The Moffett Company was founded “out of a desire to see businesses and their employees thriving, not simply surviving; passion is the centerpiece” of their message. Sean Moffett coaches his many stellar clients to not let fear make their decisions and how to create opportunity out of hardship. If you’re at all familiar with my writing, you know that those are familiar themes for me as well as I discuss how I used my tsunami divorce as a springboard for positive change.
I am honored to be an invited guest on Sean Moffett’s live, on-air broadcast on November 21 at 12:00 EST. You can view the show and participate in the live chat on The Moffett Message. Check it out and learn how you can choose to maximize your life!
Lisa Arends on The Moffett Message Wednesday, Nov. 21 at 12:00 EST
Not the bull I saw, but I loved this picture! Photographed in 2007 at G’s Ice House. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
No, I didn’t ride the bull. What are you, crazy? I have a marathon this weekend and I would be way too embarrassed to tell people that I couldn’t run because I fell off a taurian hunk of metal in a identity-confused bar in an aging tourist town with its own character issues. No, thank you.
This is me sitting on a non-bullish seat. Notice the lack of movement.
But, let me back up a bit. I went with a group of friends to Helen, GA this past weekend for Oktoberfest and to celebrate some birthdays. Helen is 1/3 kitschy Bavarian-themed village, 1/3 mountain country town, 1/3 biker bar, and 100% touristy. It has some of the best people watching outside of California, especially during October with its combination of Oktoberfest and Halloween.
This guy sits motionless until someone drops in a tip. Then, he strums his ukulale. Nothing ever moves but his fingers. Creepy.
Back to the bull. I used to see those things (real and mechanized) all the time when I lived in San Antonio. I think they were a requirement in any venue over a certain size. I haven’t seen one in quite a while and I was surprised to find two mechanical bulls newly installed in a bar that catered to heavy-metal bikers just last year. I guess the cowboy-hat wearing set pay better. I watched patrons try their hand at riding the bulls. Most were thrown off in seconds. Then, partly to encourage participation and partly for the joy of it, the guy running the ride got on. Watching him was a completely different experience. This guy could ride. Now, I’m sure some of the talent came from the wearing of the cowboy hat, but I learned some other lessons from him as well.
Also in Helen. I bet this bird felt like he was riding a mechanical bull!
Look Forward
The launched riders had a tendency to leave their gaze where they had been rather than look ahead. The talented guy kept his eyes looking straight ahead, even though straight ahead kept changing.
Don’t Fight the Motion
The more rigid a rider, the sooner the bull would send them flying. In order to stay on, the riders had to move with the bull rather than fight against its bucking.
Balance
This word is stalking me.:) The unschooled folks grabbed onto the rope tightly with both hands. This left their body free to swing wildly too far to each side. Our guy? He left one hand free to act as a ballast that balanced his body’s movements. Pretty smart.
Have Fun
After all, isn’t that what it’s all about!
Now, I really have no desire to ever ride a mechanical bull (I know, I know. Shameful for a Texan.) but I happen to think these four lessons apply themselves rather well to life in general. Oh, and I would add one more for me personally: Bagpipes make better party music than polka. Just sayin.
The view from the cabin – a peaceful contrast to town.
Thinking of all of you in Sandy’s path. Hoping you stay as warm and dry as possible and that this storm doesn’t take you for a wild bull ride.
“When am I ever gonna use this?” As an eighth-grade algebra teacher, I hear this refrain at least once a week. It’s a difficult question to answer. I mean, when is the last time that your employer asked you to factor a polynomial or prove two polygons congruent? The truth is that most of us will never use the myriad of math facts and algorithms in our post-school lives. However, that does not mean that math does not have some valuable lessons for us. The following are lessons that can be learned in an algebra classroom and applied in your life. No calculator required.
My boyfriend and I went camping on our first two Thanksgivings together. Neither one of us have family in town and we are physically unable to fragment ourselves enough to visit everyone spread across the country. So we don’t try.
We love our camping trips. It is a wonderful time to disconnect and reconnect. To slow down and savor. To shiver in the crisp (okay, frigid) morning air and cuddle up in the sleeping bag at night. The coffee tastes better and the showers are somehow more cleansing even though the space is shared with daddy longlegs. The computers are left behind and the other devices only get turned on to play music while we make dinner or play cards or perhaps to check the latest Ravens score. It’s invigorating and relaxing.
But it also takes work. Preparation. Reservations and packing. Shopping and cooking. I get a week off for Thanksgiving and this year we are flying to my boyfriend’s hometown for the first half. As I was looking at the calender, I was realizing the short turn-a-round between that trip and the discussed camping trip. I was just about to question the wisdom of the latter when my boyfriend, apparently reading my mind, said, “We have to go. It’s tradition.”
He’s right. We went on our first Thanksgiving together and it was a time to get to know one another apart from the distractions of life. The second year we went despite being sick and in the middle of a move. We learned how to work together as a team even when neither one of us were at our best. And, this year we will go again. I am not sure what lessons this trip will hold.
But I’ve already learned one. Traditions are important. They bind and anchor relationships, whether with family, children, or partners. They are a certainty, a known, a home to go back to. In divorce, you lose many of your traditions along with your spouse. Let that create the space needed to make new ones.
As for me, I may not be traditional by trading turkey for trail mix, but I love my tradition in the mountains and the woods.
How about you? What are some of your favorite traditions?
I had a statistics professor during my undergrad who used to constantly tap his temple and utter “Columbo logic” followed by a broad gesture with the arms and the phrase “mutually exclusive,” both uttered in a heavy Indian accent. I never learned what he meant by Columbo logic (luckily it wasn’t on the final) but I did master mutually exclusive events.
In mathematics, two events are considered mutually exclusive if they cannot happen at the same time. The main example I use when I teach this to my students is the two sides of a coin. It is impossible for a coin to land on heads AND tails at the same time. Don’t worry, I’m not going to teach you a math lesson; I’ve been doing that all day. It just turns out, that like Venn diagrams and marriage, there is a connection here to the real world. (Side note: If you have kids, please do not tell them that math ever applies to the real world. We math teachers try to keep that a secret. Just kidding 🙂 )
Math is simple and elegant; disjoint sets are easy to recognize and have clear and defined boundaries. Life, on the other hand, is messy and complicated. Mutually exclusive events are all around us, but they are not as simple as heads and tails.
There is a tension that can exist in life when we do not recognize two situations as mutually exclusive and we strive to have both. For example, in my life a clean kitchen and my boyfriend being in town are disjoint. As long as he is here, the kitchen will be messy. If I expect something otherwise, I will only become frustrated. Now, since I love my boyfriend more than I love an empty sink and clean counters (okay, okay, this is true on most days!), I choose to have him around and live with the mess.
We can also use mutually exclusive events to our advantage. For example, I know that it is impossible for me to feel overwhelmed when I am on a hike through the woods. So, if I am overwhelmed and time allows, I strap on my hiking boots.
These are some of the events that are mutually exclusive in my life:
Panic and yoga
A plate of veggie nachos and restraint
Anxiety and a long run
A late night out and a Friday during the school year
How about you? What events are mutually exclusive in your life? Perhaps you could apply some Columbo logic. 🙂
Lessons From the End of a Marriage 