Your Name Here

This week I learned the importance and benefit of committing to memory the names of new acquaintances.  The beginning on a new school year is perfect for this.  Everyone is scrambling to make new friends and find study partners.  There is always someone in the immediate vicinity willing to talk your ear off for a couple of minutes (...or 30).  This week I made a goal to remember at least 3 names from all the different people I was meeting, and be able to remember and use their name the next time I saw them.  

Okay, so 3 names doesn't seem like a lot to remember, but it was a stretch for me.  It made all the difference in my conversations with these people, and I never would have guessed the effect it had on the way these people subsequently interacted with me!  I am so much better friends already with these 3 people than with the other people I talked to but didn't remember their names.  People appreciate being called by their first name and will react positively to that.  

The results I've been seeing have encouraged me to continue to work on remembering the names of new people I meet.  I mean, who doesn't want a lot of new potential friends:)?  I don't know how many names I can remember at a time, but I'm going to keep remembering at least 3 a week.  I might not continue to see as drastic results as I have been seeing lately, but all throughout life, and especially in the business world, remembering names and being more personable with those I interact with will be a very meaningful skill.  

This is Why I Hate Texting

Phones are great, don't get me wrong.  I can update my family from wherever they are in the country, I can connect with people that are all around the world, and I can play awesome games when I get bored in class
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But I am the worst texter.  For some reason there's a disconnect between the moment when I get a text and the subsequent moment that I reply.  It's always a couple of days in between and a half-hearted rely.  I'm trying to do better.  I know.

Last night I was trying to work on the whole 'you text me and then I text you right back' conversation with my friend and I was feeling pretty good about my phenomenally fast reply time.  I was getting the hang of it!  But then, the conversation took a turn that I was not expecting when my friend became really defensive about something I had replied about.

What had I said?  I had no idea it was going to be interpreted that way, that I would get that kind of reaction!  It took the rest of the night (and a phone call) to fix what I had said, explaining my thought process behind that specific reply and figuring out a more purposeful way to communicate my thoughts to this friend.

I took a lot from that.  Besides feeling justified now for not being the greatest texter (I'm thinking now it's a great way to avoid future situations like this...), I thought a lot about the importance of saying and communicating with purpose each thing that comes out of my mouth.  If I can remember that, things I say to people will be more tactful, meaningful, and will better add to the conversation.

With that said, I want to better think about things before I say them.  I will process what I am going to say first instead of blurting out my first reaction or thought.  It seems like an obvious thing to do when conversing, but it's easy for me to slip into an autopilot-like mode and not invest as much as I should in what I say.

#challengeaccepted

I don't want to be that 'always happy, all the time' kind of person

After a suggestion from a friend, I started off the fall semester with a Positive Living class.  She raved about the curriculum, the teacher, and the better outlook on life it gave her.  I walked into class that Monday morning tired and not wanting to engage in the boisterous conversations of all those around me.  My attitude- I don't need a class to tell me I can be a happy person, but I do need the 2 credits.

I was taken aback when our teacher stood up and said we would be exploring the opposites of happiness (anger, depression, complacency) in order to understand what it means to have 'happiness.'  He said that happiness is not the absence of being sad.  It's ambiguous.  To me, his comments made the concept of "living positively" more achievable and real to life.

Our first reading assignment was an article from 2 years ago that explored factors that contribute to a person's well being.  They polled if men were happier that women, if rich people felt better than poor people, and even if people became happier as they aged.  None of those factors, they said, made a difference.  People across every spectrum reported similar levels of happiness.

Their conclusion was that there are 4 things that are likely to make a person happier- extroversion, optimism, self-esteem, and a sense of self control.

To me, that was motivating.  To me, it meant that I didn't need to be like the loud, over-the-top cheerful people I was surrounded by in class in order to prove I am happy.  To me, happiness means being real, but positive.

I'm an extrovert by nature.  I have enough self-esteem to help the impoverished continent of Africa.  But I want to gain a more natural sense of self control.  That means I don't say the first things to pop into my mind during every conversation I have.  A more natural sense of self control mean that I will not get on Facebook every time I want to stop doing my homework (which is usually just about every 15 minutes...).  I genuinely feel that these things will make me have more self control.  Doing these things will make me happier.

I'm thinking this class have more to offer than overly enthusiastic people and 2 college credits.