Worldpeace - Pass it on

Worldpeace - Pass it on

It is about how hard you keep going!

Never regret anything

Courage for forgiveness

7 Basic Reasons You Aren't Happy

Sixty-two percent of Bulgarians say they are “not very” happy or “not at all” happy.

At some point we’re all Bulgarians: We're all unhappy at times, regardless of business or professional success.

Here's are some reasons why:

1. We mistake joining for belonging. Making connections with other people is easier than ever, and not just through social media. Joining alumni groups and professional organizations, wearing golf course polo shirts or college sweatshirts, putting a sticker with initials like “HH” on your car to announce to the world you summer at Hilton Head Island… many people try hard to show -- if only to themselves -- that they belong.

Most of those connections are superficial at best.

If your spouse passes away the alumni organization may send flowers. (Okay, probably not.) If you lose your job a professional organization may send you a nifty guide to networking. (Okay, probably not, but they will send you the invoice when it's time to renew your membership, so you will have that to look forward to.) Anyone can buy, say, a UVA sweatshirt. UVA didn't want me but I still have one. (It was on sale.)

The easier it is to join something the less it means to you. A true sense of belonging comes from giving, self-sacrifice, and effort.

To belong you must share a common experience—the tougher the experience, the better.

Clicking a link lets you join; staying up all night with a crew loading trailers to meet an urgent ship date lets you belong. Sending a donation gets your name in a program; working in an over-crowded soup kitchen (something to my discredit I've never done) lets you belong to a group of people striving to make a difference.

Pick a group you want to belong to and do the work necessary to earn their respect and trust.

A true sense of belonging gives you confidence, especially during tough times, and provides a sense of security and well-being even when you're by yourself -- because when you truly belong you are never alone.

2. We think we can achieve anything. Our parents were well intentioned but wrong: We can’t be whatever we want to be. We can all achieve amazing things, but we can’t doanything we set our minds to. Genetics, disposition, and luck play a part too.

The key is to know yourself and then work to be the best you can be based on your unique set of advantages and limitations.

Here’s a non-business example. Say you decide you want to run a marathon. Fine -- with enough training almost anyone is capable. But say you're a guy who weighs a muscular 250 pounds and you want to finish in under 2 hours and 30 minutes.

That's just not going to happen; you’re not made that way and the attempt will leave you discouraged, defeated, and unhappy. But with enough training you could probably bench 350 pounds, something the whippet-thin marathon runners will never do.

The same is true with, say, public speaking. You may never be like Billy Mays but you could be an outstanding Steven Wright.

What you achieve isn’t nearly as important as achieving something. Pick a goal you’re suited for and go after it.

Doing something -- doing anything -- that most other people cannot or will not do will make you prouder, more fulfilled, and a lot happier.

3. We think professional success equals fulfillment. You can love your company but it will never love you back. (Cliché, sure, but true.) Another cliché, just as true: No person lying on their death bed ever says, "I just wish I had spent more time at work..."

Professional success, no matter how grand, is still fleeting.

Fulfillment comes from achieving something and knowing it will carry on: Raising great kids, being a part of a supportive extended family, knowing you have helped others and changed their lives for the better...

Work hard on business. Work just as hard on a few other things you can someday look back on with a different sense of pride; then, where personal fulfilment is concerned, you get to feel great now and later.

4. We’re afraid of what we really are. None of us really likes how we look. (Well, maybe she does. And he probably does too.) So we try to hide who we really are with the right makeup and the right clothes and the occasional BMW.

In the right setting and the right light, hey, we’re happy.

But not at the gym. Or the beach. Or when we have to run to the grocery store but feel self-conscious because we’re wearing ratty jeans and an old t-shirt and we haven’t showered and we think everyone is staring at us and jeez can we just get out of here already.

So we spend considerable time each day avoiding any situation that makes us feel uncomfortable about how we look or act. And that makes us miserable.

In reality no one really cares how we look... except us. (And maybe our significant others, but remember they’ve already seen us at our worst, so that particular Elvis has definitely left the building.)

So do this. Undress and stand in front of the mirror. (And don’t do the hip-turn shoulder-twist move to make your waist look slimmer and your shoulders broader.)

Take a good look. That’s who you are. Chances are you won't like what you see, but you'll probably also be surprised you don’t look as bad as you suspected.

If you don’t like how you look, decide what you’re willing to do about it and start doing it. Just don't ever compare yourself to someone like her or him; your only goal is to be a better version of the current you.

If you aren’t willing to do anything about what you see in the mirror, that’s fine too. Move on. Let it go. Stop worrying about how you look. Stop wasting energy on something you don't care enough about to fix.

Either way, remember that while the only person who really cares how you look is you, many people care about the things you do.

Looking good is fun. Doing good makes you happy.

5. We have no one to call at 3 a.m. Years ago my house was on a river. A hurricane put my house in the river. I had about an hour to move as much as I could and I called my friend Doug. I knew he would come, no questions asked.

Today, aside from family, I’m not sure whom I would feel comfortable calling.

I know you have lots of friends, but how many people do you feel comfortable calling in the middle of the night if you need help? How many people can you tell almost anything and you know they won’t laugh? How many people can you feel comfortable sitting with for a long time without either of you speaking?

Most of us wear armor that protects us from insecurity. That armor also makes us lonely, and it’s impossible to be happy when you’re lonely.

Take off your armor and make some real friends. It’s easier than it sounds, because other people long to make real friends too. Don’t worry; they’ll like the real you. And you’ll like the real them.

And all of you will be much happier.

6. We mistake structure for control. Most of what we do, especially professionally, is based on trying to maintain control: Processes, guidelines, strategies… everything we plan and implement is designed to control the inherently uncontrollable and create a sense of security in a world filled with random occurrences. (Did I just go all philosophical? Sorry.)

Eventually those efforts fall short because structure never equals control. No matter how many guidelines we establish for ourselves, we often step outside them. (Otherwise we’d all be slim, trim, fit, and rich.)

Budgets and diets and five-year plans fall apart and we get even more frustrated because we didn't achieve what we planned or hoped. To-do lists and comprehensive daily schedules are helpful, but you only make real progress towards a goal when it means something personal.

Decide what you really want to do and go after it. You'll feel a real sense of control because you really care.

And when you truly care -- about anything -- you're a lot happier.

7. We've stopped failing. Most of us do everything we can to avoid failure. That's a natural instinct with an unnatural by-product: We start to lose the ability to question our decisions.

And we lose the ability to see our ourselves from another person's point of view. The ability to work with and lead others is compromised when we lose perspective on what it's like to nothave all the answers - and what it's like to make mistakes.

So go out and fail, but not in the way you might think. Forget platitudes like, "In business, if you aren't failing you aren't trying.” Business failures cost time and money that most of us don't have. (My guess is "failure" doesn’t appear as a line item in your operating budget.)

Instead fail at something outside of work. Pick something simple that doesn't take long and set a reach goal you know you can't reach. If you normally run two miles, try to run five. If you play a sport, play against people a lot better than you. If you must choose a business task, cold call ten prospects.

Whatever you choose, give it your all. Leave no room for excuses. Make sure you can only be judged on your merits... and will be found wanting.

Why? Failure isn't defeating; failure is motivating.

Failure also provides a healthy dose of perspective, makes us more tolerant and patient, and makes us realize we're a lot like the people around us.

When you realize you aren't so different or "special" after all it's a lot easier to be happy with the people around you -- and happy with yourself.

Facebook: Why some “likes” are worth more than others

(Copyright: Getty Images)

After the social media giant announced its much-anticipated search function, Tom Chatfield wonders whether all its users are created equal, or has it become easy to game the system for personal profit?

When Facebook announced its much-anticipated Graph Search earlier this week, there were two questions underpinning most commentators’ responses: will this make a lot of money, and can it beat Google at its own game?

So far as the first question is concerned, the stock market response – an initial dip of around three per cent – suggested caution verging on disappointment. On the second front, however, there has been greater optimism, not least because Facebook seems to have invented a whole new game of its own: the world’s first truly social search function.

As Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg explained at the launch event, while search engines like Google are all about links, Graph Search is about answers: “Web search is designed to take any open-ended query and give you links that might have answers... Graph Search is designed to take a precise query and give you an answer, not give you links that might provide the answer".

These answers, moreover, will be entirely drawn from your individual “social graph” of friends. Type in a complex query – “people I know in New York who like video games”, or “friends who enjoy both modernist novels and hot chocolate” – and a sortable list pops up based on people who have “liked” these topics. You can search where your friends have been, what they’ve done, what they’re interested in, and how they rated all of these experiences.

The system remains in beta, but advertisers, recruiters and brands are already salivating at the opportunities. So too, no doubt, are users hoping to meet attractive friends of friends, now all they have to do is type in search terms like “people who like Star Wars and are single” – photos being another major part of Graph Search. It’s big news for businesses and individuals alike, not to mention lovelorn geeks.

Beyond this, though, Facebook’s decision to turn its data into an unprecedented playing field for social discovery also says something significant about the future of the internet, and its ever-closer integration with daily life.

Once upon a time, most people used online services from behind at least a thin veil of anonymity. Search and discovery were impersonal: driven by the measurement of global trends and the aggregated analysis of millions of users’ actions.

Arguably the biggest oversight in the history of companies like Google was their underestimation of people’s desire to personalise this experience. Using search engines to discover accurate results was all very well – but a still greater hunger existed for information defined not by its ranking, but by who it came from. Even the arbitrary mutterings of someone we know or admire (even if it is a Z-list celebrity) are more interesting to most of us, most of the time, than mere knowledge.

As Elise Ackerman put it in her analysis of Graph Search for Forbes, “some ‘likes’ are worth more than others”. Not all users are created equal, and the more that anonymity is replaced by the encroaching real world of fame, friends, status and followers, the more this inequality becomes an embedded part of the daily business of digital living.

Playing for perks

None of which should be much of a surprise to those accustomed tocelebrities like Snoop Dogg or Kim Kardashian hawking products to their millions of Twitter followers. What began with these fortunate few, however, is a pattern that increasingly applies to us all.

Inequality isn’t just about social status, of course. As more and more of the world comes online across a greater variety of devices, we inexorably face a more unequal global internet: different speeds, different restrictions, different services and rights. By putting network effects at the heart of not only social interactions, but also information discovery and dissemination, Facebook is feeding this unevenness – and helping us all, along the way, to work our particular assets for all they’re worth.

It’s easy to see how this system can be gamed. Visited a restaurant and enjoyed the experience? Write a favourable review for money off next time. Haven’t visited a restaurant, but have lots of friends and followers? Earn cash in hand for claiming that you visited and loved every minute.

Social networks are not, in this sense, a levelling force so much as a vast magnifying glass applied to human nature, accentuating that which is already there – contacts, celebrity, exclusivity, excitement and attractiveness included.

None of which is to suggest Facebook’s Graph Search is destined for triumph, or that it’s only about fame and freebies. What it is, however, is a sign of a digital culture increasingly rooted in real lives and locations; or at least in certain clickable, measurable aspects of them. Playing the system brings its perks – and opting out means missing out in real as much as virtual terms.

In the end, Facebook just wants to make us happy: to help us get more of what we want, when we want it, from whom we want. It doesn’t matter whether the details involve fine dining, exclusive fragrances, ski trips, or special offers at Burger King – it still means recruiting each one of us as part-time publicists, broadcasters, reviewers and self-promoters.

The catch, as Pinboard founder Maciej Ceglowski argued back in November 2011, is what incentives this particular vision places on our relationships. “We have a name for the kind of person who collects a detailed, permanent dossier on everyone they interact with, with the intent of using it to manipulate others for personal advantage,” he noted. “We call that person a sociopath.”

Ceglowski’s words are a warning rather than a prophecy, but they’re also something we need to take seriously. In the age of an increasingly unequal internet, where relationships and endorsements alike are saleable commodities, the rewards for tapping into our inner sociopaths have rarely been more tempting. Win or lose, however, some games are never worth playing.

Learning to listen

We all know what it's like to get that phone call in the middle of the night.

This night's call was no different.

Jerking up to the ringing summons, I focused on the red illuminated numbers of my clock. Midnight. Panicky thoughts filled my sleep-dazed mind as I grabbed the receiver.

"Hello?"

My heart pounded; I gripped the phone tighter and eyed my husband, who was now turning to face my side of the bed.

"Mama?"

I could hardly hear the whisper over the static. But my thoughts immediately went to my daughter. When the desperate sound of a young crying voice became clearer on the line, I grabbed for my husband and squeezed his wrist.

"Mama, I know it's late, but don't...don't say anything, until I finish. And before you ask, yes, I've been drinking. I nearly ran off the road a few miles back and..."

I drew in a sharp shallow breath, released my husband and pressed my hand against my forehead. Sleep still fogged my mind, and I attempted to fight back the panic.

Something wasn't right.

"And I got so scared. All I could think about was how it would hurt you if a policeman came to your door and said I'd been killed. I want...to come home. I know running away was wrong. I know you've been worried sick. I should have called you days ago, but I was afraid...afraid..."

Sobs of deep-felt emotion flowed from the receiver and poured into my heart. Immediately I pictured my daughter's face in my mind and my fogged senses seemed to clear. "I think..."

"No! Please let me finish! Please!" She pleaded, not so much in anger but in desperation.

I paused and tried to think of what to say. Before I could go on, she continued, "I'm pregnant, Mama. I know I shouldn't be drinking now... especially now, but I'm scared, Mama, so scared!"

The voice broke again and I bit into my lip feeling my own eyes fill with moisture. I looked at my husband who sat silently mouthing, "Who is it?"

I shook my head and when I didn't answer, he jumped up and left the room, returning seconds later with the portable phone held to his ear. She must have heard the click in the line because she continued, "Are you still there? Please don't hang up on me! I need you. I feel so alone."

I clutched the phone and stared at my husband, seeking guidance. "I'm here, I wouldn't hang up," I said.

"I know I should have told you, Mama. But when we talk, you just keep telling me what I should do. You read all those pamphlets on how to talk about sex and all, but all you do is talk. You don't listen to me. You never let me tell you how I feel. It is as filmy feelings aren't important. Because you're my mother, you think you have all the answers. But sometimes I don't need answers. I just want someone to listen."

I swallowed the lump in my throat and stared at the how-to-talk- to-your-kids pamphlets scattered on my nightstand. "I'm listening," I whispered.

"You know, back there on the road, after I got the car under control, I started thinking about the baby and taking care of it. Then I saw this phone booth and it was as if I could hear you preaching about people shouldn't drink and drive. So I called a taxi. I want to come home."

"That's good, Honey," I said as relief filled my chest. My husband came closer, sat down beside me and laced his fingers through mine. I knew from his touch that he thought I was doing and saying the right thing.

"But you know, I think I can drive now."

"No!" I snapped. My muscles stiffened, and I tightened the clasp on my husband's hand. "Please, wait for the taxi. Don't hang up on me until the taxi gets there."

"I just want to come home, Mama."

"I know. But do this for your mama. Wait for the taxi, please." I listened to the silence in fear. When I didn't hear her answer, I bit into my lip and closed my eyes. Somehow I had to stop her from driving.

"There's the taxi, now."

Only when I heard someone in the background asking about a Yellow Cab did I feel my tension easing.

I'm coming home, Mama."

There was a click and the phone went silent. Moving from the bed with tears forming in my eyes, I walked out into the hall and went to stand in my sixteen-year-old daughter's room. The dark silence hung thick. My husband came from behind, wrapped his arms around me and rested his chin on the top of my head. I wiped the tears from my cheeks.

"We have to learn to listen," I said.

He pulled me around to face him. "We'll learn. You'll see."

Then he took me into his arms and I buried my head in his shoulder. I let him hold me for several moments, then I pulled back and stared back at the bed. He studied me for a second, then asked, "Do you think she'll ever know she dialed the wrong number?"

I looked at our sleeping daughter, then back at him. "Maybe it wasn't such a wrong number."

"Mom, Dad, what are you doing?" The muffled young voice came from under the covers.

I walked over to my daughter, who now sat up staring into the darkness.

"We're practicing," I answered.

"Practicing what?" she mumbled and laid back on the mattress, her eyes already closed in slumber.

"Listening," I whispered, and brushed a hand over her cheek.