Presence In The Moments That Matter

A little while back, I experienced just how important ‘being in the moment’ was. My son, a soccer player, was asked to demonstrate a skill move in front of his team. He was very proud. I was there, as I (almost) always am.

I missed it.

Why?

I was on my phone, looking at an endless stream of people sounding off on Twitter about a subject so important I can’t remember it now to punctuate this story.

I was there. I was not present.

A client of mine once suggested that work/life balance was nothing more than a myth. She argued it was impossible to be in balance with all of the expectations that come from your job, your family and (if you’re lucky) your personal time.

When she first said it, I wasn’t sure if she was right; but she was. Work/life balance is a myth. It isn’t realistic to have equal parts life and work. Not anymore.

But presence, now that’s different.

For most of us, our workday begins the moment our eyes open. The first thing we look at in the morning is the screen of a handheld device. Put simply, work and life are attached to a smartphone capable of managing our days and facilitating communication with the office (at all hours). But let’s face it, work matters, work pays the bills and work is what makes it possible for us to do the things in life we love to do. So not being responsive to work issues could be career limiting. I get that. But once we get to those “things we love”, then what?

The rub (of course) is that many of us are challenged with making those things we claim to love into priorities that we are truly ‘present’ for. It seems we have collectively removed priority management from our repertoires and in its place inserted ‘multi-tasking’. This term implies we are now capable of dedicating 100% of our attention to more than one thing at a time. We can’t. We couldn’t 50 years ago and we can’t today. We haven’t gotten any smarter, so maybe we are all just afraid of missing something.

Like what?

Email spam, an emoticon-riddled text message, an ‘FYI’ work email, or maybe a status update from an elementary school ‘friend’ asking what they should have for dinner.

When you are always plugged in, you cannot be fully present in the moments that matter; without ‘unplugging’ you can never recharge and without recharging, you run out of (battery) life.

Do I believe we can reclaim work/life balance in a literal sense? No. Not if you are intent on getting 8 hours of sleep, coupled with 8 hours of ‘life’, together with 8 hours of work. Kids need shuttling; aged parents need assistance, ‘work’ (which never loses) always wants more…

So now what?

Through our own efforts or omissions, we have made everything important. Which means nothing is. We claim there isn’t enough time in the day, but then we reach for our phones and repeatedly refresh our email in the hopes of getting more. We religiously update our personal statuses on social media and scroll through our ‘friends’ news feeds, in a never-ending desire to showcase, or observe even the most benign moments in our lives. Being ‘social’ used to mean getting out and having fun. Now it means typing like you’re employed in a 1960’s secretary pool. We turned fun into work.

The result?

The creation of a false sense of urgency to everyone and everything, like Pavlovian dogs salivating, the moment our phones make a noise, we respond. While it’s easy to blame technology, the reality is most of us no longer understand (or care to understand) what a priority is.

That’s where it starts. We all know the things that really matter.

I do not wish to go back to a time of busy signals on telephones, snail mail and pink message notes left on desktops; but I do encourage more presence in the moment. Those moments that matter, not defined with selfies or videos, but with a few ‘old school’ stills captured in our memories.

A lesson I would be well served to remember.

mLearning Is Not The Future, It’s The Here and Now

An amazing transformation has occurred over the past few decades… we’ve lost our ability to wait, to be patient, to be bored.

We no longer remember what to do, when there’s nothing to do.

Why?

I blame the Internet. More specifically, I blame the technologies that reside in the palm of our hands. Super computers really. Smart phones and tablets that are so powerful, they are akin to dragging around an entire set of encyclopaedias everywhere you go.

If you’re reading this and wondering what an encyclopaedia is… use Wikipedia and work backwards.

Now, to be clear, this blog is not a thinly veiled diatribe on how I’m longing for the world that ‘used to be’. Quite the contrary; as a company we’ve embraced the world as it exists today. We are content in our realization that we will not return (at least not soon) to a time of patience. In fact, patience has been replaced by pace. Meaning speed above all else, in virtually everything we do.

We do not wait. We Google, we YouTube, some may Bing or Yahoo… but we do not wait.

So why should learning be any different?

It isn’t. Except that learners are most often bound by the inability of their organizations or institutions to produce content quickly. They are also stymied by their environment’s (corporate, academic or otherwise) ability to provide that information in microbursts. Just like the ‘Internet’ can.

Training must be mobile and fast. That’s where we come in.

We have recognized as a company that micro learning is not the future, it’s the ‘here and now’. Our technology solutions have created ways for our client partners to push real learning out to their organizations with pace. mVideo, mLearning, mGaming, mEverything…

As a speaker, I hope there will always be a place for classroom learning and facilitator driven discussion, but the world has changed and Pathways Training and eLearning has changed with it.

Learning happens in classrooms, meeting rooms and living rooms – so the more readily available the content, the more likely the learning is to occur…

You’re looking at your phone anyway.

Leadership is Fear

Take a moment to reflect back.

Reflect on those moments in time where you were most uncomfortable, most afraid of unknown situations in your life. What did you do? How did you handle them? Were you paralyzed with fear, unable to move past insecurities and doubt? Or were you able to fight through the situation and learn from the experience?

We all have had feelings of uncertainty at times. Moments where we hold ourselves back from speaking up at work for something we believe in or trusting our gut instincts to make the right choices within our personal lives.

We all feel fear.

That is why it is so important to face fear. Look at it straight in the eye and overcome any obstacles it may present. If you want to be that leader, you must take those opportunities others are fearful of.

There are a few things to consider…

Understand who you are.

When it comes to tasks, take some time to think about which competencies are your strengths and where you would like to improve. Are you a “results-only” driven individual who could not care about soft skills? Or are you a “people-person” striving to build growth in your professional environment? Are you action-oriented or extremely lazy? Do you tend to be the first one to discuss change or prefer that someone else take on the responsibility? Or do you have a mix of everything? Recognizing your abilities will help you understand what you are fearful of and provide a clearer picture on the type of leader you want to become.

Understand why you are this way.

You’ve acknowledged that you’re a pretty easygoing individual, who doesn’t know what to do in life but does want to make a million bucks eventually by getting that amazing job without actually attaining the skills needed to qualify.  Maybe you think the complete opposite.

Our past experiences and learning have a huge impact on the way we perceive ourselves. Which of those experiences have shaped your thought process and guided you over the years? What has prevented you from overcoming obstacles? Feeling afraid before starting a task is ok and sometimes necessary. Use that feeling as motivation and constantly remind yourself of the positive development you are about to achieve. The ability to self-reflect is critical to your learning when overcoming any fears.

Understand Leadership is a journey.

The continued practice of self-reflection – understanding yourself – will help focus your thoughts in an analytical manner, giving you the ability to personally and professionally develop. Remember, we all feel fear, so it’s important not to ignore its impact. However, don’t give fear so much value! Great leaders acknowledge fear. They understand its importance in their continued journey for success. Most importantly, leaders live fear and are not terrified of tackling opportunities they are most afraid of.

“Courage is not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it. The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear.” – Nelson Mandela.

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Shakeel Malik has over 9 years of experience as a training leader within customer service, client experience, sales, technology and support initiatives. Within his role at Pathways, he manages client relationships, leads training projects and provides strategic leadership direction.  Shakeel’s past projects have included fostering leadership development, building strategic competencies, improving employee morale and developing evaluation tools within Adult Education.  He is also a volunteer Commissioner of a Basketball League, where he leads and facilitates all league operations including marketing, finance, sponsorship, digital technology and training sessions.

He holds certificates in Adult Education from Brock University and Dispute Resolution from York University, and is currently a candidate for a Bachelor of Education in Adult Education.