I attended a party where one of the guests was intent on bragging about his latest exploits. I watched as he moved from group to group trying to get people to listen to his story. As soon as he started talking about himself, one by one, people in the group would excuse themselves and move…
Part of our interpersonal success is tied to saying the right thing at the right time. But, an even larger part of that success is tied to our being able to avoid saying the wrong thing at the tempting moment. There are times when we so want to tell somebody off or give them a…
A set of studies reported in The Wall Street Journal found that even the most virtuous of people can become corrupt once they get a taste of power. Google is a case in point. Twenty years ago, Google had two employees. Today it has more than 94,000. Twenty years ago, there was very little power to be…
Liz Mineo authored an article titled, “Genes are Nice, but Joy is Better,” which appeared in The Harvard Gazette. The article discusses the findings of a study which began tracking the health of 268 Harvard sophomores in 1938 is still on-going today. The subjects were all men as Harvard was an all-male university at the…
As my wife backed her car out of the garage, she discovered that her right front tire was flat. She needed to run some important errands, so she took my car. The first thing I did was read the Owner’s Manual for her car to find out where the jack and spare tire were located.…
A friend of mine and her husband went for breakfast on a Sunday morning at a small café near their home. As they finished eating, they noticed there were quite a few people waiting for tables. One of these was an elderly woman who was by herself and was dressed up in her Sunday…
When my daughter Nancy graduated from Arizona State University, Barack Obama, who was president at the time, delivered the commencement address. I remember watching and listening as his speech mesmerized an entire football stadium full of people for 27 minutes. In essence, he told the graduates that chasing after the traditional brass rings—big money, material…
One of my daughters sent me a quote from Beverly Sills. It read, “There are no short-cuts to any place worth going.” What this means is that if you want to experience a high level of success, you have to be willing to pay your dues–to start at the bottom and work your way…
I have come across several articles that say kindness is a lost art. So, I decided to test this notion as I went about my daily business. That morning as I attempted to enter the freeway, a driver slowed down and let me cut in front of him. When I got to Lowe’s to buy…
This is the first half of a quote that a friend of mine posted on Facebook. What this means is that the way you make others feel after they’ve interacted with you is your trademark—the distinguishing characteristic of how you become known. As Maya Angelou put it, “I’ve learned that people will forget what you…