Wednesday. 5:12am
It’s dark in the bedroom.

The faint light emitted by the display of a cell phone illuminates the inside of a small closet. A guy is fumbling around in a drawer with socks, apparently not finding what he needs.

He’s acting quietly, only two steps away from a bed. One side of the bed is still warm, the other side is still in use.

After rummaging around some more, they guy picks up a pair of socks and quietly leaves the room.

I’ve been running for a three weeks again, training to finish half a marathon in the autumn this year. Last Wednesday during my run I learned a couple of things. One of them is that improper socks increase the chance of blisters (ouch).

Over the past four runs I have increased both my distance and speed on every run:

1. 3.5 km | 21:19 | 9.8 km/h
2. 4.2 km | 25:30 | 9.9 km/h
3. 5.0 km | 29:55 | 10.0 km/h
4. 6.1 km | 35:28 | 10.3 km/h

That’s really encouraging, but I should look out for getting overly confident. As you can see in the increase in distance, well even that increasing. First 0.7 km more, then 0.8 km and even 1.1 km on the last run. At this pace, I’ll be running marathons in a matter of weeks! (yes, that’s overconfident)

During that run though, my body was giving me signals. My stamina was not a problem, but my right knee was protesting a little. I noticed a faint irritation, a muscle maybe. Somewhat later, I began to realize that I was developing a blister on one of my toes on my right foot. Hmm, the right side again.

This week I began reading a new book Stupid, Ugly, Unlucky and Rich: Spike’s Guide to Success, and while running I was going through the “8 to be great”. Push and Persist are two of them. So I pushed myself and persisted.

Later that day, my ankle started sending me messages as well. The right ankle. Right again…

Stop right there, Lodewijk! Your body is sending messages, stop and listen, it usually has something meaningful to tell you.

The knee and the ankle.
They show faint feelings of irritation. Nothing serious, will cure with some rest. The solution is to ease the schedule a bit. Don’t overdue it, is what they try to teach me.

All irritations on the right side.
This is a sign of improper technique I guess. I’m not dividing the strain evenly over all parts of my body. Something to focus on in the next run, maybe even find someone who can train me proper technique.

Blisters.
They tell me to use proper equipment. Not regular socks, but socks made for running. Not tennis shoes, but running shoes. Yeah, I knew this but ignored it anyway. Not smart…thank you blisters.

The messages are only warnings, no injuries…yet.

Warning that I may be pushing too hard. So besides getting the right attitude and right equipment, it’s also time to learn some more about training schedules for marathons. After all, I don’t want to get injured by ignorance.

Time to learn something from the people who did this before. Successfully.

A lot of people are mind readers. Some people are even very proficient at it, reading minds of people every day, all day long. And most of the time, they get it so wrong. Mind reading is a dangerous trait.

The practice of mind reading

Of course I’m not talking about some supernatural phenomenon, a paranormal ability or extrasensory perception. I’m talking about a trait, or maybe a habit even. The habit of presuming to know what other people are thinking, without sufficient evidence of those thoughts. Some examples:

• “He must think I’m stupid for not knowing the answer to that question.”
• “When I ask for directions, she probably thinks I’m not man enough to take care of myself.”
• “If I’m not working full-time he thinks I’m not ambitious or that I’m taking advantage of his money.”
• “If I bring flowers, she probably thinks I have to make up for something.”
• “Oh my gosh he brought flowers…would that mean that…oh my gosh!”

Get the picture? “Reading” the mind of the other person, without knowing what’s really on their mind!

What makes matters worse is that people act upon those imagined thoughts, as if they were actual thoughts of the other! And that in turn might set off a whole series of events, leading to a great and possibly very damaging misunderstanding. I know, I’ve seen it again this week. Big time!

Click to continue »

Photo by Dogbomb

You’re approaching the new person you’re about to meet.

It’s nearly time to speak…time to announce to the new person who you are.

You swallow to clear your mouth…silently you rehearse what you’re about to say. The moment is nearly there!

You take a deep breath while you move your hand forward in an inviting manner. The hands touch, and you say your name, loud and clear so it can be remembered, while firming the grip of the handshake.

Aah…you did it! The tension fades away as you exhale while your name still echoes in the room…you did it again. You stated your name clearly, and you didn’t accidentally spit while you said it. Perfect!

Suddenly you feel the grip of the handshake lose strength…oh damn! Your heart skips a beat while you realize you missed the other’s name.

You remember hearing a murmur, but you were so busy being proud, that your attention slipped… boy! it’s gonna look stupid to ask for the name now…better avoid using names all together today.

Recognize yourself in this scene? It sucks, doesn’t it?

It’s amazing how many people follow this strategy. In their minds everything builds up momentum to the climax: introducing themselves! And in the short period of time when energy levels recover from such a big accomplishment, they miss the name of the other person. And that makes for a bad start in remembering names, I can tell you that!

But even if you have heard the name, will you still remember it 5 minutes from now? Or in an hour? Or tomorrow? And if you met 10 people in 5 minutes…would you still remember the names of all the people the next day? Odds are you can’t do it. Most people can’t. Or to be more precise, most people can’t do it YET. Click to continue »

When you are learning new stuff, there will come a time when you hit a plateau. At the plateau it feels like you’re not making any progress at all, no matter how hard you try. This can be a very frustrating experience, and unfortunately a lot of people give up learning and move on to something else (I know I have!). But the plateau is not an end, it’s a natural phase of the learning process and you are in fact still making progress.

Early stage learning
If we take learning a new sport as an example. When you first start you are a blank, you know nothing or not much about the sport. In the early months you will acquire new skills, learn the rules, experience the dynamics, and maybe even pick up some strategic insights. Progress is good! You see and experience that you get better at the sport every week and the progress satisfies you.

Hitting the plateau
But then slowly creeping in, your progress is not very visible anymore. You’re not learning a lot of new skills, you basically know them all already. There’s room for improvement, but you know the basics. You know the rules, have a feeling for the basic dynamics and crude strategies of the sport. You’re no longer a beginner, you are at intermediate level.

This is where you hit the plateau. The plateau is the experience where you feel that no matter how hard you try, there is no progress in learning. And even though this is not entirely true, the feeling is very real. Click to continue »

Photo by Dano

I was tagged yesterday by John W. McKenna of The leadership epidemic. He tagged me for his “Does most leadership suck” challenge. Now being a positive guy, I didn’t like that title, but I sure can relate to the challenge.

Leadership vs. Management
Leadership is a word with a lot of definitions and perceptions. You can see this already in the enormous amounts of comments on the blog post where John announced this challenge. A lot of it deals with different perceptions of what is meant by leadership. So before I start to discuss it, let’s first define it.

Leadership and management are two different areas altogether. Management is about getting the job done, about doing things right. Leadership on the other hand is choosing which job to do, doing the right things. This difference is essential! Management is about efficiency, quality, productivity and leadership is about direction, vision and decision.

This is a definition of Leadership that appeals to me very much:

“Leadership is knowing who you are and what you want, and transforming that into value for others. “

Click to continue »