wyhr.orgWendy’s World

A quote that resonated deep within me:

“I’ve learned that it’s fine to have expectations, and dreams are wonderful, but once in a while, it would be good to have something come my way without having to fight for it.”

~Enza, The Shoemaker’s Wife

I recently recalled this quote from chapter 30 of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy when talking about a situation at work:

“I’d far rather be happy than right any day.” ~Slartibartfast

See, I had openly criticized two fellow leaders about their performance. They had not done something and I had…and what better way to point that out, then to make a snide remark in a public setting?

I felt terrible because that’s exactly what I did…and while I may have been “right” (i.e. as fellow leaders they weren’t leading by example), I wasn’t happy. I wasn’t happy because in that moment I chose myself and my need to be right over the relationship with my peers and the team environment. Let me explain.

Choosing Relationships

“Your happiness can be measured by the quality of your relationships, not your prosperity or your progress. ~Andy Stanley

If life was just about tasks (in this case being right), we would be robots. We wouldn’t have been created or developed in to beings with feelings. We were made for relationships and community. Heck, even in the book Born to Run we learn from evolutionists and anthropologists that one of the primary reasons humans survived and rose to the top of the food chain is through teamwork. The only advantage a hairless biped without fangs had was superior intellect and working as a team. And so, for many reasons, I would rather be a person who chooses relationships over being right.

Healthy Team

The foundation for any relationship or team is trust(1). Without trust we are just a group of individuals. With trust, we are a team. By publicly criticizing my peers, I was not creating a healthy team environment. Why would anyone else on the team trust me with their mistakes, fears or failures? Why would anyone choose to be vulnerable, if I would use it as an opportunity to hurt them? And so I not only hurt two relationships with individuals, I fractured the team relationships with everyone else in that room.

So what do you do when the cat is out of the bag? I’ve decided to apologize to the two individuals to whom I directed my snide remark (they graciously forgave me) and am debating emailing the rest of the team to repair the environment I fractured. That’s just me. What do you think?

(1) I can’t take credit for this nugget of wisdom. I learned it from Patrick Lencioni in his book The Five Dysfunctions of a Team.

“Teams use trust as currency. If it is in short supply, then the team is poor. If trust abounds, the members of the team have purchase power with each other to access each others’ gifts, talents, energy, creativity, and love. The development of trust then becomes a significant leadership strategy. Trust creates the load limits on the relationship bridges among team members”
~Reggie McNeal

One of the downsides of visionary leadership is that we can get our sights set on something that is so far out in the future that we miss what’s going on in our life as it exists right now. We are blind to the bush that is burning in our own backyard and the wisdom that is contained within it. We squander the gift of this day just as it is, these people just as they are, the uniqueness and sweetness (even the bittersweetness) of this particular place on the journey just as it is, the voice of God calling to us in our own wilderness places.

~Ruth Haley Barton, Strengthening the Soul of Your Leadership

I usually use Twitter to post quotes to my blog…but this I couldn’t cheapen by getting it down to 140 characters. I love it too much.

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”

~Theodore Roosevelt

“I think an ordinary paper company like Dunder-Mifflin was a great subject for a documentary. There’s a lot of beauty in ordinary things. Isn’t that kind of the point?” ~Pam Beasley, The Office

Can you believe my husband created this quote? He’s a genius…and a nerd…and I love him!

“Isaac Newton’s work was very derivative, but it was also quite integral.”
~David Hosier

They don’t just make great products, but they say some good stuff:

“Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things. They push the human race forward. And while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.”
― Apple Inc.

I used to think crying was a sign of weakness and, as a result, I never let myself cry. I most certainly never let anyone else see me cry.

As I’ve gotten older, my viewpoint on crying has changed. So this quote from actor Kaley Cuoco, Penny from The Big Bang Theory, really resonated with me.

“I cry all the time. I love to laugh, too. It’s important to create an environment for yourself where you feel what you need to and don’t hold it in. Today, I’m comfortable enough in my own skin that I can laugh or cry when I need to, and it feels so good.”

“Should you find yourself in a chronically leaking boat, energy devoted to changing vessels is likely to be more productive than energy devoted to patching leaks.”
~Warren Buffett