With the release of “A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood” this past November, I have fully jumped on the Mister Rogers bandwagon. Or shall we say, “neighborhood trolley.” Even though “Mister Rogers Neighborhood” was on air for all of my childhood, my puppets of choice at the time went by names like “Cookie Monster” and
One of the ironies of being human is that it can sometimes be hard just to be your authentic self. And no one knows that more than a middle schooler. I see my sons facing these pressures every day. Like when I recently drove one son to a tennis match with his doubles partner —
Imagine you’re out with a group of friends. How much thought are you giving to how you’re being perceived? Consider a work meeting. How often are you thinking about what people think about you? How much are you evaluating your own behaviors? Those are questions psychology expert and professor Mark Snyder has studied for three
Megan Tamte is comfortable being vulnerable. She allows people to see her for who she really is—even when it’s messy. For the founder of the fast-growing women’s retailer Evereve, it’s something that goes back to the styling floor of her first store, in Edina, Minnesota, where Megan remembers facing “uncomfortable and awkward situations all the
In 2008, my good friend Jeff Dykstra* faced significant fear of the unknown. He’d already taken a huge risk leaving the private sector and moving his entire family to Lusaka, Zambia, in 2006 with World Vision. Now, he was only a few months away from finishing his commitment in Africa. His next career move weighed
(Guest post from my good friend Isaac Vogel) Do you ever find yourself wanting to find personal freedom from the pressures and challenges of life but don’t know where to go? This past fall, our family made the pilgrimage west to South Dakota, aptly dubbed a state of “Great Faces, Great Places” in homage, of
What’s something you need in order to feel OK? What keeps you balanced? Is it approval from others? Your health? Productivity? Being organized? Being right? Winning? Financial security? All of these can be good things. But because you need that thing to stay balanced, you’ll run into a problem when someone starts to pull it
Ever since I wrote about courage, I continue to see examples of how confidence determines your willingness to do difficult things. Confidence allows you to say “yes” to a good but hard thing or “no” to something bad yet alluring. It’s trust in yourself — your values, self-image, and capacity. I’ve especially been noticing it
It seems hard to believe now, considering more than 367,000 people work for his company and its subsidiaries, but for years, this man had arranged his life around his fear. Fear had limited him in his leadership and in his ability to connect with others. But he had the courage to overcome that fear. In
I’m speed-walking through the airport, on the phone with my Dad, when he suggests I look up one of his friends in my destination city. That’s awkward. I’ve never heard of this guy and he’s not my contemporary. But I went ahead and googled the guy and invited him to lunch. I drove my rental
Matt Norman is president of Norman & Associates, which offers Dale Carnegie Training in the North Central US. Dale Carnegie Training is a global organization ...READ MORE