.

Now, more than three decades later, I have my own family, my own home and lawn. And, believe it or not, I still enjoy keeping a well-manicured yard. But I'm thinking seriously about hiring some young person to mow it. Instead of ridiculing the looks or behavior of the teenager down the street, why not pay for the privilege of speaking a lesson into his life?

Lawn Lessons/Part Two

Mr. Gilmore saw the past. A time when the western sun beat down on parched plains and a constant breeze spun the windmills that drew life-quenching water to the surface. A time when sod houses were the only shelters and every person who staked a claim in the West Texas wilderness was a pioneer. And when he spoke of it, he would point as if to show me the exact locations of every fence post, coyote and cowhand.

From Mr. Gilmore, I learned to appreciate those who built our country. The sacrifices they made, and the ingenuity and commitment they showed in the face of hardship, were things worth emulating in my own life.

The lessons piled up summer after summer as I plowed through yards of grass, earning a teen's wage and listening to and observing my customers.

Mr. Sims paid me $1.60 an hour--plus a hot lunch--to mow his lawn and keep his garden. He taught me that there's a certain way to do things and, if you follow what's proven, you'll reap a benefit in due season. Mr. Sims was big, and he was stern at first. But I learned that respect and even friendship can be earned if you're dependable and you follow orders--when they're given. Things, and people, are not always what they first appear to be.

When Mr. Sims passed away, I learned from the anguished eyes of his widow that a strong, kind and steadfast man will cultivate an undying love and loyalty in a woman.

Another customer was a 75-year-old widow who still worked five days a week at a local clothing shop. Mingling with people, she would say, kept her young. She taught me that attitude makes all the difference and that a smile is the quickest way to make friends. She was one of my favorite customers.

Sometimes the lessons that came were disturbing and life-altering.

(continued on Friday)

Lawn Lessons/Part One

A Reminiscence:

The contrast always filled me with a sense of relief.

After finishing the final row of the last lawn at the end of the day, I would cut power to my mower's engine and enjoy a bit of quiet.

But only for awhile. The day wasn't completely done. The grass catcher still had to be emptied, the plastic leaf bags tied and taken to the curb. And, then, there was the conversation.

It was an understood protocol. Even as a 14-year-old I knew that you didn't just ask for your pay. Not in Amarillo, Texas. Not with someone your senior. Polite conversation always came first.

With Mr. Gilmore, it was easy to begin. He was always waiting for me in the shade of his large front porch. I'd lean on the steps, raise my ball cap and push the sweat back into my hair. Then I'd look up in the sky and with a shake of my head say, "It sure is a hot one today." That's all it took.

Mr. Gilmore stared straight ahead. His eyes pushed out against thick lenses because of the thyroid condition he suffered. Though it seemed he couldn't see past the yard and into the street, his vision reached beyond what my young eyes could perceive.

(continued Wednesday)