Notes from a Corporate Life: Thoughts on information and libraries in corporations, music and other things.

I think I first heard of the Guardian's 24 hours in pictures from a blog entry by Linda Skrocki - thanks Linda! I just love taking five minutes each day to see some truly refreshing, sometimes disturbing, always intriguing photos from around the world. And sometimes I'm pleasantly surprised to find something new from places I thought I knew well.

Just a quick note after seeing an article, 6 ways you're wasting gas.  This has some good tips on saving gas while you drive. I maintain that simply driving less - what a concept - is the best conservation. But there's one thing in here that touches on something that drives me crazy: people who leave their car running while they go into Starbucks (or wherever). (I will confess I've been tempted many times to jump into one of these cars and speed off. I've not done it yet. I promise to confess here if I ever do.) The article states: "Idling...burns about a half-mile worth of gas every minute, according to the California Energy Commission." Oy! A handy fact to have next time I see one of these cars.

And of course there's this (which I already knew, but the article brilliantly highlights with only a few words): "And don't go through the drive-through at fast food restaurants. You're already paying enough for the oil in those chicken nuggets." Urgh.

This past weekend, on Easter day, came that awful time when we had to confess to our daughter (10 years old, turning 11 in May) that the Easter Bunny - and leprechauns and Santa, all of the magical 'holiday characters', as she calls them - aren't real. That we, her parents, had actually been, well, kind of hoodwinking her all these years. (Of course, we didn't put it like that, but that's how it feels.)

The impending breakdown of all of this started this past Christmas. More and more of her friends were questioning (or flat-out not believing) in Santa. And I suppose at 10, almost 11, it was still a bit surprising to me that she still believed (or mostly believed) in Santa. But my wife and I somehow kept the illusion up with some fast thinking. What was heartbreaking was that our daughter, more than anything, wanted to know the truth. And to tell the truth, folks, we waffled. We didn't tell her the whole truth. But we also realized that we needed to tell her the whole truth soon.

Of course, when our daughter was born, my wife and I went through some brief agonies around whether we should even encourage the belief in Santa, the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy, and all those 'holiday characters'. We knew this day of reckoning would come, but that day was pretty far off when our cute little baby first arrived.

My wife and I both grew up with all of these things, and we decided we wanted to share all the fun that we had with our daughter. While I can see the advantages in keeping a parent's pure integrity in NOT encouraging belief in these things, it just seems unnecessarily joyless to say to a child, 'There's no Santa', when likely, in the US at least, at least 75% of their friends would be chattering away about Santa for much of their young lives.

(The hard-line parent discussions, I would imagine, are probably fraught with their own agonies. 'Well, honey, your friend Johnny believes in Santa because Johnny's parents lie to him about it and make him think Santa exists. They trick him into believing in Santa. Aren't you glad we don't do that with you? Johnny will feel very sad and betrayed some day because of that. You won't, lucky you!' Ugh.)

After the bomb dropped, it turns out that everyone was rather relieved. Frankly, for the parents, it was becoming harder and harder to orchestrate everything, to keep all the logical and logistical balls in the air. For several years, I dressed up as Santa and visited - coincidentally, Dad was never around when Santa visited. You can't get away with this kind of thing forever, leaving these kinds of clues around for an increasingly clever daughter.

Our daughter said it actually was kind of a relief to her to finally get the truth. It was stressful to her to see these inconsistencies and incongruencies (my words, not hers) in the face of what we were telling her about Santa. Two years ago, I had fessed up that I was the one playing Santa, but that there was still a real Santa bringing presents. Then, how come the presents I brought as fake Santa had the same wrap as the 'real' ones from Santa? (Dammit! I guess I'm not smarter than a fifth-grader.)

So, generally, relief all around.

But, being a dad and being overly analytical, I'm still bothered. The most bothersome thing to me is that we've very abruptly removed and changed part of her world view. She truly believed in Santa, and she still wants to believe. Santa, and the Easter Bunny and leprechauns, were a magical part of her world. When you take away those things, you take away a magical, surprising and joyous part of life. Heartbreakingly, at one point she hugged me and said, 'Can we still pretend that nothing has changed?'

I would love to pretend nothing has changed.

Of course, this process is a little microcosm of growing up. Part of growing up is disillusionment, sadness. The world changes. There's no protecting kids from this process.

But it started me thinking that this is a perfect opportunity to start talking with her about other ways life can be magical. To point out that, if you're looking for it, you can find little pieces of magic, joy and surprise in every day. There are, indeed, gifts, large and small, every day. Santa every day!

My cynical side comes crashing into this construct, this attempt to 'save Santa', so to speak. Maybe I'm just an aging adult who wants to believe in Santa, too. Maybe I'm trying too hard to mitigate the situation, and I need to let it go. Maybe I'm fooling myself with this 'magical thinking' stuff. Maybe I'm brainwashing myself into this naive world view, and I should be more of a realist. And my daughter should be a realist as well.

But when you get down to it, what are the qualities of Santa that are so fun to believe in when you're a kid?

Santa means absolute joy and happiness. A world with Santa in it is a giving, generous, kind, thoughtful, surprising and magical world.

What's wrong with that in a world view - even without a real, live Santa?

Over the past few years, during December, I've gotten into the practice of re-visioning what I want my life to look like in all areas: physical, material, emotional, spiritual, financial, professional, intellectual (did I get everything?). I've discovered - as many have before me - that if I can envision and write out what it is that my life looks like, many of those things come to be - even if I don't specifically write them out as goals.

What I've observed in doing this is:

• It's fascinating to look back at last year's writing and see what has actually come to pass - again, often without my even really concentrating on it. It really is a concrete reminder of how much has happened over the past year.

• Each year, I'm able to more fully visualize what I want my life to look like. This is a big personal accomplishment, because when I first started doing this, it was hard. I wasn't used to thinking in this way. I could barely write over a page. This year, I'm easily at four pages, and still working on it.
  

Give it a try, as this year wraps up and a new year opens up. Visualize. Imagine. What could your life look, sound, feel, taste like?

'Feelings...nothing more than feelings...' - Morris Albert

Oh my, what an awful song, and I'm so sorry for implanting it in your brain. But I couldn't help myself.

Sun is a typical corporate world - feelings usually don't count for much. Businesses are about money, revenue, earnings, margin, profit, operating expense. Feelings? Well, feelings without data and logic don't carry much weight in a large business setting.

Or do they? To some extent, Malcolm Gladwell touches upon the value of feelings, instincts, hunches, whatever you'd like to call it, in 'Blink'. He essentially gives some business validation to feelings (though he also seems to reject the idea that 'Blink' is about feelings).

But I would argue that, to some extent, the concept is absolutely wrapped up with intuition and feelings. I love this passage from an example in the book. An art collector, seeing a statue to be eventually proved a forgery, 'experience(d) an instant 'uncomfortable' feeling when he first saw the statue. He remembers looking at the figure's fingernails and thinking something was wrong, although he was unable to say just what.' (italics mine)

This, to me, is fascinating. This art expert senses something wrong, but can't say what in any logical manner. (Now if this isn't about feelings, what is?)

Everyone has experienced this: you get into a situation, or you hear something, and something feels wrong about it.

What's the first thing you do? Look for logical reasons why it feels wrong. And we typically come up with reasons - even if they are small and relatively insignificant, they're logical reasons we can point to in order to justify our subsequent action.

But what happens when you can't come up with any logical reason at all?

More often than not, I find that I go ahead with it anyway, dismissing my feelings since I can't logically come up with a reason for my discomfort.

Is this a smart thing to do? Is it 'OK' to just have a feeling about something before taking action?

I had an opportunity to find out for myself recently. When working on a recent project, every time I came into contact with it, it just felt wrong. Something was wrong, but I couldn't put my finger on it. Roadblocks and issues would come up occasionally, and these would partially allay my discomfort, because I temporarily found a logical reason for my discomfort. But these issues would always resolve. And the feeling lingered. After several similar iterations, I was still experiencing this sense of dread around the project.

I finally came to the conclusion, much to the chagrin of my logical mind, that I simply didn't want to be involved because it felt terrible every time I touched the project. Try as I might, I couldn't come up with a more logical reason than this.

At the same time, I couldn't ignore the feeling. And I realized I wasn't willing to work around the feelings this time. I had to honor them.

Now, if you know me at all, this is completely counter to my typical business behavior. I have a very strong work ethic. I typically enjoy my work, and I do know who is paying my salary, thank you very much. I know I get paid for doing what I'm told to do, whether I agree with it or not. I may try to persuade, to reason, to argue with myself and others, but typically I can move to a place where I can accept even those things that I personally don't agree with.

For some reason, this time was different. And I still don't quite know why. But I eventually had to say, 'this just doesn't feel right to me - and because of that, I am dropping this project'.

Now, if you say this to anyone within a business setting - if you turn down a project based simply on your feelings - well, this could be an issue, obviously. 'I don't want to do it - just because it doesn't feel right' is essentially what I'm saying. If my direct report said this to me, well, I'm sure I'd look askance at him or her. At least at first.

But here's what surprised me: I went with what I was feeling, on my feelings alone, and it was absolutely the right thing to do. That awful feeling went away. Will that project get done? Sure it will - I just won't be doing it. Will I ever become clear why I had that feeling? I have no idea.

And here's the really scary secret I proved to myself once again: It's absolutely OK to go with what you truly feel. In fact, it is vitally important to honor what you truly feel. No matter how scary that might be.

And make no mistake, these kinds of decisions are scary. And here's the big learning for me:

If, at these critical moments, I can separate out my fear - my fear around how others perceive me, my fear around losing my job, losing face, all those big and little bits of fear that flutter around me - from what it is I really feel, that's the answer I really need. The answer from the heart, the answer minus the fear.

This is the place where feelings are more than 'just feelings'; they become a compass that always guides me back to the right path.

I feel like I should say more about this, that I should come up with a logical conclusion - but this is all I have. This is what I feel.