Your spiritual growth is our passion!
Hi there,
If you are interested in learning more about Building International Partnerships then please register for this executive development workshop! We will be covering all types of partnerships from customer partnerships to joint ventures.
I will be facilitating a rich and interactive experience that takes you from strategy creation through to implementation!
If you could share with your networks as well that would be greatly appreciated!
Joyfully,
More than once this week I found myself talking to someone who was upset about how someone else had treated them. Some even went so far as to call the persons in question nasty or evil. In almost all cases there was a feeling that these ‘bad’ people needed to be called to account for their actions. What was evident was that these people felt hurt. They had been wronged in some way and were grappling with the question WHY. Why did this person say this about me? Why did they treat me this way?
I have a friend who says, “Hurt people, hurt people.” The phrase kept popping up into my mind this week as I saw it played out in the circumstances around me. In different ways, I tried to help my counterparts to understand this truism as they dealt with their pain but they too were caught in the cycle. They demanded justice for their hurt.
Richard Rohr says that pain is either transformed or transmitted. We all have pain. Some of us have deep emotional and/or psychological trauma from things that have happened in our past. It can go as far back as what happened while we were in the womb or as recent as an unhealthy relationship last month. It can be as devastating as rape or incest or as innocuous as a spouse that constantly nags or belittles. In a sense, the form is unimportant. The question is, what do we do with it?
If we understood the ramifications of not dealing with our pain, I believe we would be a lot more proactive about intentionally seeking healing (transformation). Every hurt that is not dealt with will be passed on to those around us in some form or fashion. We will mould our children based on the pain we suffered as a child. We will see our new partner through the eyes of the hurt suffered at the hands of the last one. We will lash out at the world for the wounds inflicted by someone, somewhere, sometime.
Inner healing seen this way is not a choice, it’s an imperative. The first step for me is usually one of humility. That aha moment when I realize that as much as I feet hurt, I have also inflicted hurt. I did not set out to, but I did. I am only human. We are all only human. I have had several such moments and have gone back to say I’m sorry and ask forgiveness.
Today in church the preacher talked about a world-renowned pastor whom he held in high esteem because, as well respected as he was, a child could tell him that he had done something wrong and he would be quick to apologize. There are too few men and women like this today. I have had to ask forgiveness of my ex-wife for leaving our marriage. I’ve had to ask forgiveness of my son for not being there for him. I’ve had to ask forgiveness of my pastor for walking out of his church. I’ve had to ask forgiveness of my children for shouting at them in anger. It’s not easy sometimes. Most times. OK, all the time.
If I sometimes do hurtful things then how can I hold others to a higher standard? We must also be willing to forgive others their human-ness. Whether they are sorry or not or ask forgiveness or not is irrelevant. Forgive. Only forgiveness allows us to leave that pain behind and break the cycle. The unloving parent was trying her/his best. The abusive spouse is only human. The pastor, priest, pundit or imam that hurt us is only human. The boss from hell is only human. Forgiveness is the first step on the path to inner healing.
Ideally, our religious communities should play a vital role in society of walking with us on this journey of inner healing. The church should be the societal interrupters, working with us to break the cycle of pain at work in our lives and I know many churches do play this role. The Catholic Church actually has a formal program called Original Pain Therapy. The journey is a tough one and many times support is needed. The church community has played this role for me, but I imagine non-religious support groups could play this role as well. Alcoholics Anonymous has been extremely effective at transforming those with addictions to alcohol. Sometimes counselling from trained professionals was also necessary for me. Sometimes just a friend with a listening ear was enough. Our paths will be as different as our pains, but I implore you, take the journey.
Joyfully,
Copyright 2018, Matik Nicholls.
Today I was reminded to start my day with inspiration. Before I feed my body with eggs and sausages and before I feed my mind with social media, I need to feed my soul with inspiration.
The sky looked like an artist’s impression. The wind had painted beautiful sweeping flows with the clouds from horizon to horizon. Meanwhile, in the valley where I stood sunlight raced down the side of the mountains and embraced the treetops, leaving a trail of golden glitter in its wake. The cold morning air smelled of woody trees and freshly cut grass. The kind of scent that made you breathe long, deep breaths with your eyes closed. And birds. Everywhere. Humming birds zipping by chit chittering. Blackbirds stalked their territory. A Kiskidee darted at a bug on the ground and then sat on a branch displaying its prize naturally attracting would-be thieves. Further away familiar calls rang out from birds I recognized only by sound.
Those are some words I was inspired to pen in October 2016. I chose to share it today in the hope that it would serve as a source of inspiration to start your day.
Joyfully,
Copyright 2018, Matik Nicholls
It doesn’t sound inspiring, but it’s true. I’m not sure when this became a goal but it solidified in my psyche early in my professional career as I became more and more successful as a manager. I observed the men who were outstanding in their field or CEOs of large companies and I noticed that many of them were not spending much time with their families. They seemed to have traded the role of father for the role of Fairy Godfather. Even if they were present in body, they were not present in mind. They were also very one-dimensional. Their work consumed them.
I grew a strong dislike for this kind of persona and determined that if that is what it took to be successful, then I was not going to be successful. On the other hand, I had standards of excellence that I did aspire to in my career and I wanted a life full of interests and passions and learning, so I couldn’t be father of the year either. And so my life philosophy took shape, I was going to be mediocre at a variety of things.
I was going to be a great dad but my children would not be the centre of my life. I was going to be a good surfer but not good enough to win any competitions. I was going to be an avid football player but not club material if you know what I mean. I was going to be an excellent manager but not the super ambitious guy who is always looking for the next rung to climb. I was going to be a continuous learner but I didn’t see a Ph.D. in my future.
I often wonder though, if it’s still possible to be great at something without sacrificing the rest… I know, I know, I’ve always wanted to have my cake and eat it too. But I do think it could be possible. People like Richard Branson give me hope. He often blogs about family (both his biological and his Virgin family). Many people blog insincerely about family with their posed photos but for some reason I believe Branson when he says, “Without the love and support of my wife, children, children-in-law and grandchildren I wouldn’t have the drive to keep achieving. And without the love and support of the Virgin family, achieving things wouldn’t be so meaningful or fun.”
But on the other hand, I wonder if the sacrifice is worth it if the cause is big enough? If a researcher spends her life in a lab and cures cancer at the expense of a relationship with her husband and kids, is it worth it? I wonder what the children of great world changers like Nelson Mandela and Marie Curie thought about them as parents? Maybe they understood what their parents were trying to achieve and were proud. I don’t know and I can’t judge for others, but for me, I’m committed to my mediocrity :).
Ultimately, I want a life of great service to God and men. Maybe I will only be of great service to a few people and little service to many people. I don’t know but being of service is perhaps the only true greatness and the only standard that does motivate me greatly. I look at my life, and to the extent that it is selfishly about my happiness, I am dissatisfied. Sometimes deeply dissatisfied. So I strive on to achieve greatness…. and joy (I still want to have my cake and eat it too); the joy of service in my own mediocre way!
Joyfully,
Copyright 2018, Matik Nicholls
We all know that not everybody gives good advice. Some people just give bad, in fact downright horrible, advice. You know… the people who encourage you to drink yourself silly or to get into fights or to cheat on your spouse or to try drugs or to…or to…. Bad advice. Avoid them like the plague! Or at least know better than to take them seriously.
But what makes a good advisor? Well I have three guidelines that may help:
Examine who you go to for advice and objectively ask yourself how they match up to each of these criteria. We all have blind spots and areas that need improvement. The friends that meet these criteria will be the ones that help us to grow as a person. I have a few friends like that and I make investing in those relationships a priority.
Also, when someone comes to me for advice, these are good questions to ask of myself. Do I have their best interest at heart? Is my advice based on my values that they may not necessarily share? Am I trying to be so nice that I’m not being honest?
Let’s be the type of friends that really promote growth in those in our circle. Let’s leave the next generation with an example to follow of friendships that engender mutual growth and an attitude that strives for better. Maya Angelou said, “Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.”
Joyfully,
Copyright 2018, Matik Nicholls
Do It Together
Going after our joyful life goals with somebody (or somebodies) else exponentially increases our chances for success. Think about trying to work out at home versus with a buddy in the gym or playing football with your friends versus running alone. Your goal could be taking a class or learning a new skill or starting a business. Whatever it is, going after it with someone else makes it much more likely that you will succeed. Company makes everything more fun and we are all going to have those days when we just aren’t motivated and that’s when having a buddy will be indispensable. They will give us that encouragement or buff (Trini for scolding) just when we need it.
Synergize
We will always have more things that we want to accomplish than we have time to accomplish but there’s a trick to getting more done without living on a treadmill of to-dos. It’s all about finding the things that complement each other. This applies on many levels. To continue from the examples above…. It would be a huge win-win if couples exercised together or took a class together. The synergy between your relationship goals and your physical fitness or academic goals will almost ensure significant progress in both.
There are other types of synergies as well. For instance, understanding how your body, mind, emotions and spirit all feed off each other will accelerate your progress. For example, a run in the morning may energize you and start off your day with a positive win. Doing your most important work first thing in the morning to capitalize on that high-energy time might be a good idea.
Another example: If you have a goal to be more present and patient and loving with your children, a regular spiritual practice of prayer or meditation will help tremendously. In fact, regular exercise, good eating habits and regular spiritual renewal will make you feel good and feel good about yourself and fuel all the other goals in your life.
Finally, you can also synergize your time. Examples: listening to audiobooks if you have a long drive to work, reading a book while waiting at the doctor’s office, scheduling a nap between dropping and picking up a kid to and from their activity (my favourite 😊).
I hope these two tips help you to make your year an unprecedented success!
Joyfully,
Copyright 2018, Matik Nicholls.
Eager to get going on my goal to be more disciplined in 2018, today I started a new audiobook; The Marshmallow Test: Mastering Self-Control by Walter Mischel. I was completely taken by surprise by what I heard in chapter 6… Let me say upfront that I was in two minds about sharing this given the sometimes volatile racial tension in Trinidad but in the end the opportunity for learning from the objective scientific insights of a foreigner far outweighed the risks. Here are excerpts of what Walter Mischel had to say:
“The marshmallow experiment allowed us to see how children managed to delay and resist temptation, and how differences in this ability play out over a lifetime. But what about the choice itself? I started to ask that question while I was a graduate student at Ohio State University, well before I joined the Stanford faculty. I spent one summer living near a small village in the southern tip of Trinidad.
The inhabitants in this part of the island were of either African or East Indian descent, their ancestors having arrived as either slaves or indentured servants. Each group lived peacefully in its own enclave, on different sides of the same long dirt road that divided their homes.… I discovered a recurrent theme in how they characterized each other. According to the East Indians, the Africans were just pleasure-bent, impulsive, and eager to have a good time and live in the moment, while never planning or thinking ahead about the future. The Africans saw their East Indian neighbors as always working and slaving for the future, stuffing their money under the mattress without ever enjoying life”
“To check if the perceptions about the differences between the ethnic groups were accurate, I walked down the long dirt road to the local school, which was attended by children from both groups.” “I tested boys and girls between the ages of 11 and 14. I asked the children who lived in their home, gauged their trust that promises made would be promises kept, and assessed their achievement motivation, social responsibility, and intelligence. At the end of each of these sessions, I gave them choices between little treats: either one tiny chocolate that they could have immediately or a much bigger one that they could get the following week”
“The young adolescents in Trinidad who most frequently chose the immediate smaller rewards, in contrast to those who chose the delayed larger ones, were more often in trouble and, in the language of the time, judged to be “juvenile delinquents.” Consistently, they were seen as less socially responsible, and they had often already had serious issues with authorities and the police. They also scored much lower on a standard test of achievement motivation and showed less ambition in the goals they had for themselves for the future.
Consistent with the stereotypes I heard from their parents, the African Trinidadian kids generally preferred the immediate rewards, and those from East Indian families chose the delayed ones much more often. But surely there was more to the story. Perhaps those who came from homes with absent fathers—a common occurrence at that time in the African families in Trinidad, while very rare for the East Indians—had fewer experiences with men who kept their promises. If so, they would have less trust that the stranger—me—would ever really show up later with the promised delayed reward. There’s no good reason for anyone to forgo the “now” unless there is trust that the “later” will materialize. In fact, when I compared the two ethnic groups by looking only at children who had a man living in the household, the differences between the groups disappeared.”
Given that this was around 1956, can you imagine the cycle of absentee fathers and instant gratification that has led over 60 years later to the current social crisis in Trinidad & Tobago!?! Myers goes on to talk about experiments in Boston that showed that 12 years olds with less ability to delay gratification were far more likely to cheat to get something that they want. The correlation to our current crime culture is clear. Why work to get anything? There is no trust that society will give me any rewards for hard work and why wait anyway when I can rob somebody (equally applied to a petty thief or corrupt government official) and get what I want now?!
For me this was a poignant pointer to the root of the problem. We can continue to rail against the failed political leaders/parties or police service from now until whenever but until and unless we face the failed leadership in our homes and our communities and our churches/mosques/temples, we will be hacking away at the branches leaving the roots of crime untouched.
In 2018 let’s point the finger at ourselves and make a commitment to make a difference. As a predominantly African male with three children, I’m starting with me.
Joyfully,
Copyright 2018, Matik Nicholls.