The American Dream: Hummingbirds or Eagles

I see it all the time now.  The hummingbird effect.  Hummingbirds flap their wings up to 70 times per second to stay in the air.  70 times a second.  Whew!  Eagles on the other hand don’t flap much at all, yet they can fly up to 80 miles in an hour.  Their secret is they surf the wind.  They catch currents and thermals and just zoom.  We’ve become a nation of hummingbirds.  It’s what happens when stress overwhelms us.

We now know a lot about the physical, emotional, mental circus that noisily plays inside us when we are under constant, unrelenting stress.  We either start flapping our wings frantically like a humming bird trapped in a glass room smashing ourselves against windows that look like a way out but aren’t, or hide in our nest.  Unending stress makes us feel powerless.  At first this makes us angry, then sad, and ultimately hopeless.  Desolate.

This is what I see in America’s workplace.  Frantic wing-flapping or hopeless disengagement.  This recession has, to use a phrase of my mother’s, knocked the stuffing out of us.  Let’s face it.  The last ten years have been a whopper.  8 million of us lost our jobs and many of those jobs are permanently gone.  We’ve been rocked by the dot-com bust, Enron, World Com, subprime defaults, foreclosures, Wall Street casino games and oil spills.  The suffering of 9/11 has become a never-ending ache of Iraq and Afghanistan.  And all of this is being narrated by an apocalyptic media who merchandise fear, anger and despair like 31 flavors of imminent personal catastrophe.

All of this might be livable if we simply shut off the noise, but the biggest stress has seeped under our doors like toxic smoke.  It’s the sinking fear of economic starvation that drives our work life.  All of us know people who have lost their jobs and haven’t found a new one.  All of us know people who have been forced to move in with others.  Most of us still juggle debt we thought we could handle.  And many of us work for companies, even good companies, that have laid off too many people and pushed the extra work around the way a farmer spreads manure over a garden patch.

Layoffs and trying to bloom through a new layer of fertilizer has happened many times before.  But not like this.  The economists who track the numbers say the past two year’s rise in worker productivity is the greatest in history.  But worker productivity is basically a measure of revenue divided by worker pay.  Thus if managers can fire workers faster than sales decline, productivity magically goes up.  Profits too, at least temporarily.   But real life is not found in spreadsheets.  And in real life all I see is hummingbirds.  People flapping their wings to the point of exhaustion.  Literally.

Last month, a sweet woman who recently found a new job told me that in her previous job at a large company a close colleague was so stressed out over wave after wave of layoffs that she began to suffer form fainting spells and heart palpitations.  This is what happens when our hormones trigger biological responses that constrict our blood vessels.  She refused to take time off or go to the doctor because she feared she would be singled out as a weakling or worse a health care risk.  Her husband had already been laid off so her fear was not unwarranted.  One morning she started to have a panic attack.  She refused to let her friend call 911, said she would be fine and would go lay down in an empty office.  Her friend called the sick woman’s husband and then went down to the darkened office.  She was dead.  A heart attack had stolen her life.  Sadly, I am not making this up.  Are we really working ourselves to death?

This is more than sad.  It’s tragic.  And it’s driven by, as Einstein said, counting the wrong things and not counting the things that should be counted.  Firing people and forcing the survivors to do more work is not leadership.  It doesn’t create more value.  Value is created when we innovate and invent.  These are creative acts that arise in positive work environments where the rhythm of human life is respected.  The invisible air currents that help us soar at unthinkable heights are not sensed when we are madly flapping.  Those opportunities only come when people have the calm to see what was previously invisible.  Work environments that create conditions for human innovation or extraordinary value are drying up, so we must create them ourselves.

The original American Dream was driven by the ideal of self-sufficiency.  Brave nation builders came to our country willing to clear a field of rocks and stumps so they could plant.  Today our farms are our minds.  It is over-time to take the rocks out of our heads and plant for a more secure, self-determined personal economic life.  We must learn how to become extraordinary at what we are passionate for.  We must learn to be economically literate and create a sustainable lifestyle.  We must find time to rest our wings and find ways to soar.  It’s possible.

Last evening we were walking through our neighborhood and ran into Jake.  He’s a young-in-his-30’s, constantly smiling, life-loving, neighbor who we originally met when he was waiting tables at a local pizza place.  He learned to use a video camera making movies of local skateboarders.  He talked himself into a local skateboard manufacturer as their performance team manager and videographer.  The company has exploded with growth (Who would have thought?) and Jake told us he was on his way to Europe for a month, Austria, Germany, Switzerland and Italy, to compete as a member of their high-speed downhill demonstration team.  I know…Jake is an example of a guy who lives near the beach in one of the most ideal communities in the world getting paid to ride and film skateboarding around the world.  It may not be your dream.  But it is his.  Jake will not die in an empty office.  And neither should you.

What’s the best thing you can do?  Don’t leap.  Wisely plan to take control of your economic future.  Choose, adapt, live.  Really live.  This week we celebrate our independence.  Be  sure to celebrate yours!

Building Trust in an Age of Distrust

We swim in a sea of cynicism.  We wonder if anything is what it appears to be.  Everyone seems to be trying to talk you and me into believing his or her promise.  It seems that everyone has an idea about how to make our lives better.  They promise if we believe what they believe, vote for who they vote for, buy what they buy, we will be happy.  Tens of billions of dollars and a gazillion work hours are spent coming up with ways for someone to get their ideas in our minds, their brand in our hearts and their hands on our wallets.  All of these relentless sophisticated attempts to persuade us to do what they want us to adds to our exhausting way of life.  It’s stressful defending ourselves against all these unwanted attacks on our attention.  That’s why connecting with people who have no agenda for us other than helping us get clear on what we want is like breathing oxygen in an otherwise toxic smog of mass manipulation.  And it’s the pure oxygen of mutual service that human beings long for in all relationships whether it’s a marriage, a parent-child or a 10-minute relationship with a customer.

Years ago when I was helping Stephen Covey build our leadership practice I did most of the selling.  He told me, “Don’t sell; just seek to understand and help them find a path to get what they really want.”  So I’ve spent the better part of my professional life studying how to coach people to make their best choices.  It’s called motivation theory, and it’s a field chuck-full of fascinating research about why we do what we do and also why we often don’t do what’s best for us.  Here’s what I’ve discovered.

1. Our power to change minds principally comes from our own sincerity. If we are focused on the interests of those we’re seeking to help rather than our self-interest, our positive intentions will be felt and trust will spout.
2. Control and manipulation are trust killers whenever we try to control others’ choices, and when we manipulate to motivate we are poisoning the relationship. Manipulation is psychological poison that like a snake biting itself will eventually drain us of our life energy.  And there will be no mirror we will wish to look at.
3. Help others harness their self-determination to choose what they most desire. We are much more likely to follow through on choices we freely make.  The reasons we don’t are most often confusion because our choices aren’t clear.  Deep trust is built with people who help us get clear on what we want and why we want it.  This elevation of self-determined choices increases the motivation to follow through.
4. Helping others gain the confidence to choose what’s best is our best gift to them. The greatest hidden reason we don’t choose what’s best for ourselves is that we often lack the confidence that we can do what needs to be done to get the result.  So we act like we don’t want to learn to play the piano, learn a language, use technology, or seek a new job when it’s our fear of failure that keeps us from choosing what we really desire.
5. The most powerful way to build confidence that we can choose what we really want, learn what we need to learn and do what we need to do is to identify with stories of people just like us who were successful. This last point is critical to help people change their behavior.  By telling stories of others who are just like them who have made successful choices, people’s fear and resistance recedes and their motivation to act rises.  Stories are narratives that reveal how people overcome obstacles and conflict to achieve their dreams.  Stories inspire our minds to find new paths around brick walls.  New brain research suggests there is nothing more potent than a story to open a closed mind.

All of us have times where we desire to have a positive impact on others.  Now psychological research confirms what wise people have known all along.  We have the most impact when we genuinely care for people enough that our agenda is simply to help those we serve achieve their agenda.

Gutless Leadership and Health Care Suicide

One of my close friends is a hospice volunteer. Lately he is supporting a vibrant, full-of-life 80-year-old woman who’s got a bad heart and who’s chosen to die as fast as possible. She’s in an independent care facility that costs a lot so she’s decided to voluntarily starve herself to shut off expenses so she can leave some money to her full-grown children. I know. He’s tried to talk her out of it, but she’s determined. She wants to die because she can’t afford to live. Welcome to America.

Meanwhile our leaders do anything but lead. The Democrats are sissies. The Republicans are bullies. I think most of us are sick of toxic, dysfunctional, ego-bloated politicians pretending to lead our nation.

As I have stated months ago, as well as many great comments from the rest of you, (see Outraged at the Politics of Health Care and Will Marre’s Radical Solution to Health Care) the fundamental problem with a financially unsustainable health care system is that the profit motive is its key driver. This creates a crazy maze of confusion, waste, cost, and suffering. Today’s price of health care is driven by cartels and rich interest groups who compete like Gladiators for a piece of yours and my pie.

1. Thanks to the near elimination of antitrust safeguards, 7 big private insurers control over 80% of health insurance in our nation. These companies are designed to take in as much money as possible from you and pay out as little as possible. They make the insurance claims process confusing and time consuming for patients and doctors, which increases costs and time. This also discourages many people and even physicians from making totally legitimate claims, which increases profits by tens of millions annually. Of course we also know that insurance company claims representations are rewarded for denying claims or finding unethical loopholes to deny payments for treatments to insured persons for trivial reasons causing systematic suffering and in some cases avoidable deaths. Lately insurance companies have been raising premiums in huge chunks to make as much as they can before they are regulated. The obvious conflict between investor interests and our nation’s health care is so great it is breaking our economy.
2. Drug companies have created a closed, unfree market in the U.S., which allows them to charge many times, often 10 times, more for a drug than it costs in other western countries. The idea that Merck drugs in Canada may not be as safe as the same drug in Minnesota is an insult to all of us. The argument that American consumers need to pay higher prices to support U.S. drug companies’ research is simply wrong. U.S. drug companies spend much more on consumer advertising than all of their drug research combined. If business believes in free markets and globalism, then let’s have it. Free trade and a common world price for all drugs.
3. The medical profession has too many incompetent doctors doing procedures they shouldn’t be doing simply because these procedures pay well. It has long been known that the most expensive and difficult procedures are done at the lowest total cost and have the best results when they are done in well-equipped hospitals that specialize in those treatments by doctors who do hundreds of those procedures per year. If you need a heart bypass, go somewhere where they do hundreds of them. These “Centers of Excellence” save money and lives. The medical profession also needs to do a much better job of getting rid of incompetent doctors that cause the majority of malpractice claims. It would also be wise to establish special health courts to curb the abuses of trial-lawyers who game the system to win big awards on the basis of emotion rather than science and responsibility.

I could go on, but who would listen?

The core solution I believe is a universal insurance exchange that is set up as a national non-profit co-op “owned” by all American citizens run by competent executives and properly rewarded employees who have one goal—make sure that the most people have access to the best health care. This can be done with excellence and efficiency. Employees should be rewarded for quality and keeping people healthy not for denying sick people coverage.

We need something more than the best we get from compromising with the huge health care industry that has spent $425 million lobbying against us in the past 4 months. There is a role for private insurance companies, but we must level the playing field by creating a force of citizen power to create realistic and sustainable economics for health care. (The rest of my proposals are in previous blogs.)

Today our health care strategy is a mess because we are trying to turn a rusting ocean liner into a rocket ship. No matter what modifications we make to the rapidly sinking boat, it will never fly.

We must have a whole new system. One that gives people choice and confidence. One that rewards people for healthy lifestyles. One that is uniquely American. Not run by the government but by well-informed citizens who can blend the best of our fierce independence, distrust of bureaucracy and our collective heart for our common good.

I do not claim to have all the answers. But I am disgusted with Democrats who turned what should have been a health care revolution into a poison stew of who-knows compromises. The “brand” of the Democrats is whiny, victim, poor me thinking. They are also ready to compromise because they have no visible backbone and few ideas they are ready to fight for. The Republicans sicken me. Their “brand” is arrogant know-it-alls who only want to lower taxes, fight wars, remove regulations and promote a new aristocracy. Their “I’ve-got-mine and no-one’s-going-to-tell-me-what-to-do” mind set is a cowboy philosophy completely at odds with the higher purpose of society.

As far as health care goes, I am most impressed with Jesus’ advice. When the Samaritan came upon an enemy who was left for dead by the side of the road, he didn’t say, “Well, he probably deserved it.” Instead he took him in and got him medical attention and paid his bills. It seems clear to me that moral maturity demands we seek to reduce all avoidable suffering. If that were our motive and we didn’t compromise with the moneychangers, we just might come up with something simple, practical and affordable.

I, for one, don’t want the status quo. I don’t want some two-bit, best-I-can-get superficial leftovers approved of by the special interests. I am sick of hearing what’s possible.

What I want is a radically new way of looking at this challenge and the leadership courage to make our country a better place to raise our children.

How about you?

–Will Marre

Stupidy or Sustainability – Collapse of Systems

Lately I’ve been teaching leaders about sustainability (see The Top 10 Things Every Leader Should Know About Sustainability).  A good working definition of the term is “to act so that what you do today does not diminish others’ chances for achieving equal goals in their future.”  Another way to say it is, “Don’t be a greedy jerk.”  You see it’s really thoughtless greed that threatens our future.  The oldest motive of mankind is, “I’ve got mine…tough luck for you.”  Any way you say it, sustainability is a concept that is based on the ideal that everyone should have a chance for a decent life.  Today that is a big issue.

But it’s actually possible that it’s going to be tough luck for all of us.  Especially for our children.  Of course I understand there are loud critical voices that say any warnings of climate change, water shortages, increasing range fires, and a northward movement of tropical pests and disease as overblown.  They believe our current system of turning everything into money is the greatest ideal of humanity.  They shout that any change to the status quo will cost us jobs, wealth and comfort.  What they don’t account for is that the current banking crisis has cost us more jobs and wealth than any environmental regulations have.  Polluting our air, wasting our water and living with reckless disregard for future consequences is just plain selfish.  Stupid too.

What most of us don’t understand is the process that leads to collapse of systems.  Conditions in nature, in the economy, and in our lives don’t just gradually get worse indefinitely.  More often there is a tipping point when there is a general collapse.  Our job might be bad, but then, boom, we’re fired.  The economy might be fine on the surface, but when the rotting foundation collapses, crash.  We may be feeling a growing distance in our marriage, and then suddenly, “I want a divorce.”

The model of human history and natural systems is that if we abuse people, nature or ourselves long enough something very bad will suddenly happen.  All the big things have long-term warning signs usually ignored and then, wham!  Pearl Harbor, 9/11, The Crash and Recession of 2008, and millions of famine refugees in Africa are all examples of hellacious consequences to ignoring real problems because they require change.  The challenge before all of us is to create a sustainable future.  Not one of vicious scarcity, but one of abundance.  True abundance is one of those ideals none of us should be against.  And sustainable abundance should be mankind’s greatest goal.

Sustainability has many faces.  Environmental sustainability requires we don’t exploit nature’s resources so we don’t create a world that is a hunk of barbecue charcoal for our children.

Social sustainability means that we create a world that offers realistic hope, opportunity and education so that war, terrorism, and drug dealing are not better options than community building.

Economic sustainability means we create economic systems that don’t require insane levels of consumption or routine waves of mass job destruction to give everyone a shot at abundance.

Personal sustainability means that as individuals we live fulfilled lives without skin-wrinkling, brain-deadening stress, fractured relationships, drowning debt and self-destructive health habits.

As you can see, sustainability is holistic.  Everything is connected to everything.  Damn.  It’s hard to think about all the moving parts, but we must.  Our world is not the same as it was 50 years ago.  We need to think differently and act differently now.

And we are.  Change is happening.  It’s happening everywhere.  More people are choosing to buy more sustainable products.  The recession has caused many to strengthen social ties with family and friends.  Most of us are more engaged in at least psychologically hugging trees.  We openly value the environment and criticize people and companies who don’t.  And more of us are reconsidering our lifestyle and “life pace” so that our everyday lives are sustainable and fulfilling.

Change, radical positive change, is happening everywhere. The collective impact of millions of people doing small things is huge.  Let’s keep it rolling.

Taking a Stand for the American Dream

Since starting the American Dream Project I have been an active proponent of the strong values of our founders establishing a society that promoted the greatest happiness for its citizens.  This is happiness based on integrating the values of self-reliance and a shared civic concern for the common good.  As a nation we seem scared.  Our jobs have disappeared, our education and health care systems are broken and we owe nearly a trillion dollars to China.  Meanwhile we swim in a torrent of special interests that use the language “personal independence,” “maximum material success” and “sacredness of property rights” to marginalize the values of social responsibility, sustainable consumption and the sacredness of human rights.  It is frustrating that when we attempt to solve our problems using wisdom, creativity and higher values the debate degrades to a war of special interests trying to rig the future to their benefit.  The only counterbalance to their self-aggrandizement is citizen resolve to reach for new solutions.  Solutions that honor all our legitimate values but ensure fairness to all.

This is difficult.

That’s because we believe that what we know is reality.  But reality is a tricky beast.  The problem is that reality has at least two dimensions.  The facts of a situation represent the content of reality while the meaning of those facts is the context.    Our sense of meaning is driven by our values.  And for our values to be useful in making decisions they must be held in hierarchy.  Simply put, some values are more important than other values.  Values tell us what to do with facts.  That’s why it’s so important not to let others define our values or confuse us as to what’s most important.  Because, if we let them, they will create a closed bubble for us.  And in the bubble of their emotional logic their conclusions will make total sense.  Soon we’ll be interpreting all facts through the false reasoning of the bubble like clones in a frightened world.  This is not just a theory.  People who call President Obama a Nazi or a socialist and people who label conservatives as hillbillies and hate-mongers make the same error.  They are trying to recruit followers through fear.  This is very dangerous.  It’s what happened when Hitler hypnotized Germany.

When the courageous Christian pastor, Dietrich Bonhoeffer was struggling to find ways to rid his beloved Germany of Hitler, he wrote a series of essays that point out the folly of being seduced by those who appeal to our fear and pride, and pointed out that followers become spellbound by slogans and repeated assertions that gradually become “facts” to morally passive followers.  As simplistic slogans are spread by an over-active media, a moral flu has the power to inflict a whole society. When our prejudices are enthroned in a twisted emotional logic that our self-interest is the premier virtue, facts and evidence that contradict our opinions are simply disbelieved and dismissed.  As a successful business owner recently said to me, “I know what I believe is true, so why should I listen to anything that would make me question my convictions?”  Why, indeed.

What Bonhoeffer, who was executed by Nazis three weeks before Hitler’s suicide in 1945, pleads for is for us to “take a stand.”  His call is to stand for love.  He called on Christians to save Jews because the great work of moral humans is to bring relief to all who suffer. He challenges us to consider “the outcasts, the suspects, the powerless, the oppressed…with new eyes of generosity, humanity, justice and mercy”.

In my view the greatest act of humanity is to relieve today’s suffering and build self-reliance so that all people can lift themselves to a decent, hope-filled life.  My work with the Grameen Foundation, who empower the poorest of the world’s poor to lift themselves by providing access to microloans so they can become self-sustaining entrepreneurs, convinces me that the vast majority of humanity has the will, talent and ingenuity to live a responsible life.  They just need the tools to get started.

To return to the beginning, I am saddened that demagogues in our nation can rally millions with fear-based messages with the primal message, “Every man for himself.”  I also worry that public spending that weakens our self-reliance and creates institutional dependencies is old failure path. The people I most respect are those who hold strong beliefs, recognize that evil is real, exercise timeless values and continue to have an open mind.  Above all, they refuse to be driven by fear, pride or intolerance.

For me there is a higher center that calls for civic engagement in the common good, the restraint of greed, and the promotion of self-reliance.  It is time to take a stand.   A time to stand for our highest values.  This is not time for fear and divisiveness.  It’s time for creative idealism and a fiercely open mind.  These issues are great questions of our day.  (For a view on my suggestion on healthcare that attempts to blend personal responsibility with citizen lead social responsibility, see my other posts: Outraged at the Politics of Healthcare and Will Marre’s Radical Solution to Health Care.)

So what do you think?  Am I missing the point?  What do you believe are the answers to our challenges?

A Personal Declaration of Independence – The American Dream

The real American Dream, the one Thomas Jefferson declared as our birthright to Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness was based on the astonishing ideal of creating the best possible society for all citizens.  It was based on the ideals of the Enlightenment that promote creating conditions that offer the most opportunity for happiness and seek to eliminate avoidable suffering.

Our founders understood this would be difficult.  It requires inventing and re-inventing public policy that strives for a high center where the competing values of freedom and responsibility and equality and opportunity can be resolved.  This they knew would be an ongoing challenge because the voices of power and greed would always use fear to try to fool our citizenry into settling for less so the fear mongers could have more.

These strident voices of fear have been active in every generation.  The wealthy aristocrats and trade merchants who prospered by their special interest ties to England screamed we could never win our independence and if we did, it would bring us economic calamity.  The economic interests of the South and their bankers shouted that freeing the slaves would lead to financial ruin.  And the shrill voices of the status quo insisted that the New Deal would create a nation of weaklings and that other people’s suffering was their own damn fault.

Lately fear mongers tell us we can’t afford to save the environment, educate our children, provide reasonable access to health care, produce high-mileage cars, or fire corrupt bankers.  But the truth is always the same.  We can’t afford not to.

Fear is the tool of those who want to steal our minds.  These are the voices of dogmatic demagogues.  They insist their views and values are the only ones that make us safe and secure.  They don’t know what they are talking about.  They are lying because they want to scare us into stealing our minds.  They falsely pose all their favorite issues as either-or problems.  Trade-offs with catastrophic consequences.  Instead of looking for real solutions of the high center, they thrive like pigs in a sty of sloppy logic that stinks of self-interest even as they gain zealous converts who support policies that actually hurt the very people that support them!

Dogmatism is the assertion of an exclusive truth that demands conformity. Dogmatists of any kind are bullies and manipulators. They claim special authority.  They always set up an exclusive chosen group and make everyone who doesn’t conform the enemy.  They endow their opinions with moral superiority and those that disagree with depravity or stupidity.

They have one agenda, to which they will never admit: to rob us of our essential human dignity, our free will.  (Or as one famous political dogmatist asks us to become a “dittohead.”  We don’t have to think.  We can just ditto his prejudices.)   What’s puzzling is that we live in a world full of information.  But strangely dogmatic demagogues are more powerful than ever.  You see they are frighteningly magnetic because they offer certainty in an uncertain world.

Dogmatism in all its forms is flourishing.

Ideological: These are the assertions of outrageous slick multi-millionaire voices of media personalities who have nothing in common with you or me that dominate our radio and television.  They make huge amounts of money by stirring us up, pushing fear like a narcotic.  They can be on the far Right or Left.  The fundamentalists on the Right preach the religion of unregulated capitalism, the good of greed, fear of terrorists, fear of our government, and most of all, fear of everyone who isn’t just like you.  They call our President a racist and a Nazi and encourage us to arm ourselves against an out-of-control government that will invade our homes, clean out our bank accounts and establish a European-style regime that somehow glorifies mediocrity.

Those on the far Left whine and complain about the victimization of the poor and insist that higher taxes is the answer to every social problem.  Their big ideas are 40 years old.  They still haven’t learned that giving people the tools to build self-reliance is much more effective than making them reliant on hand-outs and entitlements.  They declare that culturally everything that is abnormal is now normal and the bizarre is beautiful.  If you don’t agree you are either hateful or a hillbilly.

Loyalty to the dogma of the Right or Left is absolute.  Anyone who disagrees is stupid or evil or both.

Religious: Every major religion has its fundamentalist pulpit-pounders.  Islamic Suicide Bombers believe that salvation filled with sexual pleasures is in store for those who kill innocents.  Christian fundamentalists tell all those who don’t join their version of the holy club are bound for hell.  Some even look forward to the global annihilation of the wicked, so they can exclusively inherit all that is glorious.  And new age gurus tell us personal morality is relative and god is simply a good vibe.  And all those whose beliefs differ are not yet enlightened.

Scientific: These are the arrogant agnostics or militant atheists who claim they have, or soon will have, the explanation to everything worth knowing.  They see their own brains as nature’s highest achievement.  They systematically dismiss as silly and irrelevant any question that science can’t answer but speculate they can solve virtually any problem if they just have the time and money they deserve.  They disdain spiritual believers with knowing looks of intellectual superiority.

All fundamentalists claim to be 100% right.  They proclaim themselves infallible.  Ideologues claim principle, religious leaders claim scripture and scientists claim their process as the source of their authority.  But all of those who would force their beliefs on you are simply bullies who claim opinion as fact.

Do you need someone else to find your truth for you?

Dogmatic fundamentalists who claim they know and you don’t come in all flavors and varieties.  They are not interested in your dreams.  Only theirs.  Dogmatic thinking in politics, religion, science and even families has created more suffering, more conflict, more injustice than any other cause.  Think about it.  The truth is far more than any of us can know.  And the future will be driven by events and forces we cannot possibly detect.  So how can anyone tell you what you absolutely need to do to be safe and secure?

Realize that the whole truth is always more than we know.  More than we can know. An open mind is willing to consider new facts and evidence contrary to one’s existing opinions. Dogmatists insist we close our minds. They assure us they have considered all that is important and that their conclusions are the only correct ones.  Bullies in business suits.  Liars in lab coats.  Hypocrites at pulpits.  It is unwise to surrender our inner integrity for a little fake certainty.  Our confidence must come from within.  It must come from love-based values and a fearless motive to lift our future to the best we can imagine.

There are new solutions in the high center.  There is political wisdom that honors both freedom and responsibility.  Ideals that balance equality and opportunity.  There is faith in a felt but unseen benevolent power that whispers a higher level of love and meaning in a reality we don’t fully understand.  There is humble science that is content to explore how our world works without insisting it is meaningless.

What’s the best thing we can do? We might…

1. Read and listen to different points of view from sources that are calm, researched and reasoned.  Avoid the shrill, insistent and fearful.
2. Aim to create our best personal society we can.  In our family, our friends, our neighborhoods we can forge healthy social ties that foster love and self-reliance at the same time.
3. Give our work, whether paid or unpaid, a sacred dignity by continually pursuing the highest good right here, right now.
4. We can continually strive to experience the touch of the Divine so we might be encouraged that we are all connected at a deeper, bigger level than our separate, superficial experiences.
5. We can take full responsibility for the message of our own inner voice.

What’s the best thing we can do?  Resist the insistent voices of the Grid.  Imagine the best future we can create.  Stand for something higher than the forced choices being screamed at us.  Let’s create the future we most want our children to live in.

Will Marre, founder, American Dream Project

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The Real Pursuit of Happiness

Have you heard the news?  It was reported recently that marriage is working again (“Is Secularism Saving Marriage?” USA Today).  Maybe better than ever.  The divorce rate is down to 36%.  Divorce is tragic, but the often-quoted rate of 50% of marriages failing is now history.  Of course what everyone wants is to know why.

The truth is we don’t really know.  But it’s not just because we can’t afford divorce.  In fact, some social researchers have some encouraging ideas based on trends of timing, commitment and counseling.  One cause of stronger marriage bonds may be related to the fact that couples are tying the knot at older ages.  The average age for first marriages is over 27 for men and hovers close to 25 for women.  It turns out the older a person is the more likely they will marry someone they have much in common with.  Important things like values, goals, religious beliefs, attitudes about raising children and spending money.  It’s also more likely they’ll share hobbies and recreational interests.  All these things in common create a platform of shared positive experiences and less value and lifestyle conflict.  On the other hand, people who marry young tend to be more attracted to their opposite.  A sort of odd-couple fascination with the neat attracted to the messy, the responsible saver is dreamy over the spontaneous spender…you get the idea.

And other forces also seem to be at work.  When I was recently speaking on colleges and alumni groups for the American Dream Project, our research revealed that one of the things Gen Y age (18-32) Americans most wanted to avoid was divorce.  This is because so many of them were the victims of their Boomer parents’ domestic wars and family split-ups.  Many divorcing boomers said to themselves, “The kids will be fine.  It’s better they don’t hear all the fighting.”  Well kids definitely wish their parents didn’t fight, but for millions the trauma of divorce didn’t leave them feeling fine.  Far from it.  So these same children are more committed to marriage than their parents were.  We think this is because young couples seek counseling far sooner when things get rough than their parents did.  Young Americans also say they value relationships, friendship, and social intimacy more than money, toys or even exotic experiences.  And as one researcher said, we all seem to be getting better at being married.  Wow, that is certainly good new in a society whose media is obsessed with conflict and bizarre personal behavior.

The positive embrace of marriage is maybe just the beginning.  In our American Dream Project research we found both Gen Yers and Boomers agree that genuine happiness and positive relationships go together.  Humans are emotionally wired to connect with one another.  We are intensely social beings who long to love and be loved.  In almost all end-of-life research the dying report that relationships, marriage, family and friendships are the greatest sources of life happiness.  Maybe more of us are waking up to the fact that investing in deep, mutually supportive relationships has life’s biggest pay-off.

But many of us are not great at friendship or choosing friends.  In my book (Save the World and Still Be Home for Dinner) I write about research that says friends fall into two groups.

Level One friends are superficial, the drinking buddy kind of friend. These friendships are driven by you-scratch-my-back and I’ll-scratch-yours.  We’re friends because we get some extrinsic benefit like companionship or favors.

Level Two relationships are based on intrinsic respect. These friendships are based on mutual respect, genuine compassion and caring.  These kinds of relationships affirm our higher selves, our noble aspirations, and our virtues.  These kinds of friends (or spouses) make us feel enthusiastic about life, optimistic about the future and are a source of resilience in tough times.  Mainly these kinds of friends are personal advocates, and who among us doesn’t need that?

Returning to marriage, it’s Level Two friendship that makes marriages great.  When we fall in love it’s passion first.  Passion ignites a volatile pool of brain chemicals.  But as the fire burns lower, friendship becomes most important.  Friendship that is affirming, compassionate and drenched in mutual advocacy.  Wonderfully, it’s friendship that becomes the pilot light of constantly renewable passion igniting the flames of intellectual, emotional and physical intimacy.  All the best of what it means to be human.

So what’s the greatest thing we can do? Be the best friend we can be to the people we love the most.  Look for ways to be a genuine advocate.  As the “Little Prince” said, enthusiastically “waste time” with those you love.  Often it’s in this wasted time that the most genuine love is experienced.  Take a vacation from the troubles of our world and be fully present today with someone who values you.  Call that person you’ve been meaning to call.

So, what’s your experience?  Have you been blessed by genuine loving friendship?  Tell us how.  This is the real “pursuit of happiness.”

If you would enjoyed this post, you might like to visit my older post, What is Life?

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Save the World and Still be Home for Dinner

• What if we could live a pace and enjoy a quality of life that constantly renewed our energy?
• What if all we really wanted in life was to make a positive impact and enjoy our lives?
• What if we understood our own gifts and developed them so we actually made a unique difference?
• What if we could do this no matter what our life circumstances in virtually any job, any time, anywhere?
• What if we didn’t need permission, power or position to do the best thing we can imagine?
• What if we could just start…now?

We can.

Five years ago I founded the American Dream Project to discover what the American Dream is for the 21st century.  I crossed the country giving speeches and hosting town hall meetings to college and alumni clubs, business leaders and community groups.  The Project interviewed and surveyed over 20,000 Americans ages ranging from 8 to 80.  What I discovered was that vast numbers of us are exhausted and drained by the way we work and how we live. What I also found was a shared persistent concern for our future.  We are awakening to the reality that the world needs saving and that it’s up to us to do something.

The bottom line; what nearly all of us really want for our lives is to matter. Our research confirms that today there is a voracious appetite for meaningful work.  At the same time we want to enjoy life, especially our relationships.  We also want to pursue our personal interests and reignite the pilot light of our inner zest.  As one hard working business founder and mother put it,

“I just want to save the world and still be home for dinner.”

What I found on my search for the modern American Dream were many, many people doing exactly that.  They hadn’t quit their jobs; they transformed them.

Of course, no one of us will save the world.  But as one inspired teacher put it,

“When we change our world, the world changes.”

My recent journey into the lives of real people ignited my energy to write a new book, Save the World and Still Be Home For Dinner (Capital Books) that’s going to be released September 30.  It has some themes and elements I developed in my first book, Dreams on Fire, which I wrote for the PBS show Reclaiming Your American Dream.   In Save the World I take those themes into the wider arena of creating a world of sustainable abundance.  Sustainable Abundance is the ideal of uniting human ingenuity and moral values to give every human being an opportunity for a decent life.

Even though this is a grand idea, it doesn’t require huge earth-shattering change to bring it about.  It doesn’t require a magic charismatic leader or even the aristocrats of the status quo to respond to a wake-up call.  Rather, I discovered, it is already happening because individuals are changing the way they think, act and communicate.  It is happening everywhere with people of all ages who are making an individual difference that is creating a “tipping point” of positive change.

What I learned from my interviews and experiences is that this positive revolution for sustainable abundance is happening because people whoever they are, wherever they are, are making it happen in their lives, their work and their communities.  Sure, resistance from the voices of the old way of seeing the world only through the lens of greed and self-interest is noisy.  But the tidal wave of change is already drowning their voices through the millions and millions of positive choices we make every day.

We live and work in a time of disruptive transformation.  The convergence of continuous technological breakthroughs, a generational values shift and worldwide entrepreneurialism is radically changing everything.

So how exactly do we participate and accelerate the new future?  That’s the question I address in my book.  There is a common formula people are using to live a life they most value and enjoy.
The book focuses on the idea that we need to “be who we are and do what we came to do.” Here’s how:

1. We all have a Promise to keep. A Promise to live both joyfully and make a difference that only we can make.
2. Do not be afraid. In times like these where we are losing our homes, our jobs or our peace-of-mind, it’s essential that we don’t abandon our Promise because we’re afraid.  Fear will keep us from both happiness and fulfillment.  If we know what our Promise is, we can keep it in any circumstance.  And yes, your Promise matters to all of us.
3. You can bring your life and your work to a higher level right now. By examining the stories of people just like you and me who are living game-changing lives and relishing their relationships we begin to see a formula for breaking through.  By understanding our Design we “see” our calling.  By becoming clear on our soul’s Desire we focus on a unique life-altering passion.  By responding to our noble Drive we bust down doors of opportunity.

This is not trivial.  Or simply inspirational.  I do my best to paint a vivid picture of people who are transforming their careers, personal relationships and individual place in the world. This book tells the stories of how dozens of ordinary people are living the most extraordinary lives.  It reveals the uncommon habits of how these people think, decide and act.  They teach us how we can transform any circumstance into a fulfilling, exciting and contented life. From these stories I lay out the essential steps and ingredients necessary to help us transform our lives by creating a sustainable abundance of all that is truly important in life, both material and spiritual.

I believes the only way to achieve personal sustainable abundance is to help invent it for everyone.  We have two choices.  The first is what happens if we do nothing.  This choice will create a future fundamentally driven by increasing scarcity and competition characterized by economic and military wars and immense suffering.  The second choice is positive adaptation driven by entrepreneurial invention that amplifies our standard of life as we increase human health, human rights and human opportunity.  The second choice is not automatic, but making the right choice during the next 10 years is maybe the most important choice in human history.

By “Save the World,” I ask you to stand up for something that really matters to you.  To make your unique contribution to a sustainable future and add value to the lives of others.  By “Still Be Home for Dinner” I mean our ability to enact these changes in our own way – a way that fulfills our heart and satisfies our soul.

As I hope you can tell, I am deeply motivated by this message.  As loyal advocates of the American Dream Project I wanted to make Save the World and Still Be Home For Dinner available to you for free before it is published.  So, if you sign up, we will email you a (short) chapter every day for the next 30 days.

I now have a favor to ask you.  As you know in today’s media circus it’s very difficult to get and sustain anyone’s attention on any message or ideal.  So if you like what you read, it would be very helpful if you would send us a review.  Also send the chapters on to friends and family who you think might benefit.  (If you don’t like what you read please send me an email with your ideas.  I don’t mind being challenged to think in broader, bigger ways.)

And finally, if you have any ideas or opportunities to better promote the book, please let us know.  Believe me when I say I am much more interested in the message than the money I might earn from royalties.  (In fact, I am donating $1 per book to the Grameen Foundation to help end poverty through micro-credit.)  So I am interested in book giveaways, using books as fundraisers for charities or a zillion other ideas you might have.  Most of all, let me know what you think.  I look forward to hearing from you!

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Welcome to a New America

The blast damage of what is turning out to be The Great Recession has united the mindscape of our workplace and marketplace in unexpected common desires of Baby Boomers (age 50 to 65) and Generation Y (age 20-35).  Yes, the generation gap is transforming like a giant, cultural smoothie of unifying values and opinions blended by our new technologies and flavored by the fruit of our shared concern for the future.  This is what research reported in two articles in the Harvard Business Review says (How Gen Y Will Reshape Your Agenda and Understanding the Post Recession Consumer).  The implications are potent for all of us seeking to make a living amidst the economic violence of our new economy.

In the workplace the new trends are turbocharged because Boomers expectations of working long, hard and loyally for a secure retirement has been vaporized.  Meanwhile Boomer children (Gen Y) have seen what work first, last and always priorities have brought their parents, so they want to create a sustainable work life that supports their personal interests and family aspirations even as they launch their careers.  In fact, they don’t view their job as a career.  Instead building a livable, integrated life is their career.  This translates to the mass of America’s working population wanting three things from the work place.

1. Personal flexibility. After health care the most sought after work benefit is flex-time and telecommuting.  Both Boomers and Gen Y want to be held accountable for results not face time.  Employees increasingly feel that the 24/7 connection of their digital leashes work both ways.  If you can email me or text me at home, then I should be able to work from home at least some of the time.  Today, time is the valued currency.
2. Personal meaning. 21st century workers want to contribute to a better world.  This begins with eliminating waste, being environmentally responsible, recycling and a host of “green” practices that make companies feel like good work places.  What’s in most demand are jobs with companies whose core business model benefits humanity or the environment.  The application pool of engineers who want to work on GE’s eco-imagination products is steadily swelling as is the number of advertising professionals who want to work on accounts of the most socially responsible companies.  This trend toward meaningful work is as true for Boomers seeking to leave a final legacy, as it is for their children intent on building a sustainable future.
3. Social Connection. Boomers have worked so hard that they have let their social support networks wither.  No more.  Following the example of Gen Y, they are suddenly investing more in friendships and family.  They are the fastest growing user group on Facebook and more and more Boomers are working with 25 year olds at work on a collegial basis.  In fact, the new business rage is “mutual mentoring” which involves Boomers sharing their wisdom, skill and connections with 20-something’s who are teaching them the wonders of emerging technologies.

In a recent YouTube video I posted, Job Creation for Today’s Unemployment and Uncertain Times, I discuss signposts to look for when searching for a 21st century career that are expanded upon in my book, Save the World and Still Be Home for Dinner.

Meanwhile in the market place the length of our financial famine is likely to permanently alter what we buy, how we buy and how much we buy.  Gone are the days of the insane consumer.  They’re gone because our money has been caught in an industrial strength shredder.  Incomes and credit are unlikely to grow for some time so consumers of all ages are:

1. Simplifying, reusing, substituting and generally discovering that often less is more Eating at home vs. out saves money and often increases family connections.
2. Choosing carefully by consulting the bazillion consumer reviews on the Internet.  Brand loyalty for loyalty’s sake is dying.  Quality, functionality and responsibility are thriving.  New brands are being created almost over night based on value more than bling.
3. Going green on the cheap by simply buying less.  The strong consumer trend in all developed countries toward environmentally friendly products looks to be irreversible in the long term.  As price and quality issues get sorted out with these products, consumers are feeling that wasting less and living more leads to a wonderful life.  The simplest way to reduce congestion and pollution is drive less or reduce our landfill trash by drinking our tap water.  A recent poll revealed that 47 percent of us believe we already have all the things we need to live a good life.  This belief has nearly doubled in the past three years.

Who’s doing this?  According to a broad base of consumer research, mostly all of us.  Donald Trump is an irrelevant icon.  Yesterday’s brand.  We, the big WE, rich, poor, working,  not working, young, old are all discovering that our real dreams are realized by timeless values of family, friends, and valuable work.  Will we go back to old addictions of work without end and debt without satisfaction?  I hope not.  This may be a harder path forward, but it’s real.  The past was fake.

What’s the best thing we can do? Perhaps the most powerful trend coming out of our economic turmoil is that we can’t consume our way to prosperity.  What we were doing as a society was unsustainable.  So decide what is.  What is a sustainable workstyle and lifestyle for you for the long haul?  What is your sustainable job of the future?  Many of us became serial consumers because we were bored.  If we deliberately filled our days with more satisfying work, our bodies with more healthy food, our minds with more inspiring thoughts and our hearts with more loving relationships, how much more would we have?

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Independence Day and Our American Dream

I’ve been giving speeches and writing about the American Dream for the past 5 years my quest has been to discover what our dream is for the 21st century. Today I have a powerful conviction that deep down we know we have the solutions to our own confusion. Answers seem to be on the tips of our tongues, like a memory that has just slipped our mind. The answers we seek are already embedded in our spiritual wiring; we are merely fumbling in the dark for the switch to turn the lights on.

Amidst the darkness of the evening news, the never-ending war in the Middle East, the decline of the middle class, the tidal wave of national debt, and the corruption of our institutions, there is another voice calling out. A voice calling for a rebirth of vision. A vision in which the greatest good for each and all is once again the ideal. It’s a new model of governing without the corruption of special interest and financial favors. A new model of sustainable enterprise that aims for the Greatest Total Value for all. A new model of personal action based on understanding our own unique design and our most noble human desires.

This is all more than a dream. It is The Dream. The Dream envisioned by the most inspiring human phrase, “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” It is time to dream again. Will you?

A recent survey reported in the Harvard Business Review reveals that Baby Boomers and Generation Y have a lot in common (July/August 2009, p. 71). This is the first time parents (Boomers age 50+) and their children (Gen Y age 22 to 32) have been in the same work place in large numbers. Both generations are about the same total size, 70-75 million. Generally these are two generations that like each other. About 1/3 of Gen Y children talk to their parents everyday! So now Gen Y and many Boomers battered by the world we created have found common ground.

Here’s what we want! The genuine American Dream. The exhausted refugees of Boomer World and their meaning-hungry children find themselves longing for the same five things.

We want enduring relationships and families that work.

Love, loyalty and intimacy are our greatest needs because that’s what has been missing. It’s time for a re-commitment to commitment. For our children and us.

We want a lifestyle we both value and enjoy.

We want to live in a safe, attractive place we can afford. We want to do things that feed our soul and engage our emotions. We want community, meaning and sanity. For our children and us.

We want a career that embodies our Dream.

Neither a job nor a profession alone is a career. Our whole Dream Life is our career. We want real work with real meaning and real rewards. Over 85 percent of us want our work to make an important contribution to society. We want flexibility, autonomy and to be rewarded for results. We want to make a meaningful contribution, express our talents and follow our interests. For our children and us.

We want growth.

We want the tools to reinvent ourselves as often as we choose to in this constantly changing world. We want to learn whatever we need in order to excel at our priorities. We want affordable, efficient, stimulating education and access to enriching experiences. We want spiritual growth. For our children and us.

We want real leadership.

We demand truth, not spin or hype. We’re bombarded daily by a barrage of exaggeration and outright lies. People we should be trusting shamelessly offer denial, blame and rationalizations to worm out of their own failures. We have become a nation of skeptics because our leaders are less than we need them to be. We want leadership of vision, substance and honesty. In our homes, factories, stores, schools, banks and churches…everywhere.

We are that X factor. Our common values are powerful. Imagine how good our world will be when we live according to these aspirations. This is an exciting time in human history. How you and I act, right here and right now, is crucially important. The counterfeit American Dream invented by mass marketers that reduced our vision to a McMansion, a new car and a platinum credit card is up in flames. Many more of us are focusing on improving more than our material standard of living. It is time to create a standard of life that we are willing to pass on to our children. It is time to stop arguing over trivia and stand for our ideals that will inspire future generations.

In the best possible society, everyone can enjoy their Life and their Liberty and pursue real Happiness. We can literally save the future if we act on our beliefs and change our behavior right now. As we change, our institutions change. When we lead, our leaders will follow. We must take the lead. If we hope to change the world, we must change our world first.

It matters. The American Dream will only be reclaimed one dream at a time. Only when enough of us stand up for our real dreams of a sustainable future will the entire energy of our culture rise up to transform the world. Only our noble vision will save our future. All we have to do is start right where we are. Today.

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