I was recently reading over an interview I did with Dennis Ross, one of the most skilled diplomats in the world. He was the chief Middle East envoy during the H.W. Bush and Clinton administrations and was appointed by Obama this month to serve as the chief envoy for Iran. He is the author of the diplomacy book Statecraft.

Dennis is one of the most understated, down-to-earth people I’ve ever met. He epitomizes the guy who just doesn’t take himself that seriously. He likes to invoke DeGaulle’s quote, “The cemeteries of the world are filled with indispensable people.”

But perhaps Dennis’s most outstanding quality of life skill is active listening. Here’s what Dennis shared with me about the importance of listening when it comes to quality of life. 

“I tell people that work with me that one of the most important skills in negotiations is active listening. I believe in not always asking questions with the purpose of getting the other side to reveal things. There is immense, untapped benefit to getting a deep understanding of what drives them and you certainly build good will with such an approach. “Why is that issue important to you. I want to understand it the way you understand it. I don’t want to have a false impression. Explain to me why that matters so much to you. Where does it come from? Why does it create an imperative?” You can’t find the underlying sources of behavior and issues unless you ask questions in this way. In my personal life, this skill has made me more interested in others and in turn made others more comfortable with me. When people see that I am curious by being an active listener, they get a message of respect from me. And of course you have the benefit of actually learning something.”

Well said, no?  We all know that feeling of respect we feel when we encounter people like this.  Those that don’t feel a need for the conversation to revolve around them.  That are secure enough that they don’t need to preoccupy themselves with coming across as interesting all the time.  Those that when you are talking about your vacation will ask you follow up questions about your trip to understand why you had such a good time, rather than instantly relating it back to themselves and have to talk equally about their vacation.  Most conversations are ping pong games; to the point that it is incredibly refreshing when you meet someone who just doesn’t feel a need to bring it back to them all the time.

My wife is one of the best people at listening and engaging people with probing questions. It is natural to her because she is genuinely interested in people.  She knows that there will be a time where the other person might want to learn about what our family did on our vacation.  But instead of doing the ping pong thing, she’ll be an active listener and want to truly understand the other person’s experience or perspective.  People will say that it is one of the qualities they admire most about her.

The ironic thing is most people that underperform with active listening do so because they are trying to make themselves more interesting.  And the best way they could accomplish their goal of being liked is the opposite approach.

Quality of life for me is doing the things that bring joy. Over the past five years I have learned a lot about what does not work for me and I have turned over a new leaf.

1.  Reading

I am an avid reader, and reading is one of the simple pleasures in my life. I go through phases where I will focus on one genre until I am ready for a change. Right now, I am reading books across genres, and one of the unique things is that I have the ability to make connections among disparate pieces of information. I am an active reader so I get emotionally caught up with the words on the pages as I interact with them.

2.  Meditation

Twice a day I meditate, which helps to bring peace to my life. I retreat to the quiet place within, where I listen to hear what my inner voice is trying to tell me. This practice helps me to become the person I was meant to be.

3.  Raja Yoga

I recently discovered Raja Yoga, the highest form of yoga and it has made such a difference in my life. I have received tools to help me to achieve self-mastery. I see simple yet profound changes in myself. Things that used to bother me no longer do, and I view difficult people as my “Tests.”

4.  Flourishing

I have been in many situations, both personal and professional where I felt a piece of me wither and die each day. Now I know how to quickly identify situations where I flourish and blossom. This allows me to be my best self, which contributes to contentment and happiness.

5.  Working at relationship with myself

This is tied into flourishing because I recently let go of a few relationships because I finally admitted to myself that they simply were not working for me and never had. Now that I have stepped away I realize how important it is not to be around people who devalue you and put you down constantly. You cannot change people, you can only change yourself. I am busy working to be the person who I was meant to be so that I can move into relationships that are better for me. I am getting to know myself for the very first time. If I have a great relationship with myself, I can have a great relationship with others.

6.  Success

I am working on achieving success in all areas of my life. For me, success isn’t solely about money, it is also about good health, quality relationships, meaningful projects, leisure and so on. Money is important though, because it provides freedom and independence, but the other areas have to be very present in my life. I am working at integrating my personal and professional life to bring more harmony to my life.

7.  Work

I recently made a career change and focusing on work that feeds my soul. For a long time I was going through the motions. An important discovery for me is that because you are good at something does not mean that that is what you should be doing.

8.  Reflection

I take time to check in with myself so that I am actually going where I want to go. This helps me to feel a sense of accomplishment.

9.  Systems & Routines

I work for myself so I have added systems and routines to my life to add structure. This allows me to clearly see and map my progress, which makes me feel good about myself.

10.  Going for walks

Walking is another simple pleasure for me. I live in a Metropolitan city in the heart of downtown so I walk to all my meetings. I have a pedometer and I seldom do less than the required 10,000 steps each day. Walking is very freeing for me and the open space allows me to think without borders. I get some of my best ideas when I travel by footmobile.

Ariane de Bonvoisin

I had the opportunity to interview Ariane de Bonvoisin this summer.  We met last year and I have quickly become a fan of her endeavors.

Ariane is the author of First 30 Days: Your Guide to Making Any Change Easier and has built a media company around her desire to help people enjoy life more.  Ariane embodies this Quality of Life Project purpose:

-  Contributing to the growing worldwide movement in which individuals are increasingly measuring success based on quality of life over other pursuits and are increasingly drawn to authenticity over pretense.

Ariane’s independent approach to life is truly inspiring. She lives like an explorer constantly finding new and interesting experiences to enrich her life. And her path through life is a great indicator. She grew up living in six countries, was an internationally competitive swimmer and graduated London School of Economics at 19 and Stanford Business School at 24. She went on to leadership positions in the venture capital world, at one time overseeing Time Warner’s venture fund. But she felt out of synch and saw how her personal life was suffering through by not being in tune with her true inner voice. She was always a spiritual person but felt she needed to regroup. Ariane ended up taking a new path. In 2005, she decided to become a media entrepreneur, which led to her First 30 Days book and the launching of www.first30days.com and soon www.arianestudio.com.

You can view the VIDEO of our interview with Ariane HERE.

Within the video there are index tags so you can navigate per your preferences.

There are some outstanding takes on big picture life perspectives that have helped Ariane enjoy her life.  You should not miss out on these.  But the best part of the interview in my opinion are the little things we unearthed that any of us can immediately try out.

-  Trampoline in office (“What brings you joy” section)

-  Five year journal.  (“What brings you joy” section)

-  Wheatgrass (“Diet or health practices” section)

I hope you enjoy the video!  Ariane is doing great work so if you like her book, definitely help get the word out…

Ten Tips to Greater Quality of Life

The most frequent question we get from people is, “So, with all the interviews  you’ve done, what are the commonalities that you’ve seen?”

We are now ready to report back to you the common practices that have emerged through all our interviews.

We aren’t offering a road map; but rather a simple recap of what practices and perspectives we have encountered the most, as well as some links to interview excerpts that expand on the particular quality of life driver.

We hope you like it.

You can get a free copy at our home page, www.qualityoflifeproject.org.

Photo by Tata_Aka via Flickr

I had lunch recently with the managing editor of Keith Ferrazzi’s company Ferrazzi Greenlight.  She asked if I could put together a small piece on what quality of life means to me.

It’s funny because you would think I would have written something along these lines given our organization.  The thing is we always see ourselves more as a “manager” in this project so it’s not our tendency to tell you about our personal practices.

Anyway, here is what I came up with.  It was actually a very cool exercise.

WHAT DOES QUALITY OF LIFE MEAN TO ME?

Quality of life to me is living in a way and doing the things that makes me enjoy life.

I guess these are the things that get me there, at least at this stage in my life.

Family

I have an incredible wife and two great kids that I love very much.  I’m also lucky to have parents and siblings and extended family that I love being around.  The love I get from my wife and family makes me feel confident and secure; and everything springs from there for me.  I also think that one of the great things in life is to be able to share experiences with people you love and respect.  Whether it’s a day at the beach or a nice bottle of wine, being able to share it with someone you enjoy being with makes it that much  better.

Being in tune with myself

I have always been an introspective person but when I was 20 I had an experience which set me on the path of examining myself.  It’s a long story but that experience led me to better knowing myself (which certainly included some discomfort) and ultimately having a more confident approach to life.

Alone time

I need to carve out reflection time so I can assess if I am on the right path. This can be big picture stuff like spending enough time with friends but it can also be small stuff like remembering to mark my calendar for something I ought to do.

Doing the things I like

To me, it’s spending time with people I love and enjoy, doing meaningful work and surfing.  Those are the things that I love to do the most so I plan around that.

Managing the mix

It is dificult because not only do things evolve over time but at a given time there are multiple and sometimes overlapping quality of life drivers that you need to prioritize.  It becomes an art form, for example, to know how much to focus on work given the quality of life dividends of financial success and the flexibility it can allow later.

Work

I don’t feel good unless I have interesting work that keeps me busy.  While I enjoy work, I believe that there have to be periods of stress and flux to ultimately achieve progress.

Being in nature

Spending time in nature is a key part of my enjoying life.  It’s where I have the most fun but I also need to be in nature a lot to  just feel right.

Being independent

To me, this actually means taking offense when others try to tell me how I should live.   The reality is given the extent of product and idea marketing out there that does NOT have your personal interests in mind, you HAVE TO BE skeptical in order to live your best life.  Don’t let someone bring down your quality of life because they want you to buy their shitty salad dressings.

Enjoying the contradictions in life

I don’t want my life to make perfect sense.  Walt Whitman in Song to Myself said, “Do I contradict myself?  Very well, then, I contradict myself.  I am large, I contain multitudes.”  I believe getting the most out of life means allowing dichotomies to exist.  I can’t live without being mature but I also can’t live without being immature.

Working hard at relationships
I have relationship issues like anyone but I work hard at doing what I can do to effect the happiness of those close to me and to minimize family and relationship problems overall. Call me crazy but I don’t like drama and stress and using my time on repair issues when I could be using that time on other stuff.  I find it helpful to invest the time to think about what are some things I can do to make those close to me happy.  I have a tendency to be controlling though, and I need to work on that.

Being organized

I feel my best when I am on top of my tasks.  I have a system for managing my tasks and I am good about sticking to it.  One of the most common traits I’ve observed in people that enjoy life is a “make it happen” approach.  Being organized and doing the things that makes you happy work hand in hand.

Money

What I want in life is to have freedom of movement.  To go where I want to go when I want. Money helps on this front; doing well financially is a goal of mine for this reason.  I am in the camp that does not believe that money brings happiness.  But I am firmly in the camp that believes that if you have the other things in order (being a positive, secure, non-materialistic person), financial security can definitely help on the quality of life front.

Getting what you want

People don’t like to talk about this quality of life driver because they don’t want to seem aggressive.  We all want to make things happen. If you get the best table in the restaurant and do it in a cool way, that is a noble approach to life in my opinion.

Guarding my time

Time is my most precious resource.  I exercise in a way that minimizes time.  I plan phone calls before I do ten minute plus drives.  I always have reading material with me when opportunities for lines or delays exist.  I also realize there are some people out there that don’t get me or appreciate me and I am good about not prioritizing my time to be with them.   Back to the point of letting contradicitons exist, I am also a big fan of idle time.  I have been called a “football thug” by my wife on more than one occasion.

What are the things that contribute to your quality of life? If you put yours together and submit via comments, I will include in a follow up post.

Not only are we all overloaded with information as a society today, but most of the information we receive is either unimportant or slanted due to the ideological bias of its editors.

I have long  been on the lookout for a source of information that, a) efficiently delivers the most important stories of the day, and b) does so with minimal bias.

If I were to find a publication that does an exceptional job filtering what are the real impactful stories in the world, I would buy it.

If I were to find a publication that offers a truly moderate viewpoint, not pulled to ideologies on the left or right, I would buy it.

The Week is the best magazine I have ever encountered on both of these fronts.

On top of that, the layout is excellent, making it easy and interesting to pass through the pages.  It has one section called, “Boring but Important,” which is such a cool way to communicate with readers.

For domestic and international news, it offers briefs and a selection of the best editorials from around the world and from both the left and the right.

Another thing I love about this magazine is that, as strange as this seems, it gives off an unpretentious air.  It has a grounded approach and is not afraid to give its readers some humor or feed its jones for a little popular culture coverage.

To me, a publication like The Week is a total quality of life play. Now that I have a trusted source and filter of news information, I can afford to cut back on other information sources that took up a considerable use of my time.  For the first time in 12 years, I felt comfortable canceling my daily newspaper subscription.  This saves me a lot of time.  I now glimpse the news online every day knowing that come Friday I will get up to speed on all the important issues of the day.

You would think I gain some benefit from promoting The Week by the way I am hyping them (needless to say I have no affiliation with them).   I guess what draws me to this magazine is its moderate, enlightened philosophy and the fact that we don’t get enough of this today.  You can’t put your finger on it, let alone measure it, but this publication just has it.  I think most of us would agree that the world will be a better place when a greater proportion of people realize they can think on their own and don’t need to accept ideologically driven information.  When that happens, these negligible voices on the far left and right will go out of business.  [Some of those voices really believe what they say  (which still doesn’t make them worthy) but the majority have business plans on how to gain the biggest followings possible so they can pay their own bills.  They know that polarizing views are more likely to get talked about than moderate, enlightened views.]

Look, it was conventional wisdom for decades that politicians had to “dumb things down” to best communicate with voters.  Guess what happened?  This notion has been turned on its head during the last year in which politicians are finally starting to realize the American people not only can handle complexity and details but have an immense hunger for it.

The same idea applies to moderate politics (and culture for that matter).  For decades it has been conventional wisdom that the best political strategy is to pull constituents to the left or the right, taking advantage of the power of polarizing positions.  The benefit is staying in office, the cost is that such a strategy retards societal progress and individuals’ self development.
I just can’t imagine it taking that long for politicians to realize the untapped market in politics for moderate leadership that gets them elected and is also beneficial to society.

There is so much hunger for moderate views and leadership don’t you think?

If you like this article, please share it.

Pamela Slim's new book

I just finished reading Pamela Slim’s Escape from Cubicle Nation and I did not expect it to cause such a torrent of thoughts and ideas.

I’ve always felt that one of the most important enablers of quality of life is freedom.

Freedom to go where you want, freedom to do what you want, freedom to be yourself.

And that gaining control over your work life is one of the best options of getting there.

Everyone knows the traditional trade offs of working for yourself.  High return (personally, professionally, often financially), high risk (you could fail and suffer financially).

I’ve always understood that it’s still not a path for everyone even if the costs/benefits say “GO.”   Not everyone was born with the traits that allow one to deal with massive uncertainty and the ego blows of starting your own company.  [On the latter, I mean some people can’t even handle an intermediary stage of “failure” – even if it’s not really failure but just a stage where you come across to most people as struggling or naïve.]  But for those that can handle the pain associated with starting a company, there has never been a better time to venture out on your own.

Escape from Cubicle Nation offers an important reminder that:

1.    The risk side of the equation for venturing out on your own is much more favorable today, while the return side has remained equally attractive.

2.    The quality of information today to help entrepreneurs go out on their own is at such a high level that this is a factor in itself.

Even putting aside the current economic depression, it is no longer a safe call working for someone else.  Even before the economic crisis, half of the Fortune 500 were operating in rapidly changing environments where remaining a going concern in the medium term was no given.  In other words, how many Fortune 500 companies TWO YEARS AGO would you have been crazy enough to be CEO of?

In addition, the “world is flat” concept applies equally to startups vs. stalwarts as it does to emerging markets vs. economic superpowers.  Meaning it is a lot easier today to compete against large competitors.  Not only has the information age equalized the playing field, there is greater opportunity to grab market share from the traditional “stalwarts” as they are more than ever distracted by being in survival mode.

To the second point above, you’re not going to find a better book out there to help you make the jump to working for yourself.  Escape from Cubicle Nation walks you through the big picture considerations, and is therapeutic to the aspiring entrepreneur in this sense.  Then it delivers all the guidance you need on the small steps required to build a business from scratch.  On top of all this, it’s really a stimulating, enjoyable read.

And just by reading the book, you will walk away with five or so ideas that can be immediately implemented for your business, whether a start up or existing.

I’m excited overall about the growing movement of people wanting to take control over their lives; and how books like this are helping people make it happen.

Gary Vaynerchuk

I’m sure you have heard of Gary by now. He is a gutsy, charismatic, hard working, gifted entrepreneur who owns the wine category online through his site WineLibrary.TV.  He is best known as one of the world’s experts in social media and online marketing.  However, as he continues to draw audiences, he is now just as appreciated by his talent as a motivational speaker.

He’s also hilarious and totally authentic.

The highlight of the video is Gary’s emphasis on the importance of being yourself.

“Not being yourself is exhausting.” How great a line is that?

In our 20’s and early 30’s, we start to realize the importance of being yourself for happiness and personal satisfaction reasons.  And then halfway through our careers, we start to realize that being yourself is also the greatest competitive advantage you could have for professional success.

Be yourself. There can’t be a better life tip than that, and Gary Vaynerchuk is making the world a better place by spreading this message.

At 2:48 into this video, Gary shares a best practice on how he deals with bad days.  It’s a great lesson about the importance of mindset; but it’s also completely hilarious.  I love that he gave us such a specific, quirky example.  That’s what it’s all about.

Click on the below to watch the video.   Let us know what you think.

Donny Deutsch

I have not interviewed Donny Deutsch for the Quality of Life Project but I love his perspective on the positive side of a sense of entitlement. [He also refers to it as the “deserve” and “why not me” factors.]  If you haven’t read his business and life perspectives, check out his book, “Often Wrong, Never in Doubt.”

First, he gets it that some of the richest aspects of the human experience can be found in the realm of dichotomies. That with enlightenment comes an appreciation for nuance and even contradictions.

Donny Deutsch offers one of the best examples I’ve come across with his take on sense of entitlement. To feel deserving of all the world has to offer but simultaneously not feeling entitled to success without doing what needs to be done.

Deutsch has accepted that he is no smarter than anyone else and no one else is smarter than him. For business, this translates to a huge competitive advantage in, a) building a corporate culture that is not just authentic but confident, and b) capitalizing on business development opportunities since you know that you can do anything that your competitors can do.

In one’s personal life, this concept has huge quality of life dividends. Confidence is one of the greatest enablers of enjoying life and what Deutsch is talking about is the adage of “we all put our pants on one leg at a time.”  When you take this adage to heart, you know you can deal with anyone, and thus become more confident around other people. And when you are more confident around other people, the more comfortable they become and the more they want to do good by you.

If you follow Deutsch’s advice, the next time you won’t feel intimidated the next time you need to reach out to the head of admissions at a school you are looking at. “Why not me?” Right? [Again, there is dichotomy and nuance at play here. You simultaneously realize that you WILL back it up with smart, hard work.]

Another application of this concept is that so much in life is experiences. They rarely just come to us. Rather, we have to go out there and pro actively pursue them. We have to introduce ourselves to individuals we think have the potential to open doors. We have to follow up with that friend of a friend that could be an interesting contact. But to take advantage of this quality of life driver we need to understand at our core that we are entitled to and deserve what the world has to offer. And as a result we become more confident in our pursuit.

Let me end with a beautiful Talmudic passage that is one of the greatest examples of the wisdom of dichotomies.

“Every person should carry in one pocket a slip of paper reading ‘I am but dust and ashes’ and in the other, a slip of paper reading ‘For me the world was made.’”
- The Talmud

Please share your thoughts. I would love to get your perspective on this subject.

Tom Skerritt

Tom Skerritt is the ultimate “man’s man” so when I had the opportunity to spend a few hours with him at his home in Seattle I was pretty psyched.

Most people know him from his roles in MASH, Top Gun and River Runs Through It (one of my all time favorite movies).  He’s a real mellow guy and the fact that he makes Seattle his hometown, despite being a full time actor, says something about how important he views quality of life.
We talked about a lot of quality of life drivers and things he practices in his life.  During the interview, it became clear that a key component to his enjoyment of life is his overall sense of calm and energy.  He shared with me how he practices tai chi and how this helps him achieve calm; and how the world around him just seems more interesting as a result.

He said it also allows him to better tune in to himself.  That spurred me to ask him if he considered himself fairly in tune with his emotions and whether he reaped any benefits through this trait. This is what he said:

“If I am in a bad mood, what usually is effecting my emotions is just smoke. It goes away if you let it go. Most of the time you get past a negative mood by identifying what’s bothering you and making a decision of whether it deserves a seat at the table or not.”

What Tom is talking about is a habit that goes like this.  When he feels negativity or any emotional drag, he figures what is making him feel that way and decides whether it makes sense to be occupied by it.   If it’s not a rational cause/effect (allowing his mind to be stressed by something he can not control or by something that is simply not a big deal), he can bring his mind back to a clear, calm state.

90% of the time if not more, we allow our minds to be occupied by emotions that do not “deserve a seat at the table.”   Below are a few examples of a quick, three step emotional weather check:

Of course in some cases, one might determine that what’s weighing on them is a legitimate issue, and it would not be rational to try to “move on.”  For example, one might be upset about a friend having a health issue and there’s no sense in trying to mitigate the surrounding emotions.

Research also shows that the overwhelming majority of our thoughts have to do with things that have occurred in the past.  So, even when we’re having “rational” thoughts, it doesn’t mean we are having productive thoughts.

There is nothing soft about this kind of evolvement.  Soft is allowing anyone to crash your party and take away from your enjoyment of your day. This is about being a better professional; about enjoying life more.

Wrapping this up, we do not need to be yogis to realize the productivity and life satisfaction benefits of being a little tougher on what thoughts we allow to occupy our minds or affect our emotions.

Thank you Tom for sharing this great quality of life perspective.  Please share your thoughts.