• the loss of a job.
• a divorce.
• a traumatic injury.
• a death.
• the alienation of a loved one due to a fight or disagreement.
• a severe illness.
• or even your own impending death.

Crisis is absolutely one of the most challenging things that we face, and when many people are in crisis they simply cannot cope and therefore fall apart. The key to managing any crisis is to look towards the future while you’re inside the crisis.  You always need to be thinking about the future and the fact that a better future lies ahead for you.  Knowing that there is a positive future in the picture and that you can control the future is extremely important. Today I saw a man speak who recently had a horrible accident that left him paralyzed from the waist down. I have known other people who became paralyzed as well.  Due to their paralysis, those people confined themselves to their homes and stopped living the lives they were capable of living.  In the case of this man, he started diving, surfing and doing all sorts of things that he never did before he was paralyzed.  Despite the fact that he cannot walk, he made his future bigger than his past. If you were faced with the prospect of paralysis, what would you do?  Would you look forward to doing things you had never done, or would you decide you would make your future bigger than your past? In terms of your life, you are going to be faced with crisis at some point.  You may be in crisis right now.  If you have recently lost a job, or are about to lose a job, you may be in crisis.  I want to give you a few words of advice about how to navigate the crisis of losing a job or any other crisis in your life. If you have lost a job, the first thing you need to do is start thinking about your future and where you want to be.  If you are about to lose a job, you should do the exact same thing.  You need to concentrate on the future and how you are going to make your future so much better than your past. Your future is going to be much, much better than your past because you have learned so much in your current or last position.

• You know what employers in your industry generally like and do not like.
• You presumably have dealt with more people and are now more proficient with people.
• You know how to look for employers in your industry that are doing well.
• You are more mature.
• You know how to do your job better.
• You know what aspects of your job you are good at.
• You know what aspects of your job you are not good at.
• You know what aspects of your job you enjoy.
• You know what aspects of your job you do not enjoy.

Another incredibly positive thing is that you can start looking at other sorts of professions and jobs you may be good at.  I have seen so many incredible transformations of peoples’ lives after they lost or left a job, that it is difficult for me to recount all of them.  The number of success stories of people who have transformed their lives after losing jobs is inspiring. Many of these people I have even hired. So many positive things lie in your future if you lose your job. I know of a guy who hated practicing law and was fired from a law firm.  He ended up going back to school and is planning on becoming a professor.  He has never been happier. I know of another guy who was fired from a law firm and ended up becoming a recruiter.  He has never been happier, is making more money, and is more well known than he ever was when practicing law.  I know of a man who failed the bar exam in New York several times, lost his job with a big firm there, ended up moving to California and founded one of the most prestigious law firms in the nation.  I know of so many people who were in crisis, who looked towards the future when they lost a job, and ended up changing the world as we know it.  Lee Lacocca, for example, was fired from Ford Motor Company.  He went over to Chrysler and literally saved the company. He became world famous in the process.  He made the absolute best of a huge crisis. People who succeed when losing jobs are able to get a perspective in their life that the loss of a job would not normally force them to get.  This incredible perspective they get is something that enables them to dramatically increase their options and long-term happiness. If you are in crisis then feel good about this.  The crisis you are in is going to force you to reexamine your life, and see what opportunities are potentially awaiting you.  You will now be able to get out of what may have been a rut.  This is something that is incredibly positive and you should be happy about it. In a divorce, for example, people will learn a lot about themselves.  They will learn the sort of mate they get along with and do not get along with.  They will learn about aspects of themselves that one mate may not like and that they need to be with a mate who happens to like that particular aspect of themselves.  They will learn how they want and do not want to be treated.  If you are in a crisis in a relationship right now (and you believe it is not solvable), then look to the future and the fact that you will one day have a much better mate who appreciates you. If you are in a job right now that you do not like and are in “crisis,” then look towards the future and see that there is likely something out there that will be meaningful for you. Look towards the future when you are in crisis. I have been in crisis situations many times. I have been in these situations in my career and in my personal life.  Whenever I find myself in a crisis I just do what I am telling you right now: I look towards the future.  You can feel bad all you want about the present situation you are in.  This is what most people do.  In fact, a lot of people spend their entire lives feeling bad about their situation and the life they are in.  For example, they find friends and other people who will listen to how bad their situation is, and they sit around talking about this incessantly.  They wallow, and may eat or abuse food or something else, while feeling bad about their situation.  They simply do not allow themselves to enjoy life because they focus on what is wrong with their life right now.  This is a serious problems for many people. The thing about the future is that it is always getting better.  Even if you are about to die, depending upon your religious beliefs, you may be about to go to heaven or some other incredible place.  You can mourn your departure from this earth, but you can also look towards the future.

• If you are sick, look towards the future.
• If you did not get into the college you wanted to get into, look towards the future.  Maybe you can get into a better graduate school than the college you went to.
• If you did not get the job you wanted when you applied, do not give up. Look towards the future, because you may be able to work for that employer again.
• The future is always improving.

Juan Enriquez, the founding director of Harvard Business School Life Sciences Project, has written extensively on the topic of the future.  One of the most interesting topics he studies is that we are now in a position, using stem cells and other methods, where we can regrow teeth such as molars in a petri dish.  We can regrow the ear of a soldier injured in battle.  We can regrow a bladder.  We are even in a position now, where we are working on artificial eyes. The future that Enriquez sees is one where we will actually be a different class of humans that he calls “Homo Evolutis.”  This name signifies that our species is continually evolving.  Instead of being content with being able to hear, like we do right now, through science we will be able to engineer ourselves to hear like bats if we choose.  Instead of seeing things normally like we do now, we will also be able to see infrared if we want.  We are very, very close to doing this because we are taking direct control of the evolution of our own species. These findings are profound and they signify to me that even if we are deaf, if we cannot see, if we are missing an ear, if we are losing a bladder, there is hope.  There are incredible miracles out there for the taking and the most important thing we can do is look towards the future when we are in crisis. The future can always be better than the past, if we allow ourselves to focus on what is possible. You manage crisis by looking towards the future and what you can accomplish there, instead of dwelling on where you are right now. THE LESSON Crisis is among the most challenging things that anyone can face, and many people cannot cope and fail in the face of it. To survive in the midst of a crisis, look to the future; doing so will make you feel more confident about your current situation. Crises can force you to reexamine your life, and make you seek out potential opportunities. The future can always be better than the present or past, and focusing on the future can be incredibly positive and guide you out of what may have been a rut.

• I thought my biggest challenge would be finding a job when I got out of college.
• I never thought I would be an attorney.
• I never thought I would even go to a good college.
• I never thought I would leave Detroit–and I never really had big plans for myself.

My sense of who I was and what I could achieve was simply not at a high level. At some point, however, based on encouragement from my father, teachers, and others, I began to develop a stronger sense of self–a sense of self that encouraged me to aim high in my life and to believe that I was capable of incredible things. Over time, this sense of self began to stick, and it continued to grow for me. A strong sense of self is the most important possible thing you can possess, and developing a strong sense of self will change your life. Do you think the close friends I had when I was 17 would have helped me develop this strong sense of self? In most cases it is not our friends who will encourage and push us. It is not that our friends are trying to hurt us; it is just that, as much as they like us, they may not want us to change. For example, my friend at the time liked being around people who looked up to him, and he avoided people who looked down on him. If I had changed then, the dynamic between us would have changed (and it eventually did, when I changed). People around you may want a certain level of control over their relationship with you in your career and life, and they want whatever makes them look and feel the best. While they may like it if you do well, their doing well is their priority. Please understand this: If you have a strong sense of self, this will alter the power balance in your relationships with many people around you. This is why so many people never change and reach their full potential. Many children develop a strong sense of self starting from the moment they are born, from their parents, who encourage them and help push them to do better and better. But it is not just parents who help us develop a strong sense of self. A strong sense of self comes from many areas in our lives and from the feedback we receive from the world:

• Our Recognized Abilities Give Us a Sense of Self–If we are very intelligent and test well, we may feel smart, and this may contribute to a strong sense of self. If we are considered interesting or funny by others, or have been called industrious, inventive, and so forth, this may contribute to a strong sense of self.
• Our Various Affiliations Give Us a Sense of Self–We may be members of a certain sports team, college, or other group that is interested in particular things.
• Our Religion Gives Us a Sense of Self--If we are members of a certain religious group, this will give us a sense of self related to the religion.
• Our Social Standing and Relationships Give Us a Sense of Self--We have a sense of self based on the people we are friends with and how we are regarded by others.
• Our Occupation Gives Us a Sense of Self–Our jobs and what we do for a living give us a sense of self.
• Our Families and Family Relationships Give Us a Sense of Self--Our wives or husbands, our parents and other relatives, all contribute to our sense of self.
• Our Past Gives Us a Sense of Self–Things that have happened to us in the past and things that people may have said about us in the past may contribute to our sense of self.

When you get to know people, they will constantly be telling you about themselves and various things they have done. I have heard people brag about being the best free-thrower on their basketball team, setting local records for shot put, getting the best score in their school on a standardized test, dating the homecoming queen, and more–often forty or more years after all this occurred. Why? These people’s sense of self is intertwined with things that they achieved decades ago. It is who they are and who they consider themselves to be. Most of us rarely develop our sense of self deliberately. As children, we may further develop the characteristics for which our parents give us positive feedback, because we naturally seek acceptance, love, and protection from the people who provide us care. As we grow older, we do the same thing with the schools we attend and within our peer groups, where we also seek acceptance and protection. We may have different senses of self with our peers than we have at home. We may have a different sense of self on the athletic field than we have off the athletic field. In addition, our motivation may be affected by our sense of self. If we are told we are very smart by others, we may study more and work harder in school, due to having a sense of self that is strongly related to our academic skills. If we are given the impression that a certain behavior will improve our sense of self then we will likely engage in this behavior. Recently my wife and I have started watching a television show called Bait Car. The show is about the police parking a nice car in a bad neighborhood with the keys in it. The car always gets stolen on the show, and the police have a method for turning off the car as the car thieves are speeding away. In most instances, there is more than one person involved in the theft, and sometimes kids talk other kids into stealing the car. The kid that ultimately steals the car usually does so because he wants to be accepted by the other kids. In some neighborhoods and around certain people, our sense of self might be related to committing crimes in order to be accepted. What is inside of you, what you feel and believe may be entirely different from what the rest of the world is telling you. If you have a strong sense of self, you can overcome nearly any obstacle out there without being concerned with anything–except for what is inside of you, what you feel, and what you believe. We all think about ourselves and our lives in a certain way, and this ultimately ends up controlling the future of our lives. Our beliefs about ourselves have a tremendous amount to do with what ends up happening to us, what we accomplish, and the quality of our life. Inside each and every one of us there needs to be an understanding of who we are. Our sense of self underlies our internal strength as human beings, and it enables us to accomplish what we desire. Our sense of self needs to give us the ability to power through–no matter what others may say about us, and no matter what sort of feedback we may get from the world. Developing a strong sense of self enables us to be happier and more successful and to live better lives. Unfortunately, most of us do not live our lives in accordance with our own sense of self and, instead, our sense of self is based too much on what others are doing out in the world, what others have, and what others say about us–these are externals that are irrelevant to what is really inside of us. If you have a strong sense of self, then what you do for a living, your past, your religion, your parents, your affiliations, your recognized abilities, and more should not affect your thoughts about what you can accomplish. Having a powerful sense of self is going to make all the difference in your life. You need to understand that your thoughts about yourself and your capabilities need to come from what is inside of you, not from societal structures that may have led you to believe who you are. THE LESSON A powerful sense of self will make all the difference in your life. You must understand that your sense of yourself and your capabilities come from inside of you, not from the external forces that have brought you to your current place in life. What you feel internally might be completely different from what the world is telling you, and you must learn to focus on the former rather than the latter.

• Some men only want to work for other men
• Some women only will work for men.
• Some women will only work for women.
• Some people only will work in large companies.
• Some people will only work in small companies.
• Some people refuse to ever assume a management role.
• Some people refuse to be anything but a manager.
• Some people avoid working for new companies.
• Some people avoid working for older, more established companies.
• Some people will only work alone.
• Some people will only work in large cities.
• Some people will only work in small cities.
• Some people will only work in jobs where they are represented by a union.
• Some people refuse to work in jobs where they are represented by a union.
• Some people will only work in the service sector.
• Some people will only work in the manufacturing sector.
• Some people will only work with groups of large people.
• Some people will avoid work where they have to talk on the phone.
• Some people will only work places where they have to talk on the phone.

I could continue with this list of preferences almost indefinitely, and these preferences are something that really control what happens to us and in our lives.  Many of these preferences could be seen as more than just “preferences” and could instead be called “musts” because many people refuse to work in certain types of environments and do certain things that are largely controlled by their past. When I was growing up, down the street was a family that was extremely poor.  The family never had proper clothes, and they never had enough to eat.  One the the real low points must have been the time that my mother went out and bought a Boy Scouts uniform for one of the boys because their mother could not afford one.  The mother had asked my mom to do this, and she had.  My mother then asked me to take the uniform over to their house and give it to the boy.  I remember that, despite the fact that he and several of his brothers were at home, he did not answer the door.  I left it in between the front door of the home and the screen door. This family was incredibly poor and never had enough of anything because, back in the 1970s in Detroit, plumbers were unionized.  If you did not belong to a union, it was apparently extremely difficult to get a job, and this particular man was chronically unemployed.  He did not drink or smoke and was fit and willing to work.  Due to some early experience he had with unions, however, he simply refused to have anything to do with any job that involved the unions.  Due to this one belief about how “evil” he believed unions were, he was effectively cutting himself off from participating in virtually every job out there.  His family literally starved due to this, and his wife ended up divorcing him because he could never find work. This is an example of someone whose beliefs about something in the past are controlling their future.  I am sure that there are examples in your own life about beliefs from things in the past and how they are controlling your future.  You need to insure that you do not shortchange yourself and your future life due to erroneous beliefs you may have about the past. Because most of my career has involved legal recruiting, one of the conversations I have had many times throughout my career is a call from attorneys in New York City who inform me they no longer have any interest in working in New York City.  They may say something along the lines of the following: “I never want to work in New York City again.  The people there are too competitive and mean.  I need to get out of here and work in a smaller market.” The experiences that these people are having in New York City are typically just related to the practice of law in general.  The practice of law in any law firm is “competitive” and “mean” in many respects.  However, most people that do not like practicing law who are working in New York City will generalize the fact that they do not like New York City, and not that they do not like the practice of law.  This is another sort of generalization that is extremely dangerous.  Here, someone is making a generalization about a massive geographic market and the people within it instead of looking at what really may be the cause of their frustrations. The attorney who forsakes the entire City of New York is often making a very reckless mistake.  First of all, there are thousands of law firms in the city.  To surmise that not a single one of them may be a place the attorney would like working is dangerous.  Secondly, the attorney who is contemplating moving out of New York may already have a life set up there.  They may have children in school, and they may already have a substantial network of professional contacts.  Third, the attorney has already taken the bar exam in the state.  To simply walk away from this is extremely reckless. In speaking with these people, I am always pretty amazed because they will have all sorts of generalizations about why they do not like New York that involve things like public transportation, the size of their apartments, and other trivial things.  Most of these conversation never revolved around how the situation may be fixable in New York itself and not require a cross-country move of some sort to another part of the United States.  For example, the person may be better off practicing law inside a corporation or working in a different practice area of the law in New York City.  However, few of these people will regularly undertake this sort of rigorous self-examination and will instead make various conclusions about why New York is the wrong market for them to be working in. This person may subsequently pick up their family and moved to a small southern town to practice law.  They may end up earning one third the salary and working just about as hard as they did in New York.  The attorney may have a wife and children they bring with them in the move.  Almost invariably, once the attorney starts working with the new law firm in the small city they will start experiencing the same pressures and issues again.  They will have left all of their friends and maybe even some relatives back in New York and now will be isolated in a small town.  The attorney may spend years trying to convince themselves that the problem they had was New York City and not the practice of law, their practice area, or another issue with the work.  They will spend the rest of their career avoiding New York for jobs under the belief that this is something that created problems for them. You need to be aware of beliefs that you may have from things that have happened to you in the past that may be limiting you today.  What are these beliefs and how are they hurting you?  The past never equals the future and associations of what things represent from the past can be extremely dangerous. Several years ago, I had a customer in my asphalt business, Ken, who owned a giant mansion in Grosse Pointe, Michigan. I would see this man every year when I would come by to work on his asphalt, and I made personal friends with him to some extent over the years.  He was a person I liked very much, and I feel bad for not staying in more contact with him throughout the years.  On his property, he had a guest house, and he had a tenant in the guest house who was a man around 45 years old.  The man had never been married, and Ken noticed that there was a constant procession of new women continually going to the guest house over the years.  Eventually, Ken told me he sat down with the man and asked him why he could never have a steady relationship. He said that the man told him that he wanted to, but that he kept cheating on his girlfriends.  When Ken asked him why he continued to do this, the man stated that he had learned somewhere along the line that if he did not cheat on the women, they would eventually cheat on him, so he never saw any reason to be faithful.  Ken tried to reason with the man, but the man simply could not bring himself to believe anything different than this. Think about the gravity of this statement and how truly significant it is.  This one belief this man had picked up in the past was preventing him from ever settling down and having a family.  He was essentially dooming himself to a life of short-term relationships and connections with other people due to a belief deep down that no one could be trusted.  We all have beliefs like this, and these beliefs can be guiding our careers for the positive or the negative. A couple of years ago, I purchased a house that did not have any air conditioning or heat in it. I still live in this house today.  The previous owner of the home had been forcibly evicted from it and, for whatever reason, had taken the entire air conditioning and heating system with him.  I am unclear what someone would do with used heaters and air conditioners, but this guy was able to accomplish this.  The situation was even a bit more alarming because the owner of the house left in the middle of the night.  He was being watched and pursued by the Federal Bureau of Investigations and other authorities for stealing $40,000,000 from school teachers and others.  He was eventually arrested in Aspen, Colorado, for various crimes after checking into a hotel under the name “Bryce Pilaf”  (“Rice Pilaf”)–not his real name–and passing numerous bad checks. For several weeks, I lived in this house with no air conditioning or heat.  We had moved in during the Fall and despite the fact that I live in Los Angeles, the nights do get pretty cold.  Showers in the morning were the worst.  While I was enjoying the significant financial savings, my wife was starting to get really upset by this.  Eventually, I got estimates for having the work done.  It was not an inexpensive job.  In fact, I believe it cost about $15,000 to have everything done.  I selected a contractor based on price alone and not anything in particular other than that. For several days, the air conditioning contractor worked on the job with another worker.  The contractor in charge of the job was extremely dramatic about the entire thing. “This is hard work, oh boy!!” he would say every time I saw him running around the house. After he had completed the job, he came to me and presented me a bill for the work he had done.  I owed him around $5,000 because I had given him two progress payments of $5,000 each for the job.  The bill he presented to me was for $10,000. “Clearly, this is not the correct amount,” I told him.  “The balance due is $5,000.” The contractor then puffed his chest out and started telling me how the work was “much harder” than he had originally believed and, due to this, he “deserved” an “extra $5,000″.   Obviously, I did not pay him the extra $5,000.  However, I was absolutely fascinated that this guy thought he could get away with this and proceeded to talk with the contractor about his experience doing this sort of thing.  I got him to “loosen up,” and he told me that he always did this on jobs, and everyone always agreed to pay him more money.  He told me that, in his experience, this “always works”.  He related a belief about his customers that they were basically “evil,” and his job was to take as much money from each person as he possibly could. The man was a complete “scum bag,” but I realized right then and there that somewhere in the past this man had learned that the best way to get ahead was to rip people off like this.  I found the experience extremely informative on several levels.  Here was someone who had learned and came to believe that his customers were there to be stolen from, intimidated, and not served.  He had to take as much money from each person as possible, and he needed to do it unethically and in whatever way he could.  This was this man’s belief about business and how he did his job. I looked this guy up with the State of California a couple of days later and saw that he did not even have a contractor’s license because it had been taken away by the state for this sort of behavior.  What I found so difficult to believe was that this guy’s entire career had been defined by being incredibly dishonest.  The more I had questioned him, the more I realized that this was the only way he knew and understood how to get ahead in his work.  He only knew being dishonest. One of the most destructive things that we all do is that we look at the world in front of us in a way which is defined almost entirely by the past.  We use the past as a guide to what objects, people and circumstances represent in the present.  You do this.  I do this, and everyone around us does this.  The past has an incredibly defining impact on the things that happen to us in the present.  In fact, all of the decisions we are making about our lives and what is going to happen to us in the present are affected by what has happened to us in the past. In the case of this contractor, somewhere deep down he believed that the only way he could get ahead was to be dishonest.  He literally did not know how to be honest in business.  His entire perception of the world was controlled by a belief that it is best to be dishonest.  People seek to control their future by making giant generalizations about the past.  They generalize the way things are going to be by things that happened to them in the past. You need to look very closely at your life and see how your beliefs about the past may be limiting you in the future.  Do not allow the past to limit the opportunities you have today. THE LESSON For most of us, our limited understanding of the past can in turn limit our future opportunities; looking at the future as defined by your past experiences is among the most destructive things that you can do. Instead, look very closely in your life and determine how your past opinions may be limiting your current situation, and change those opinions.

• Do you like your job? Someone probably has a better one.
• Do you like your spouse? Someone has a better one.
• Do you like your house? Someone has a better one.
• Are you happy? Someone is happier.
• Are you successful? Someone is more successful.

This sort of thought process goes on and on and it is addictive. In fact, most people are incredibly addicted to this sort of thought pattern. There is always something better out there and when you start to feel good about whatever you have and whatever you might have achieved, you start comparing one thing to another. In order for us to understand reality, most of us evaluate the things around us relative to other things. We do this for boats, cars, houses and so forth and we also do this for jobs, people, friends and more. We are always comparing and contrasting and it is a vicious cycle that does not let up.  The second you feel good about something in your life, there will always be someone who comes along and contrasts how you feel with someone who has it better. That someone could be you or it could be someone who comes along and pretends they are a friend. In my life, there have always been people around who are happy to contrast what I have done in a negative light. This is upsetting to me because I let these contrasts get to me. I am sure there are people like this in your life as well. There are people around you who will point out contrasts in what you are doing that are not as positive as you might like. This will never make you feel good. Several years ago I was at some sort of self improvement seminar of some sort. There was a girl there who had gone to some Ivy League school I had forgotten and now was an extremely successful banker who had married an equally successful banker. The woman had poise, self confidence and you could tell she was extremely competent and confident in whatever she did. She was perfectly groomed and even her clothing and appearance looked immaculate. We were all sitting in a circle at this retreat and the woman had lost her composure and was crying hysterically. She was having a complete meltdown and practically shaking. The person leading this group did not know what was wrong and asked her several questions before it finally came out that she did not feel her father loved her. The reason? She felt that she was never good enough. Despite the fact that she got almost perfect grades all through high school, he never complimented her. If she got one “A-” he would ask her what happened and why she did not get a better grade. He would go on and on about the “A-” and tell her to do better next time. The idea I got from this was that the girl felt she could never do well enough because the comparison her father had set up for her was perfection. There is no such thing as perfection. In order to be happy in your life and career one of the most important things you can do is realize that some of the contrasts you are setting up are not healthy or productive. You can choose contrasts that make you feel nice (such as where you were before you improved) or contrasts that will make you miserable (contrasts of people, places and things that are better than where you are right now). The more I thought about this stupid ship the more I realized that I had fallen into the trap of contrasts. We all do this and it affects all of our lives. Many, many people spend their entire lives chasing a barometer of happiness that cannot be met because it contrasts with something unobtainable. I hear about illnesses, lost jobs, failures, tragedies and so forth on an ongoing basis. Many times I hear about these things when I am in a large group of people. You can tell a lot about people when they hear bad news in a group of people. I love looking around the room at the group when bad news is being delivered because I frequently will see the majority of people in the room smile—even if the smile is just a quick tick of the face upward. Why do so many people relish bad news about other people? The answer to this is simple: They are caught in the game of contrasts and they believe that if someone else they know is having problems, then their lives are somehow better in contrast. I also like watching people in groups when good news is delivered about someone people in the group know. Just as certain people will smile when bad news is delivered, the same people will frown—even if imperceptible—when good news is delivered. You can tell so much about people from these reactions. What you can tell is that they are caught in the game of contrasts and that these contrasts are driving their feelings about themselves. People whose opinions about themselves are formed based on how others are doing are in a bad trap. They have put their happiness in life in the hands of others. If your own happiness is dependent on how others are faring you are making a giant mistake. You should be comparing yourself to how you are doing and not how others are doing. Compare yourself to where you were in the past to measure your growth and happiness—not to where others are. THE LESSON People who form their opinions of themselves based of how others are doing fall into a dangerous trap; do not base your own happiness on how others are faring. Compare yourself to your own past performance rather than that of others to measure your growth and happiness. The process of comparing oneself to others is addictive, and you must free yourself from such unhealthy contrasts in order to find true happiness.

• When you focus on getting an offer, instead of not getting an offer, the offer is more likely to come to you.
• When you focus on not getting laid off, as opposed to being laid off, you are more likely to not get laid off.
• When you focused on getting a promotion, as opposed to not getting a promotion, you are more likely to get a promotion.
• When you focus on getting along with people, as opposed to not getting along with people, you are more likely to get along with people.
• When you focus on prosperity instead of the lack of, you are more likely to be wealthy.
• When you focus on being happy as opposed to being sad, you are more likely to be happy.
• When you focus on being talented rather than average, you are more likely to be talented.
• When you focus on being interesting rather than boring, you are more likely to be interesting.
• When you focus on being a hard worker as opposed to being an average worker, you are more likely to be a hard worker.

Whatever your focus on is most often the direction you are going to go in.  This is just how it works and how it has always worked. If you wanted to feel bad right now how would you do it?

• The first thing you could do is start thinking about all of the funerals you have been to of close people.  Then you could think about all of the bad relationships you have been in.
• Then you could think about all of the bad things people have said about you in the past.
• Then you could think about the biggest failures you have had in your life.
• Then you could think about how you are not that successful if you wanted to, as well.

This would make you feel really lousy, right?  I am sure it would. It would be a real ball of laughs!  What do you think your mental state would be like after an hour or so of this?  Do you think you would be able to accomplish a lot due to these thoughts?  Do you think it would be fun having these thoughts?  Give me a break!  This would be a complete nightmare. But this is what a lot of people do with their lives.  They focus on the negative, they focus on where they do not want to go and this is exactly where they end up going.  This is so stupid! This is something we all do, however.  You may be among people who concentrate their thoughts on negative stuff like this.  A good part of the world does this all day long and every day. I am sure you know a lot of people yourself who concentrate their thoughts like this.  What a bunch of bologna! If you wanted to feel good right now, you could do the following:

• You could think about your greatest successes.
• You could think about all of the good things people have said about you in the past.
• You could think about all of the people who love you and you love.
• You could think about what you are grateful for.
• You could think about the future you are dreaming about for yourself.
• You could think about all of the good decisions you have made in your life.

Now that’s what I am talking about!  If you focus on the positive and things that empower you, that is exactly where you are going to go! I am about to describe two types of people to you. I am sure you too know these two types of people because they are everywhere around us. First, there are people who tend to look at every situation in a positive way.  They look at people and assume they have a positive intention.  They look at the world and see a happy and exciting place.  They are, in a word, happy people.  When you are around people like this, your experience of the world tends to be pretty good as well.  It is enjoyable being around those who are happy with the world and whose focus is on positive things. When you see the world in this vein, you tend to feel less threatened and overall much better about everything that is going on around you. Second, there are people who tend to focus on the negative.  They focus on how this or that is impossible or very difficult. They focus on how people are mean and out to get them.  They focus on negative things that people have said.  They look at the world as evil and they are suspicious about the world and what is going on around them.  When you see the world like this, and spend time with these sorts of people, you tend not to feel that great about anything.  Your experience of the world tends to be pretty bleak. The sort of focus that has gotten you to where you are today is not going to be the same focus that gets you to where you may want to be tomorrow, next week, or next year.  Changing your focus cannot happen overnight and instantly.  It is like anything–you need to take small steps to get more cumulative changes made over time.  However, if you change your focus, you are going to change the direction your life is headed. This is just how it works.  Remember that where you focus is where you are going to go.  Focus is what empowers you and gives you and your career power and not what hurts you. THE LESSON Many people mistakenly focus their energy on things that they want to avoid, rather than the things they wish to achieve. Your focus ultimately determines where you will go in life and what will happen to you. The best way to move ahead in life, therefore, is to focus on your goals rather than the obstacles to them and the risks along the way. You need to take small, consistent steps toward changing your focus, and understand that it will not change overnight. Once you do change your focus, however, you will be able to chance the direction and momentum of your career for the better.

He who conquers the mind, conquers the world.    -Guru Nanak Dev

In today’s economy, a lot of people are losing their jobs.  People are being fired and let go from companies at an alarming rate.  There is a huge sense of betrayal people feel when they lose a job.  People are incredibly angry at their employers and often life itself.  There is also a tendency for people who feel they have been wronged to want to “lash out” at their employers who have fired them.  Many of these people become angry, not just at the employer where they have lost their job, but at all employers.  They take on a vengeful attitude towards the world. A couple of years ago, I hired a guy who was very talented and had been fired from his last job.  He had a home and a family and came in and interviewed with our company, and I ended up offering him the job.  His work was not that great but he did good enough work that he was not in danger of losing his job.  I had cordial relations with him and said hello to him when I saw him in the office. No one ever said anything mean to him, and no one was ever critical of him.  He was paid a good wage and was doing just fine in his job. I had heard from some other people that were friendly with him that he had been fired from his job in a manner that was probably unfair.  He had upset the wrong person inside his company and one day someone appeared at his office door and told him he was fired and had to leave immediately.  The man was very angry.  I am sure this was difficult for him. One day, he came into my office and fired me. “I am leaving tomorrow, I have another job,” he told me.  He seemed to be relishing putting me in a bind like this.  Most employees give at least some notice, but this guy was just walking out of the job.  I was fine with that; however, he was in the middle of a huge project. “I will finish it over the week weekend if you pay me for two days,” he said. So we paid him his final check and it contained two extra days of salary.  He did not do the work over the weekend.  We called him and emailed him about it constantly, and he finally replied a week or so later: “Sorry guys.  I am too busy in my new job to get this done.  Good luck to you guys!!” I was astonished by this but let it go.  We could have pursued the money and won, but for whatever reason, this guy had some anger he was acting out against us.  A couple of weeks later, we hired his replacement.  The replacement showed up to work, and we realized that the computer the guy who quit had been using had all sorts of passwords on it that made the files inaccessible.  I was a little upset about this because the computer he was using was a $6,000 computer. We called him at work and asked him for the passwords.  He refused to give us the passwords and told us he forgot them.  I was amazed and sat down for a few minutes pondering this situation.  Then I called him on the phone: “If you do not email me the passwords in the next 20 minutes” I told him, “My next call is going to be to your boss.  I am going to tell him about how you stole two days worth of pay from us and also about how you are refusing to give us the passwords.  I am not sure what your problem is because we have been very nice to you.  You have some anger you need to work through, but we are an inappropriate target for this.” A few minutes later the passwords arrived. Four or five months later, this guy used me as a reference for a job and I got a call from an employer.  He had apparently lost his last job.  Then a few months ago, I got another call from an employer where he had used me as a reference.  I cannot imagine why I would be listed as a reference after this.  This guy was very angry at the world, and this anger was playing itself out like a cancer through his career.  I feel sorry for him despite what he has done to me. Do you have anger and vengeance in your career?  Is anger and vengeance playing a part in your career and life at the moment?  If it is, you need to step back and take a quick inventory because this is something that is incredibly harmful and can really hurt you quite badly. I remember speaking with my wife about a year or so ago, and we were talking about the people who are the best hires.  One of our recruiters at one of our companies, BCG Attorney Search, has been recruiting for about 40 years and once told me “never hire someone who has been fired from their last job.”  He told me that these people are usually “pissed off” and they take it out on their next employer.  There is a lot of truth to this.  If someone hurts us, we want to hurt someone back.  We look for the closest related target, and that is usually the next person who is our employer. As you surely have as well, I have been hurt by many people in the past. I have been hurt by lovers, employees and friends.  I have also done my share of hurting other people.  Deep down, I have a lot of pain for both being hurt and the hurt I have caused others:

• I have allowed women to fall in love with me, even though I did not want a future with them and kept the relationship going longer than I should have.
• I have let employees go who were good people when a given business could not support them economically.
• I have not returned phone calls or responded to emails from people who were reaching out to me.

Similarly, all of this sort of stuff has been done to me as well. A few weeks ago, I was at a retreat called the “Man Kind Project,” and someone got up and started talking about how most men are “full of shit” and never tell the truth.  They are not honest with others and also not honest with themselves.  This was explained in an incredibly effective way and, after the speech about this, many of the men in the audience were quite moved.  They said hearing this was transformative.  Not being honest with ourselves and the people around us is something many of us do.  More than this, when we are dishonest with ourselves, we are seeing the world in a way that it does not really exist. Over the past several years, I have employed several hundred people in one capacity or another.  Every so often, someone turns out to be a “bad person” and has interests that lie in things like stealing or being dishonest.  These people are, of course, always fired from the company, but an interesting thing always happens with these people.  I always hear from them again–even after several years. And when I hear from them, they are usually coming back to attack me and even the score.  This is something we are all doing.  We look around at the world with anger and are looking to even the score in some way.  It is like this with careers. It is paradoxical that they want to even the score with me since they have harmed me (or my company) in the first place, but this is how many of our minds work. Every thought you have brings either happiness or sadness, love or hate, peace or war, vengeance or acceptance.  There is no such thing, for example, as a neutral thought.  Every thought we have is something that is bringing us closer to something positive or something negative.  The battle for the control and direction of your mind is a massive and incredibly important undertaking, and it is one you are responsible for.  Most of us never learn how to control our thoughts and the direction they can take us in.  However, the power of our thoughts is something that is incredibly transformative, not just our consciousness but our life.   The more we control our thoughts and put them in a positive direction, the better we can do.  Pushing your mind in a negative direction that is based on vengeance, anger and so forth does no good.  You should be pushing your mind towards something positive. Everything we see is the result of our thoughts. Thoughts are something that shape everything around us and our entire world.  True thoughts create their own reality and false thoughts create their own reality, as well.  This is one reason it is so important that we are constantly guarding our mind against negative thoughts in the world.  We see in others the worst in ourselves. When you try and stand up for something, people are always going to come back at you to try to even the score–even after several years.  Even when you are right about something.  This is one reason you need to be very careful about what you want to stand for.  The more you stand for something, the more you are likely to be attacked. When I was in high school and college, I never smoked marijuana. I was very against this.  The reason was mainly due to the fact that I had seen some kids I know change completely when they started smoking the stuff.  Their minds literally turned to mush, and it seemed that all they could say were words like “dude” and so forth.  Their grades cratered, and it really messed them up.  This is not to say that this happens to everyone who uses marijuana, but it happens to some people.  Many people can be incredibly productive despite smoking marijuana daily.  Nevertheless, I took a stand against the drug. What ended up happening is that the people who used the drug and knew I was against it, started finding fault with me.  I stopped being invited to parties where people were smoking marijuana.  My friends who smoked marijuana stopped wanting to hang around me when they went out and smoked marijuana.  Taking a stand always creates a reaction. A few days ago, I was at a conference walking down a hallway in Atlanta and my cell phone rang. I picked it up, and it was someone who had worked with our company several years ago.  While I do not want to get into too many specifics, this person did some bad things to me and the company:

• Before losing his job, he had gone through various databases and deleted numerous records of our clients.
• This person had told at least one person he had stolen hundreds of thousands of dollars from our company while employed with us by billing people for work our company did in such a way that he got paid directly and not our company.
• Using our records that he had stolen and deleted, he went out and started a business in the exact same field that we had trained him in (after pretending to me that money could not be made in the field)–because he was using the business’ resources and then sending people bills independently.

There were a ton of warning signs I should have seen before I even hired this person:

• This person had been someone I had hired after he had been fired from a law firm after only working there a few months.  I felt sorry for him and felt, at the time, felt there was some sort of injustice that must have been done to him.
• Then he got to our company and could not get along with others.  The problem got so bad others refused to work in the same building as him.
• I then tried to allow the person to run his own business in our company.  This, of course, did not work either and it was one of the biggest business mistakes I ever made.

I am not angry about any of this because I made a massive mistake in my character judgment and others had as well.  There are some people out there who just do stuff like this and always will.  My lesson is just to stay away from them and avoid them at all costs. When the phone rang and I heard the person’s voice, however, I knew it would be some sort of attack and attempt to “even the score”–no matter how trivial the matter.  People that wrong you mercilessly and with no reason are generally looking for some sort of justification for doing so and will keep looking for reasons until they find them. They want you to deserve it, and they want to feel like they have done the right thing in hurting you. The psychology that lies behind this sort of individual is something I have seen time and time again.  Over the next several minutes, the person proceeded to tell me that I had a very similar picture on one of our corporate websites that they had on some website they had launched three weeks ago.  They accused me of copying the picture.  When I looked into the matter, I discovered that not only were the pictures different, but we had our website page built over a year before this person even launched their website.  Not only that, but the pictures were completely different.  The absurdity of this was magnified by the fact that this person had a tiny little site that was not even averaging 50 visitors a day.  I operate one of the larger career companies in the world, and our sites typically average millions of visitors a month. This person was out there in the world looking for any possible reason to attack me because he was looking to even the score and looking for some sort of justification for what he had done.  The person sees the world in terms of evil and bad will.  The reason he thinks this way, I think, is because he has bad will.  When you see things in a negative manner, you will spread bad will. When I was in college, I had a very nice girlfriend.  The only problem was that when I got to law school in Virginia, several of my fraternity brothers called me and told me she was dating another man in Chicago as well as dating me.  Unfortunately, this was not something I was aware of.  We probably would have ended up getting married at some point had I not learned about this sooner.  It was a devastating experience; however, I am glad it happened then rather than when I was married.  I was very upset and over the course of a very animated phone call, I ended the relationship. It was a very difficult time. I am sure she was upset, as well.  We became friends of sorts and she would check in with me every three to six months, but I knew the relationship would never go anywhere again because of the fact of what she had done.  Thinking back on this, I feel sort of sorry for her and I am not sure why. I have compassion for her despite what she did to me. Around 8 years later, I was married and living in Los Angeles.  I was operating a legal career company that was doing well.  I was sitting in my home reading a book one evening.  The night before, I had a large party with all of my employees, their families and probably around 100 other people.  During the party, I had spent a couple of hours speaking to a very talented girl who had gone to Harvard Law School and worked in a couple of excellent law firms.  I thought she showed a lot of potential and was hoping that she would come to work for one of my companies.  I was in “recruiting mode” and was recruiting her for one of my companies.  Also at the party was a relative of someone who knew my college girlfriend. I did not speak to them much at the party, but exchanged a few pleasantries. “I know you are cheating on your wife and having an affair!” my ex-college girlfriend said when I picked up the phone. “Excuse me?” “I know you are cheating on your wife!” She then slammed down the phone.  Since I was not cheating on my wife, the only thing I can figure is that her friend who was at my party must have reported that my chat with the girl at the party amounted to something more than it was. I had no telephone number to call my ex-girlfriend back at.  That was the last I have heard from her–ever.  It is the strangest thing.   But this is the sort of pattern I have seen numerous times.  She somehow was justifying her past actions based on reading something into a conversation I had at a party eight years later! She had evened the score in her own mind, I suppose.  However, what good did this do her-sitting around for eight years looking to even the score?  In addition, she was so eager to even the score she was using information that was not even correct. You need to realize that it does you no good in your career and life to try to even the score.  When you are trying to even the score, you are in a state where nothing good can come of it.  Trying to prove something to your next employer due to the way you want to perceive the world is not worth it.  You do not want to let your mind be transfixed on negative and destructive thoughts.  Think about what is positive. Losing a job, being betrayed, being stolen from, and more are all horrible things to happen to us.  The worst thing you can do, however, is allow this to occupy your mind and look to put your anger, sadness and so forth on another.  Let the pain go through you and move on. THE LESSON Every thought you have ultimately brings you closer to something positive or negative; you must therefore learn to control your thoughts, and direct them towards something positive. Negative experiences happen to all of us, but the worst thing you can do is let these things control your mentality instead of moving on.

1. We need to purchase something
2. We need to get a particular type of job
3. We need to receive a particular acknowledgement
4. Someone needs to do something for us
5. We need to get promoted

The idea with all of these things is that something outside of us needs to happen in order for us to be happy.  The fallacy of this thinking is that nothing is ever good enough.  There will always be a better job, something else which can be purchased and something else outside of us that can happen in order for us to experience happiness.  I have no doubt that much of our thinking in this world is driven by the fact we are in a consumer society and as part of this society we are constantly bombarded with advertisements that link up the purchase of a particular good or service to being happy.  That is why, for example, in the heart of consumerism in an area like New York City the idea that something outside of us can make us happy is even more pronounced. The most amazing place to me in the world is Thailand.  If you have never been there, you need to go.  I spent some time attending high school there and the experience of living with the Thais changed my life.  The people there are extremely happy and despite massive western influence have largely stayed removed from a psychology which requires external events to occur in order for them to be happy.  The last time I was in Thailand my wife and I met a man who stated he goes there at least twice a year because it is the only place in the world where people are happy all the time.  He feels good there because people do not think about happiness the same way.  The thinking of the people of Thailand is that happiness comes from the inside and not the outside. When you watch a baby you can see the baby be happy about an incredible number of things.  They can laugh at a light bulb on the ceiling.  They will smile for the most trivial reasons.  When you watch a baby being happy what comes to mind is that we are born happy.  Happiness is on the inside.  Happiness is something we are born with. Back on the street of New York people are rushing too and fro and the thought that occurs to me is that people are working so hard and living these lives because their ultimate goal is really to be happy.  They believe that if something occurs they will be happy.  This is such a Faustian bargain and it makes no sense.  People are doing all of this and working so hard because they believe that if they do they will be happy.  When you think of someone walking down the street singing a song because they are so happy, the image is typically not of someone in New York.  The image is most likely of someone in the country where there is no one around to judge, evaluate and tell the person they should not be happy.  You need to be happy regardless of what is going on outside of you.  We are seduced by the outside world into definitions of happiness that require various external things to occur before we can be happy.  Happiness is inside of you and never requires any sort of external intervention. The reason I am focusing so much on your happiness is because the happier you are the better job you will get and the better you will do in your career.  Your happiness will guide the course of your life.  When you are happy you perform better at your job.  When you are happy all the time people want to be around you.  When you are happy good things happen to you and continue happening to you.  Most of all, the best way for you to be happy is to stop focusing on externalities and realize that happiness is already inside of you right now. You do not need any rules of what must and must not happen for you to be happy. You can just be happy.  You need to realize that what is already inside of you will give you joy if you allow it.  You need to set up rules which allow you to be happy for no reason at all–just because you are happy. Another important way to insure you are constantly happy is to change your focus. I am amazed when I go into different companies and meet people.  I can always get a very good sense of what the people are like and what the company is like by speaking with the people.  In some companies the second you get there the people are talking about how exciting this or that is and what a great place the world is and how much opportunity there is. In other companies the people will be talking about how awful the world is, how tough the economy is and more.  Most of this thinking occurs and is prevalent in these companies regardless of the state of the economy.  When the economy is good the people focus on the bad and when the economy is bad the people focus on the bad as well. This sort of negative thinking is very destructive.  People feel what they focus on and a negative focus is self reinforcing and continues to make things worse and worse. Focus is one of the most important skills you can learn. Refusing to be negative is a skill that really can help you accomplish a great deal in your life and career. Right now you can start thinking about who has wronged you in the past and get angry.  You can focus right now on jobs you have lost and get angry. You can focus on people in your life you were close to that died and feel incredibly sad.  You can continue focusing on negative things forever if you like (which many people do) and will continue to feel absolutely dreadful about your life. You can share your negativity with everyone you meet and insure that you spread this negativity everywhere.  This is what a lot of people enjoy doing.  They focus on the negative. Refuse to focus on the negative. When you look at the world around you there are many choices you need to make.  For example, if someone is rude to you one option you have is to be rude back.  Another option is to empathize with them and see if there is anything you can do to brighten their day and make them feel better.  You need to choose meaning which support you and make you continually feel good.  Nothing in your world and life has any meaning except for the meaning you give it.  One thing I have noticed about the unhappy people and the most unproductive organizations is that they are constantly judging and putting a negative spin on people and events around them.  They decide to interpret things in a negative way and this ends up doing them a massive disservice. When you think about all of the famous people in history who have died despite being incredibly gifted but have taken their lives with drugs it makes no sense.  All of the overdoses and issues of rock stars and other entertainers are nonsensical. Some of the most talented people in the world have used drugs like this to excess, most likely because they felt stressed and upset by the world around them.  They wanted to feel good.  Managing how you feel about yourself and your life is probably the greatest skill you can have.  You need to feel good about yourself and how you feel about yourself is most often determined by the meanings you give to circumstances and the world around you.  The most important thing you can do with your life is to choose meanings that are empowering you. One of the reasons I think that so many people get into so much trouble when they get famous is that they are suddenly surrounded by people who are even more famous and talented than they.  They look at these people and they start comparing themselves with other people.  Because they make happiness external, they start not feeling as good about themselves due to the fact that someone is better than they are in one way or another.  One of the ways that we look at the world and interpret the world is through contrasting ourselves with others.  For example, I run a group of career sites that I believe are the best at what they do in the world. I feel very good about the power of EmploymentCrossing and how good it is in terms of getting people jobs.  However, if I decided that the measure of my success was whether or not this site had as many users as a free site like Monster, I probably would never feel that good about myself and my business.  The reason I would not feel good is because I would be measuring my success and ability to feel good by something external. I made this mistake growing up. I grew up in a very wealthy neighborhood with parents who were not well off.  Since the people around me were making such a big deal about cars, homes, vacations, clothes and so forth (none of which I had at the same level), I decided that I should feel bad about myself.  This is a crazy reaction.  A choice I could have made was that I should feel happy that I am being exposed to this and glad my parents are able to afford for me to be in an environment where I can associate with these sorts of people.  Instead, however, I chose the negative interpretation. I think this is how many of us run our lives.  We so often use contrasts to make ourselves feel badly instead of to make ourselves feel good.  You need to use contrasts to make yourself feel good and not bad.  Contrast is one of the most important tools you can possibly use in your psyche and it will change your life. One of the largest obstacles to our true happiness is not just the contrasts we make it is the rules we make for when we can be happy. I remember one time I was on my way to visit a relative with my mom and I had on a shirt that I thought was alright and a sport jacket. I was probably 25 at the time.  My mom started getting all agitated in the car and was very unhappy and angry with me.  She wanted me to stop at a store and purchase a new jacket, slacks and shirt.  The whole thing seemed very strange to me. “You need to look ‘crisp’ and if you do not these people will not respect you. Your clothes have too many wrinkles.  You need to be ‘crisp’,” she said. Somewhere along the line she had picked up a rule about the importance of being “crisp” that led her to believe that wrinkles were a massive sort of sin.  Perhaps she was right, but if she did not have this rule she would have had a much better time that day and so would have I.  Many of us have rules about the way things need to be that prevent us from being happy.  We want things to be a certain way before we will allow ourselves to be happy.  We decide that to be happy we must be rich, lose 10 pounds, have a certain mate, or drive a certain type of car.  We allow ourselves to be paralyzed by rules that are difficult if not impossible for us to ever meet and this prevents us from ever being happy.  So many people out there are paralyzed by rules like this.  Relaxing these rules would change their lives forever. I would challenge you to stop externalizing your happiness with rules, conditions and more that will continually make you unhappy.  Instead, you need to adopt a belief for your life and career that defines success as simply being happy and failure as not being happy.  While we all have our ups and downs in life, the most important thing that you can do is to be happy.  When you are happy your career and life will change as you know it.  More happy people will start coming into your life and you will attract the energy of good opportunities and other happy people.  Your life is too important not to be happy.  Change your mind and you will change your life. THE LESSON Your life’s ultimate goal is happiness; your drive for happiness guides the course of your life, and you need to be happy regardless of the external circumstances in your life. The happier you are, the better jobs you will get and the more successful you will be in your career.  In order to achieve happiness, turn away from externalities and instead focus on the happiness that is already inside of you. Your life is too important to be unhappy.