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talktodiana

~ Igniting the power and passion in others…

talktodiana

Tag Archives: perspective

A Story of Gratitude on Thanksgiving

08 Sunday Oct 2017

Posted by dianasschwenk in Diana's Enormous Book of Quotes, In My Opinion, My Stories

≈ 20 Comments

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200 words, Dad, Diana Schwenk, Diana's Enormous Book of Quotes, family, Gratitude, growing up, happy, health, life, love, parents, perspective, Relationships, Thanksgiving

Me, Shannon and Dad in 1985

Never let things you want, make you forget the things you have.

In the summer of 2015, Dad called and insisted that I visit that September. Looking back, I am grateful he did so, as unknown to any of us, Dad would pass away two months later.

When I reflect on what I am grateful for, Dad is at the top of the list. I know how fortunate I am to have had a father who loved me, and kept me safe, who was in my life for 52 years.

Dad also was a grateful man. During that 2015 visit, from the couch he practically lived on due to the back pain he’d suffered, he looked at me and said, “You know, Diana…I cannot really complain about anything, I’ve had a great life.”

“A great life, Dad? You grew up in war-torn Berlin. Your windows imploded when bombs were dropped. You were hungry much of the time!”

I don’t remember his answer verbatim, but it was something like, “yes, but we looked out for each other on our street, we shared everything. I was loved.”

~ DIANA’S ENORMOUS BOOK OF QUOTES ~

This Thanksgiving, don’t forget what you have…

 

 

 

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A Little Water Between Neighbours

13 Sunday Aug 2017

Posted by dianasschwenk in Diana's Enormous Book of Quotes, My Stories

≈ 22 Comments

Tags

Diana Schwenk, Diana's Enormous Book of Quotes, Don't sweat the small stuff, growing up, Life's like that, peace, perspective

When you look at a field of Dandelions, you can either see a hundred weeds, or a thousand wishes.

~ Unknown

My apartment building was painted a while back, including my balcony. It looks so nice that I bought one of those outdoor carpets to enhance the look. Next year, I plan to buy a couple of potted wild grass pots and comfy chairs to spruce it up even more – maybe I will even get outdoor solar lights to string on the railing!

Today my upstairs neighbor watered her balcony plants. Honestly, she used so much water, it poured onto my balcony, drenching it, drenching the carpet, splashing up onto my patio door.

“HEY!” I called up, “you’re messing up my balcony, creating a mucky mess!”

I don’t think she heard me. She just kept watering. I would have run upstairs and pounded on her door, but I was still in my jammies – maybe that was a good thing. 🙂

Instead, I focused my adrenaline flooded body to the task of hanging my carpet on the rail, and mopping the mucky water from my freshly painted balcony.

I’ve laid the carpet back down and my balcony is once again my urban oasis. You know, in retrospect, I’d been thinking of mopping the balcony anyway. It looks great.

It was just a little water between neighbours. Nobody died. What’s the big deal?

~ DIANA’S ENORMOUS BOOK OF QUOTES ~

Happiness

14 Sunday Aug 2016

Posted by dianasschwenk in Diana's Enormous Book of Quotes, In My Opinion

≈ 32 Comments

Tags

200 words, Alberta, Calgary, Canada, Diana Schwenk, Diana's Enormous Book of Quotes, First World Problems, Gratitude, happy, Life's like that, perspective, reality check, summer

Girl-Resting-Meadow

Summer afternoon—summer afternoon; to me those have always been the two most beautiful words in the English language.

― Henry James

For me too, Henry. For me too.

Feeling that warm sun on my skin.

Eating ice cream on a park bench.

Taking evening walks when it’s still light out.

Riding my brand new bike on Calgary’s many pathways.

Summer really makes me happy.

But here’s the thing. We haven’t really had much of a summer this year. It’s been all rain, rain, rain. I keep telling myself better summer days are coming. I mean yesterday wasn’t bad. It was sunny in the morning and it didn’t rain all day. I rode my bike and sat out on a patio with a good friend but…

…there’s not much time left for ‘better summer days.’ I’m seeing signs of fall. Wasps are acting all aggressive already, as they do in the fall and today I noticed leaves are turning and some are on the ground and I’m just not happy about it!

But I have a home, food in my stomach, good people who love me and I’m reminded gratitude is what REALLY leads to happiness.

~ DIANA’S ENORMOUS BOOK OF QUOTES ~

 

 

Perspective

24 Sunday Apr 2016

Posted by dianasschwenk in Diana's Enormous Book of Quotes, In My Opinion

≈ 25 Comments

Tags

200 words, building community, community, Community engagement, compassion, Diana Schwenk, Diana's Enormous Book of Quotes, division, human behaviour, humanity, integrity, judging, justice, love, perception, perspective, understanding

lioness-protects-cubs

When man calls an animal “vicious”, he usually means that it will attempt to defend itself when he tries to kill it.

Unattributed

As we encroach more on and more on wild animals and their habitats, we inevitably find ourselves in situations were animals have mauled people. Often the offending “vicious” animal is relocated or destroyed.

It got me thinking how that also happens in our interactions with each other when we perceive a threat to our way of being.

When we see ourselves as superior because of race, religion, no religion, social status, political affiliation, income tax bracket, level of education, gender, or any other form of discrimination.

When we justify our attacks on those who are not like us because we perceive them as a threat to our culture and way of life.

When we oppress the weak, the poor and the sick in our efforts to gain even more wealth for ourselves.

Yet, we are surprised at their indignation and “viciousness” when they retaliate; when they fight back to defend themselves and their children.

~ DIANA’S ENORMOUS BOOK OF QUOTES ~

Think about it. If attacked, wouldn’t you fight back? Wouldn’t you protect your family and way of life?

If we both always agree, is one of us not really necessary?

17 Sunday Aug 2014

Posted by dianasschwenk in Diana's Enormous Book of Quotes, In My Opinion

≈ 42 Comments

Tags

200 words, common ground, courage, Diana Schwenk, Diana's Enormous Book of Quotes, differences, integrity, life, listen, love, open-minded, peace, perspective, point of view, respect, tolerance, understanding

Meet regularly with someone who holds vastly different views from you ~ unattributed

imagesOK.

SO THIS ISN’T THE NORM for me, because let’s face it – life is much easier when people agree with me.

And depending on whom I’m speaking with and what the topic is, often I will keep my mouth shut, for fear of hurting the other person’s feelings.

But even I have to admit that there’s value in varying views.

So it’s something that I engage in when the opportunity presents itself.

It’s also something I seek, when I’m stuck in a rut.

And I always learn something from it!

I try to keep the following principles in mind when talking with others who have varying views:

  1. Listen to the other person
  2. Try to see their point of view
  3. Give thoughtful answers to their questions
  4. Respectfully share my perspective
  5. Avoid personal attacks
  6. Discuss new possibilities with an open mind
  7. If we can’t achieve #6, agree to disagree

~ DIANA’S ENORMOUS BOOK OF QUOTES ~

Reaching common ground takes longer, but often it’s worth it. Can you think of a time when doing so produced better results?

And I'll try to see them from yours

And I’ll try to see them from yours

How Do You Feel About It?

29 Sunday Jun 2014

Posted by dianasschwenk in Diana's Enormous Book of Quotes, In My Opinion

≈ 67 Comments

Tags

200 words, Diana Schwenk, Diana's Enormous Book of Quotes, gifts, giving, good intentions, helpful, open-minded, perspective, tolerance, understanding

Cat Food Is For People – Seth Godin

photo found at www.morenormalthannot.com

photo found at http://www.morenormalthannot.com

The above quote was the title of a recent post written by Godin.

He wrote that even the gifts we give others are at least as much about how they make us feel to give them, as they are about how the recipient of the gift feels.

He concluded by saying if cat food was really for cats it would come in mouse flavor.

Truth is, most of us wouldn’t buy mouse-meat cat food because it sounds disgusting, and since kitty doesn’t buy her own food, pet foods contain ingredients that appeal to us.

Seth’s post got me thinking how this phenomenon occurs in other ways.

Like when we view other cultures and their customs for example, we interpret them according to our own beliefs.

Often, especially when a certain custom offends our own sensibility, we want to enlighten our fellow humans with our version of what is right.

If you think about it, it’s kind of arrogant.

When we position our beliefs as superior over another’s beliefs, we lessen our ability to understand and care about them.

~ DIANA’S ENORMOUS BOOK OF QUOTES ~

Understanding what motivates others; is it important?

19 Wednesday Jun 2013

Posted by dianasschwenk in Hump Day Chronicles, In My Opinion, My Stories

≈ 41 Comments

Tags

actions, behaviour, building community, communication, community, Diana Schwenk, Hump Day Chronicles, motivation, perspective, projecting onto others, Relationships, understanding

On Sunday, I wrote this post about kindness and just in case you don’t want to go back and read it, let me tell you the gist of it.

I wrote about a man who can be like a bull in a china shop when pursuing his goals. And then, as if out of left field, can commit a random act of kindness by plugging ‘almost expired’  parking meters as he walks down the street.

Then along comes mrsfringe and comments, “Love your story, but I’d guess filling the meters has much to do with a sense of just/unjust.”  And by golly, I believe she’s right! Because I worked with him for many years, I know this man had worked his way to the top because he believed that he could make more of an impact on this world in a systemic way than he could by dealing with individuals on the floor. So what if you have to bowl over a few folks on the way if your end goal will create a better system, right?

Change the system and in the long-run you change the situation for all individuals.expired_parking_meter_small

Change the system and you create justice and equality.

And if you can’t change the system, buck the system by plugging almost expired, money-sucking, ‘when you know your meeting is an hour and they only let you pay for 30 minutes max and are counting on you to forget to come back and pay more’ therefore enabling them to issue a parking ticket, stupid parking meters.

That’ll teach the powers that be!

Ok so why does it make a difference whether he plugged the meters out of kindness or out of a sense of justice?

Whatever the reason, the people who were parked there were spared the cost of a $30 parking ticket and that’s all that mattered to them.

So why is understanding someone’s motivation important?

So glad you asked!

Understanding why someone does what they do is a great place to start in any relationship or collaboration. And sometimes, it can even relieve the stress that you are feeling from the actions of someone else.

For example, a few years back an organization that I worked for hired a company to help us understand our individual core personality traits and also create job personality profiles for our vacant positions. With this tool we would be able to hire people who were well-suited for specific jobs. The premise being that if you hire the right person the first time the organization wins by saving costs. And the employee wins because they are well-equipped to do the job and have a better chance of excelling.

All the leadership in our organization took the test and the owner of the consulting company (lets call him Bill)  reviewed the results with us as a group. I won’t get into how amazing and revealing these results were but suffice it to say it was a remarkable and eye-opening experience. When my profile was projected onto the wall for all to see, Bill pointed at me and said…

“You’re always asking questions! And when people answer them you ask more questions.

You are full of ideas and you are constantly voicing them.

Have you ever stopped to think about how that makes your staff feel?

I’ll tell you how they’re feeling…they’re thinking they have to scramble and implement all those ideas and there’s not enough time in the day to do that!”questions

He was right of course.

They thought I was questioning their work and time management.

They thought I was inferring that they weren’t measuring up to some impossible ideal.

They thought this because the only way they could ever imagine asking so many questions themselves is if they were concerned about how someone else was doing their job.

The reason I ask lots of questions is because I’m curious to know what my team thinks. I ask lots of questions because I want to understand things and I want to empower others to take ownership. And yes I have a lot of ideas that I toss out there. I do it for feedback – I honestly want to know if people think my ideas have merit. And if they do have merit I want to know if they think we have the resources to implement them. And because that’s how I think, I just presumed everyone would think that way and know that that was what I was doing.

So is knowing someone’s motivation for what they do important?

I think so. Sure those who benefited from their meters being topped up didn’t care about what motivated this man to do it. But understanding what motivates him was valuable to me because I worked with him day-in and day-out.

Knowing how my questions affect others is also helpful to me. Now when I am trying to understand a situation or want to throw ideas out into a room full of people, I start with a preamble that makes my motivation clear to those present.

Have you ever misjudged someone based on your perspective of what would motivate you to do what they are doing?

Or have you ever been misjudged based on someone else’s perspective of what would motivate them to do what you are doing?

~ THE HUMP DAY CHRONICLES ~

What is your perspective!

HEY BOZO that’s my parking spot!

20 Sunday Jan 2013

Posted by dianasschwenk in Diana's Enormous Book of Quotes, In My Opinion, My Stories, Out and About

≈ 36 Comments

Tags

200 words, anger, blessed, Calgary, compassion, Diana Schwenk, First World Problems, kindness, Parking space, perspective

I felt sorry for myself because I had no shoes – until I met a man who had no feet ~ Jewish proverb.

It had been a long week.blocked

I’d been fighting that nasty bug going around.

I’d had my head stuck in numbers and policies and although this is necessary work and I appreciate its value, I was tired and happy to be going home.

When I got home, my parking spot was blocked by another vehicle.

I felt my blood pressure rise along with my temper and wrote a note that said

“… you’re blocking my spot, can you please call me when you move!”

I found a two-hour parking zone down the block and marched home like a crazy woman on a mission with anger burning in my heart.

Then I remembered that there are those who…

can’t afford a car

don’t have a job

or don’t have a home.

By the time the guy called to say, “I’m so sorry, I thought I’d only be a moment, I’m gone now…”

I replied with, “…thank you so much, no worries!”

~ DIANA’S ENORMOUS BOOK OF QUOTES ~

How is it that I often forget how truly blessed I am?

Talk to Diana


"I RELATE WITH, PROMOTE AND SPEAK COMMUNITY WHEREVER I AM..."

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