by Mary Lloyd, CEO, Mining Silver

When it comes to job performance, most of us would prefer to be in the dark.  We see even the best critique of what we are doing for the company as criticism that isn’t fair or necessary.  But there’s gold in getting that feedback.  Knowing what you need to improve makes it a whole lot easier to work on it.

Younger workers want to believe they know it all when they’ve only had the chance to scrape the surface in terms of being good at the work they do.  But older workers can get complacent just as easily.  So anybody who wants to be really good at what they do (which is the best job insurance you can find) needs to have good systems in place for getting that feedback.  There are three realms of information that you can use.

Formal Performance Reviews:  Large companies have policies and procedures that require some kind of employee review, typically annually.    Most of us dread these.  Try not to.  Even if your boss is awful at them–which is too often the case, they are a place to start.  The trick is to not let that one feedback session be where you stop.

Take in what’s said, ask questions, and try to avoid the “yes but” reactions.  Supervisors are not always right, but arguing about the quality of your performance is not the way to change his or her mind.  To do that, you have to PERFORM differently.

So be sure you understand what you’re being told needs to change and then pursue additional information from other sources to confirm and expand on that.  Make a plan for how you’re going to improve and have another conversation with your boss about your intentions.  Then follow-through, even  if you are the only one keeping track of it.

Ideally, a supervisor gives feedback on performance on an ongoing basis.  If you are blessed with this kind of miracle, pay attention to what you’re being told.  But if you are not being told anything, don’t assume all is well.  Being good at what you do will make a huge difference in your job security; so take responsibility for it yourself.

Input from Peers, Clients, and Vendors:   You work with a lot of people on your job.  If you are paying attention, they are offering you feedback all day everyday.  Did one of your clients call Shipping directly instead of asking you to figure out what’s going on as your job description indicates?  Ask what made them feel that was a better way of doing it.  Encourage your customers to give you feedback.  Saying something like “I’m working on being sure I’m as accessible as my clients need.  Have there been any problems with you on that?” will both give you important information and create a better bond with that client.

Getting gentle feedback all along about things you need to improve on avoids that “hammer over the head” of being let go because you weren’t pulling as much weight as you thought.    Keep your ears open and follow up when you have the chance to learn what you could have done better.

And remember, it’s very comfortable to hear the nice things people see in you, but that’s not the feedback you really need.

Numbers, Ratings, and Reports:  Every job has something that you can quanitify and those numbers can help you keep track of how well you’re doing.  But be careful with this stuff.  Looking onlyat sales figures (or some other trackable performance number) isn’t wise.  But numbers have a quick, “snapshot” quality to them that makes them great for doing comparisons over time.

What dimensions of your job can you keep track of?  Sales calls?  Billable hours?  Test scores of your students on what you taught them?  Time between ordering and receiving the espresso drinks you create for customers?  Find ways to measure what you are trying to improve though, rather than trying to use existing but irrelevant numbers.  Keeping track of something will only help you improve if  the number relates to that aspect of your performance.

Bottom line to all of it is this:  Feedback on how to do you job better is far more important to your career than the “atta boys” we all love and seek.  The best job insurance is to be good at what you do. And to do that, you have to learn where you need to improve. 

There are ways.  Lots of ways.  Use them.

by Mary Lloyd, CEO, Mining Silver

Right now, having a job is, in and of itself, a reason to be thankful. Very very thankful. But gratitude is one of those things that easily gets lost in the stress and bustle of actually doing the work and having a life simultaneously.  Try not to let that happen.  By happy about the work you do.

Why? 

Well, for starters, it’s just plain dumb to take a negative attitude toward anything.  There’s plenty of research to support the claim that thinking positively keeps you healthier.   It’s a better way to live.  Period.

But thinking positively about your job no matter what you’re doing on it is also an important part of your overall strategy for staying employed as long as you want to.  Being positive about your job means you will do it better.  And in this economy, the better performers are the ones to keep.  Better performers are the ones other employers snatch up if they do get laid off, too.  Grateful people are easier to work with and to have working for you.

So if you want to stay employed, put some effort into being positive and upbeat, even if  you do have a heavier work load than seems fair.  Even better:  Don’t start telling yourself it’s “not fair.” That kind of judgment is just negativity in a self-righteous wrapper.  It doesn’t make any difference what’s “fair.”  It’s your job.  For the time being, you want it, you need it, and you need to do what you can to keep it.

The cornerstone of that is being happy you have it.

I can hear your “yes but’s.”   The “You have no idea what I have to put up with” rebuttal seems so justified.  But it isn’t.   How awful the job is or isn’t is not the deciding factor in whether you can be grateful for it.  Deciding to grateful is.  Your attitude toward your job is 100% up to you.

There are offices who manage to do the impossible day after day because the people who work there believe in what they are doing and are happy to be doing it.  There are other offices with more flexibility, pay, and perks who are full of complainers and unmet business goals.  Which kind of place are you creating with your own attitude?  How much negativity are you buying in on without realizing it?

That’s another piece of this you need to pay attention to.  Getting sucked into a negative group mind set at work happens so automatically that you don’t even know it’s happened.  You just end up going home grumpy every day and start to dread the next one–unless it’s the weekend.

Work is never perfect and there will be days that don’t go at all well.  You can still be pleased and grateful you have the job.  You can still be cheerful.  You can still do your best to do the work as well as possible. 

Even if we don’t need money, we end up working at something.  It’s a basic part of being human.  If you are doing work as a job, make sure part of how you approach it is to be grateful.  It’s easier to hold a job when you have that attitude.  And easier to keep one.  Or find another. 

Work is good.  Be grateful.

By Mary Lloyd, CEO, Mining Silver

Clips from a business speech:  (about 13 minutes, but it covers a lot of ground)

Mary Lloyd author of Super-Charged Retirement on Vimeo.

By Mary Lloyd, CEO, Mining Silver LLC

This article initially appeared in the November edition of Barbara Morris’s online newsletter Put Old on Hold.

 We’ve reached my least favorite month of the year–“dreaded November.”  Growing up in Wisconsin, January was the daunting month.  But snow and subzero temperatures pale in comparison to what November dishes up in the Pacific Northwest.  It’s dark enough to develop photographs at my dining room table at noon and the rain and wind just keep on coming.  Ah, November…  The perfect time to look at the wisdom of learning to wait.

The gloom and cold and Mother Nature’s nasty fits have sweet purpose for everything in the yard that has either died or gone dormant and for us, as a reminder that resting is an important part of living well.

The “fun” parts of cycles are easy to get used to—the growing, the flowering, the fruit.  But this is the time of year that reminds us that things die.  The lovely blue lobelia.  The crimson leaves of the maple.  The zucchini plant (finally!).  Quite a lot stops being what it was–some permanently and some until next spring.  The idea that “it’s over” is not so uplifting for most of us.  But it’s every bit as important in the cycle as the flashier parts.

Nature going dormant reminds us that parts of our lives need to die sometimes, too.  Friendships, pastimes, jobs we thought we’d have until we retired.  The reasons for the end of each are more complex than with plants.  But they have reached that same point in the cycle–an ending.  Endings come just slightly before the next beginning if you let them. 

Maybe the friend moved away.  Maybe the hobby got boring.  The person you can’t love anymore may have died in the real sense or just in how you saw him or her.  The job—and maybe the whole company—may have gotten eliminated.   It’s easy to get comfy with what we like and expect it to go on forever.  But that’s the natural progression of things.

Most of us aren’t very good at dealing with these little deaths.  Instead of seeing them for what they are–necessary transitions—we dwell on what was, convinced that’s what still should be.  Every time we do that, we miss the point, and the chance to savor that quiet time that comes before starting again.

Being still and waiting is not easy in this age of instant everything.  We flip a switch and have light and move from place to place on seventy-miles-per-hour freeways.  We can buy or learn anything we want at any time of day online.  But the downtime that comes when something ends has lots to offer.

First, of course, we get to rest.  But we tell ourselves we don’t have time for that.  This rest is important for more than relieving weary bones though.  Getting clear of what was before you move on to what’s next streamlines the process in the long run.  Letting an idea steep for a while often gives it additional depth and breadth.  Waiting instead of jumping into the next thing as soon as the last one is finished can give you much needed perspective that makes it easier to get things to go right once you do get going.

But how do you wait? 

With patience.  Much as we want to believe we have total control, we don’t.  Things happen when they are supposed to not when we think they are supposed to.   The simple act of accepting that notion is powerful.

With hope.  Wise waiting includes believing that good things are on the way.  Getting things to grow involves trusting they will.  When you don’t believe what you want, need, and are focused on will come, you keep changing course—sort of like planting different seeds in the same spot the garden every other week. 

And with gratitude.  Being grateful you’re part of something bigger than your personal timetable is the fast route to serenity.  Let life be what it is and you will automatically slow down when the chance presents itself.

Whether it’s kids or carrots, growth is never uniform and consistent.  There are spurts and there are plateaus.  There are times when you wonder if you really did plant what you thought you did because nothing’s coming up.  Respect those times.  Let that part of you be dormant.  Wait.  Trust that growth will come again.  That your efforts will bloom and bear fruit.  

Even when it’s dark and cold and wet outside, the warm fire of promise burns inside you.  That makes resting good.

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Mary Lloyd is a speaker and consultant and author of Supercharged Retirement: Ditch the Rocking Chair, Trash the Remote, and Do What You Love.  Her passion is in capitalizing on the potential of those over 50.  For more, please visit her website http://www.mining-silver.com.  She can be reached at mary@mining-silver.com.

By Mary Lloyd  CEO, Mining Silver

Last week I got my carpeting replaced.  I live in a small house, but there’s a lot of carpeting.  And it had been there for twenty years, so pulling it up could not have been a very pleasant job.

But the two guys who did the work conversed pleasantly, with lots of good-hearted laughing, whenever they were working near enough to talk to each other.  What an unexpected lesson in how to work happy!

They both seemed very pleased to be doing what they were doing and did it well.  But they also did it in a way that took them home in a good mood.  How many of us approach our work that way?  If I’m not paying attention, I can make myself grumpy getting the simplest things done and I’m my own boss! 

I wish I could tell you the secret of their attitude effectiveness, but I can’t.  I understood the laughter, but I didn’t grasp one word of what they were saying.  They were speaking Russian.

If you are ready to suggest that they were probably making fun of me, my choice of carpet, or my house, shame on you!  I’m a psychologist and a screenwriter by training.  I can deduce a lot from tone of voice and pitch.  These guys were happy.  Open.  Enthusiastic.

When I spoke to the salesman who sold me the carpet about them after they finished the job, I learned the lead guy is willing to work every day of the year if they want him to.  He will work 18-hour days if needed.  He trains other young Ukranian guys in his trade so they can have a good future in this country as well. And in his spare time, he’s building a house for his parents–since he’s already built one for his own family.

This isn’t about how unique this guy is–much as he is.  This is about the power of wanting to work.  It’s a mindset that’s gotten very little encouragement in the last fifty years in the US.  With the economy retching and writhing, perhaps we are getting back to it.  That would be so good.

Maybe those of us who’ve been blessed with all this opportunity will start to see work as a plus and a joy again.  And maybe we will be healthier simply because we have relearned how to be happy at work.

by Mary Lloyd,   CEO, Mining Silver

A while ago I wrote a piece on how being good at what you do is the best job insurance you can ever invest in.  Being good at what you do makes you too valuable to let go.   It makes you the best candidate for the new, bigger challenge.  And it makes you want to go to work–and enjoy being there.

Sounds like that should be it, right.  End of helpful suggestion, friendly advice, or whatever you want to call it.  However, most of us assume we are good at what we do without ever bothering to work at it.  And without looking for feedback to confirm our comfortable assumptions.

You don’t want to believe that you’re one of those, right? We all do it.  So the first step toward being really good, instead of just thinking you are, is to adopt an ongoing attitude of wanting to improve.

Perhaps you’re thinking that’s just not worth the effort.  When the economy is sour and pink slips are flying like snowflakes in January, the ”safer” inclination is to keep your head down.  To do what you are told and not try anything more.  Out of sight, out of the axeman’s mind, right? 

Not really.  The more you do to help the company make it through the bad times, the better your chances of being there–and on a fast track–when things improve.  That’s true whether you’re 23 or 63.

So…what can you do to be better at what you’re doing than you are today?  How can you know more–about the product, the customer, the competition?  How can you gain better skills–at telephone communication, writing effective e-mails, calling only essential meetings?  How can you do better with the paperwork?

Even in the perfect job, there are things that aren’t exactly bliss to accomplish.   If you’re good at what you do, you get them done timely anyway–without anyone having to hound you.  People who are good at what they do prepare.   And they follow up.  Are you an ace at all of that?

It doesn’t make any difference if you are the CEO of a Fortune 500 company or the volunteer who gives cookies to donors once they’ve given blood, being good at what you do makes whatever you are involved in better for those you interact with.  That’s one payoff–people like working with you.

It also makes whatever you are doing better for you.  The phrase “half-hearted effort” says it all.  If you don’t care about what you are doing, doing it leaves you with half a heart.  It’s a case of prostitution in a way.  You’re selling your effort to something you don’t care about for some other benefit–money, social acceptance, being considered “holy,”  whatever.  

If you don’t like what you are doing, you need to find something else to do.  Something that you WANT to do–and want to be good at.

There are many aspects to this quest for excellence, but the first one has to be that you WANT TO BE GOOD AT IT.  You can be ten years old with your first paper route or ninety-two and playing roles as a patient for med students at some university–or smack dab in the middle of an “ordinary” career with too much work and not enough resources.  It doesn’t make any difference where you are when you decide to honor yourself by seeking to be outstanding at what you do.  It just means that you have found a path that will sustain you for your entire life.

Being good at what you do gives you traction externally, by being a valuable resource to the compnay and its customers.  It also give you more power internally because it helps you feel competent–and confident.   

So that’s the first step:  WANT to be good at what you’re putting your effort into.  I’ll offer more in the next few weeks on ways to do it–finding good resources, getting accurate feedback, and staying the course after a not-so-stellar performance. 

No matter what your age, being good at what you do is worth the effort.

By Mary Lloyd, CEO, Mining Silver

This article originally appeared in the Oct 2009 edition of Barbara Morris’s online newlsetter Put Old on Hold

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This idea that we must focus exclusively on advancement as a career path needs an overhaul.  We sacrifice “out” into a broader life experience and “around” into a more meaningful context when all we worry about is  “up” in our work lives.

A while back I did a presentation about giving older workers a way to keep working on a flexible basis.  That’s important, but it’s only part of the picture.  A wise 40-year old who spoke to me after the speech hammered this home when he said “You need to do something for those of us standing in line who deserve a chance to lead, too.”  He’s right.  This is not  just a case of letting the venerables of the company show up when they feel like it.

“Career” entered the corporate lexicon in the 1960’s.  Since then, the assumed career path is “Work hard, climb the ladder.  Work harder.  Climb higher.  And higher still if you can.  Then retire.”  And fall off the ladder instantly.

The going-up is full of stress and the going-down is WAY too abrupt.   Why do we keep doing it this way?
 
The current economic mess makes us yearn for the up….up….up.  But is a rocket the best analogy for fashioning a career?  It assumes one launch and then a climb into the stratosphere in a steady trajectory to great things–and then oblivion.  We miss so much using this image. Careers can have any shape.  The best is allows you to live the rest of your life at the same time. 

So back to the dilemma of giving retirement-aged workers meaningful opportunities AND young lions the chance to prove themselves as leaders.  We need to do both, but to get to that point, we need to change our sense of career trajectory.  A good career is not just a case of going up and up and up.  It also needs to include a well-thought stage of coming back down.    The way we currently do it is an  ascending straight line with a precipitous fall once we get to retirement. 

An inverted “U” with salary changes in sync with workload would be far more effective.  This would be good for employers who wouldn’t be paying fulltime salaries to people who are starting to throttle back unconsciously.  It would be better for employees since they could stay involved longer abd not deal with the abrupt changes and resulting physical and emotional perils of the traditional version of a career end.

Eventually, companies large and small will use their most experienced people as mentor and coach long term so the company gets the most benefit from their extensive experience.  Then younger leaders shouldering top roles will have access to wise counsel in their decision-making and fatr more extensive resouces for learning what their new roles involve.  At the same time, older workers will know their expertise is valued even as they are paid for fewer hours.

We need to get rid of the idea that throttling back implies a demotion to make this work though.  Cutting back on workload–with a resulting reduction in pay–in late career should be an assumed part of a career path.  If we were REALLY good at this, going to half time when kids are young or to care for a sick loved one would also be accepted practice.   We need to learn to value this kind of flexibility rather seeing it as a flaw or mistake when somone adopts it.

But we’re still fixated on rockets—launch, go into orbit, and stay there.  In reality, careers are more a series of attempts with varied outcomes and additional launches.  Consciously deciding what level we are shooting for each time we launch would be so much smarter.  With a young family or an ailing loved one, we shouldn’t shoot so high.  When we’ve already achieved a lot, moving from leading to giving wise couns–and making room for other things in your life–can be energizing.

A career is more like the space shuttle than the booster rockets that get it into space.  Yeah, there is a big deal launch, and a lot goes into getting ready.  But a shuttle does more than one mission.  It handles the garbage as part of its return duties.  It corrects problems it didn’t create.  And sometimes it gets into dilemmas that weren’t supposed to be part of the mission.  But most to the point, it’s really good at COMING BACK DOWN. 

We need to learn to come back down as part of a career path.  To throttle back as needed so that the rest of life occurs for the entire trip.  We need to launch more than once and when something doesn’t work, launch again without any of the current “failure” mindset. 

The ultimate value of a career is not in the height of the trajectory.  It’s in the quality of the life you lived while you were in it.

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Mary Lloyd is a speaker and consultant and author of Supercharged Retirement: Ditch the Rocking Chair, Trash the Remote, and Do What You Love.  Her passion is in capitalizing on the potential of those over 50.  Her website is http://www.mining-silver.com.  She can be reached at mary@mining-silver.com.

by Mary Lloyd, CEO, Mining Silver

Today, I had to accept the awful truth.  I am not invincable.  I am not even well at the moment–unless you think five naps a days is normal. 

I’ve been telling myself for over two weeks that I was NOT going to go to the doctor.  That I didn’t NEED to go to the doctor.  That it was just a matter of letting my body have the time it needed to get over whatever this is.

I dislike going to the doctor intensely.  It’s an antiseptic experience that drains my wallet faster than a good sale at REI.  I usually feel like I’ve just been duped yet again when I leave the clinic after I ask for some help.

Some of this is the nature of the beast.  Modern medicine is monstrous assortment of machines, needles, computers, and contraptions with a face stuck in every once in a while to make it look “human.”  It’s a lot of anonymous waiting and undignified “procedures.”  At lot of people end up worse off for getting into it. (The most recent figures put the annual death rate from medical mistakes at 98,000 and from adverse drug interactions at 100,000. )

But this time I had to admit that whatever is wrong hurt–a lot. 

So I tried an acupuncturist, which was a  vastly different experience.  After an hour of informative conversation with that knowledgeable person I spent  another half hour making myself lie still with tiny little needles poking out of me.  (The needles were nowhere near as traumatic as I expected but you do sort of feel like you are in a fake horror movie–the first time anyway.)   She advised me to add some supplements to my diet and I was out of there.  NO tests!

Acupuncture helped with the pain some, and with a diagnosis, but I started to not feel right about my stubborn stand in not seeing my primary care physician (who is also a nice, capable person–but rushed).

Two days ago, I finally had to own up.  My resistence was more ego than intelligence.  I didn’t want to go to the doctor because I didn’t think it would do any good.   I wasn’t AFRAID of it.  I just didn’t want to give in and subject myself to the whole prolonged, expensive drill.

But then I got to thinking about the responsibility of it.  What if there was something wrong that could have been easily discovered and easily remedied–and that had really bad consequences if left undetected?

I wrangled with my ego for the better part of two days, trying to unravel just what about the process had me so turned off.  All I could hear was myself repeating  “No.  No.  No.”

Then it finally dawned on me.  I did not want the malady to BECOME my life, which often happens when you seek entrance into our “health care system.”  I didn’t want to be a victim of anything, including a disease.  I didn’t want to sit in a lot of cold hard chairs in lifeless lab lobbies waiting to be called for yet another test after the previous one came back “normal.” 

That’s when I saw the solution.  I am an adult.  I didn’t have to agree to every imaginable test.  Just the basic ones that ruled out big problems.  That was responsible.  Agreeing to an open-ended list “just in case” was not.

So I went, my doc and I talked, and I agreed to some simple blood tests.  If they all come back okay, I will see if things improve on their own for a few weeks before I puruse anything else.  The doc is okay with this approach.  And I am relieved–I haven’t let my loved ones down by ignoring a health problem.

Medical attention is not a case of putting yourself in some doctor’s hands with blind faith.  Doctors PRACTICE.  You need to be fully engaged in getting their help or they are going to be doing a lot more guessing than they should have to.  Pay attention to what your heart, gut, and mind are telling you when you go in and don’t agree to stuff that doesn’t seem right.  Run your health care.  Don’t let it run you.

By Mary Lloyd,  CEO Mining Silver

This article originally appeared in the September edition of Barbara Morris’s oline newsletter, Put Old On Hold.

A few weeks ago I had the chance to go on a weekend bicycle trip with a group that included a new friend.  He rode a recumbent bike because of a neck injury that would have otherwise ended his cycling fun.  He taught me something that I’m realizing relates to far more than riding a bike.  I asked him if it hurt when he rode.  He said, “I’ve reached the point where it’s important to distinguish between ‘pain’ and ‘discomfort’.”  That’s a good thing for all of us to know. 

Pain is when something hurts so bad you can’t keep doing what you are doing. 

Discomfort is when something about the situation creates less than a perfect experience. 

If we are doing it right, we’re paying attention to the pain and ignoring the discomfort.  We don’t get much encouragement for going about it that way.

In one camp are the “no pain no gain” folks, who claim you have to work through the pain.  They’ve been falling out of favor recently, and that’s good.  If you are truly in pain, it’s time to alter course, be it backing off on an exercise routine or letting go of a certain version of a life.

But the messages that suggest we need to “fix” every little discomfort do just us just as much of a disservice.  The idea that nothing should ever hurt makes great business for pharmaceutical companies and therapists, but is it realistic?  No.  And it means you miss a good opportunity to prove your mettle.

On the bike trip where I first got to thinking about this, I had the chance to feel assorted discomforts.  The second day we had rain.  We rode anyway.  It got a colder than what I was dressed for.  It was still a good ride.  We addressed the discomforts when they got to be excessive—like finding shelter in a bike-friendly convenience store along the trail during the worst of the deluge. 

But none of us gave in to the bad weather entirely—and that engendered a greater sense of accomplishment.  (The next day we were going to ride a dirt trail over high trestles and through long tunnels.  Lots of them.  When we got to the trailhead, it was 42 degrees and foggy.  That one, we aborted.  There is discomfort and there is lunacy….)

But back to the idea of living with discomfort.  Take the common cold.  I’ve had friends tell me they give it three days and then go to the doctor.  For what?  It’s a cold.  Bed rest.  Lots of fluids.  And a big dose of patience is pretty much all that’s going to work.  Instead, the expectation is that there is some medicine that will make it all go away.  Nope.  But now in addition to the cold, you’ve wasted money and time on a doctor’s visit.  Did you really need it or were you just impatient with the discomfort?

The distinction is every bit as useful in assessing a job situation.  Perhaps you have to work with someone you don’t like.  Is that pain?  Not unless you make it so.  Discomfort, yes.  But pain from such a situation is usually more a case of what your ego is telling you about how awful it is.  Learn to live with the jerk and you win twice—by mastering that skill as well as avoiding the frustrations of a job search.

Both pain and discomfort serve useful purposes if we choose to let them. 

Pain tells you it’s time to stop doing what you are doing.  Pain makes you stop doing what you are doing.  Quite often, pain requires you to seek help, whether it’s for a broken leg or an impossible business situation.  Pain precipitates change.

Discomfort, on the other hand, is a challenge to keep going.  It provides the opportunity to reaffirm your commitment to whatever you are doing.  Working through it confirms that what you’re working on is important enough that you are willing to put up with less than perfect circumstances to get it done.  And often, when you work through the discomfort, there’s a sense of achievement from it that gives you even more motivation to complete what you’re trying to do.

Given the contrast in what each offers, being able to differentiate between pain and discomfort is important.  Can you?  Knowing when to quit is good.  So is knowing when to go on.   

Mary Lloyd is a speaker and consultant and author of Supercharged Retirement: Ditch the Rocking Chair, Trash the Remote, and Do What You Love.  Her passion is in capitalizing on the potential of those over 50.  Her website is http://www.mining-silver.com.  She can be reached at mary@mining-silver.com.

By Mary Lloyd, CEO, Mining Silver

When I started this blog over a year ago, I did so with quite a bit of reluctance.  I am to that point in life where flexibility is paramount and I didn’t want to be bound be the “musts” of blogging.  Thou shalt blog at least once a day.  Thou shalt blog no more than 400 words at a time.  Thou shalt be prepared to blog while on vacation and otherwise away from the space where you are prepared and outfitted to blog…in any corner of the world at any time of the day.

Obviously, I have not played by those rules and the most glaring example has been the last three weeks.  You haven’t heard a peep from me.  I’m really sorry about that.  But I can explain.

It’s not anything awful.  It’s just…well…I’ve been living my life.  And that involved a bike trip followed by two weeks on the road in Colorado doing book tour stuff and having some fun.  I’m not a fan of the “I’m making myself dinner” style of blogging, so you didn’t hear about all that.

I finally realized as I was slithering out from under the resulting pile of guilt this afternoon that those who read this are most likely just as happy with that  as I am.  When I write here, I hope it’s to offer something useful.   If I write too often, I may actually be offering you less.  Case in point:  I am subscribed to several online newsletters and the ones that come even once a week are starting to wear me out.  TOO MUCH INFORMATION!

So this post is just to set the record straight.  I will write when I can and you will read when you want.  Hopefully, we can enjoy each other best that way.  If you need more, please feel free to complain by sending me a note.  Or commenting on this post.  Thanks.

Life is sweetest when rules are kept to a minimum.  Down with blogging tyranny!