STOP THE NEWS!

                                    
I want to get off!

You deserve a break today, and not because

of some hamburger company! You just do.

CONSIDER:

If it isn’t bad enough dealing with your boss, your in-laws, your whining friend, your outta-control kids (or dog!), your popped button, indigestion, and scraping what you stepped in today—off your shoes, in front of smirking passerby, with your (never-used-anymore-for-writing anyway) ballpoint pen . . . If all that’s not bad enough, you got news media!

So now all you masochists seeking pleasure from having your butts dragged through global gutters, can add yet another layer of daily upsets and aggravations to your personal shoulders —the whole damn rest of the world! Go ahead: BE ATLAS! See if anybody cares.

You think it doesn’t matter how much news you see or hear every day? (That was a short question.) Now you no doubt think I’m going to beat up on your psyche for all the reasons you fidget at work and don’t sleep at night. But, no. There’s just another question coming.

This one’s a long, take-a-breath-in-the-middle question: Does a minute (a second even) ever pass without seeing or hearing some modelesque-looking or vocabularied-up (no ers, ahs, ums, or duhs) nudnick with an earpiece who’s being told what to say, how fast to say it and where to stand . . . you know, someone who’s somberly rattling out (or yelling, as in the case of higher-paid, more famous nudnicks) every minutia of detail about world and neighborhood threats to life, limb, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness? Whew! That was long, wasn’t it?

You better believe this: If it’s not terrorism glaring through ski-masks, or paying the price for cavalier attitudes about the seriousness of Ebola, or the ineptness of the VA , the CDC, the WH and Congress, or war zone updates on bombings and surprise WMD cache findings, it’s body counts, student demonstrations, racially-charged bullet exchanges, the stock market, Shark Tank, some athlete run-a muck, or insufferable Hollywood-type feigning make-believe insults.

If it’s not any of those things, it’s fictitious global-warming and severe weather (the great standby for upsetting news), the neighbor’s trash blowing across your yard, or your empty wallet, refrigerator, or gas tank.

Don’t let it be your empty HEAD!

Feel like you’re juggling seagulls?

Want to lighten yourself up?

Do the following for one week

(if you dare!)

I absolutely guarantee it will change your life for the better. But you have to be willing to take the risk. What’s to lose, stress?

1. JUST BREATHE— Take some nice deep ones—as often as you can remember to each day.

2. TURN OFF THE WACKO (TV, RADIO, AND ONLINE) NEWS REPORTS – If something major happens that will engulf your life, you’ll know it; someone will come running to pound on your door and give you the scoop!

3. THROW AWAY ALL THOSE NUT-CASE NEWSPAPERS AND MAGAZINES YOU READ— Toss ‘em under the bus! Better yet, let them pile up somewhere (not at your door!) for the week and when you get back to them, you’ll be startled to see that nothing has changed . . . just names, places, amounts, severity, intentions.

4. TURN OFF YOUR TEXT AND EMAIL BOMBARDMENT— “Smokeless tobacco,” “Death-by-milk class action lawsuits,” and “37 ways to paint your garage floor” will all still be clogging up your in-boxes a week from now anyway. Besides it’s rejuvenating to delete hundreds at a time!

5. TAKE A HOT SHOWER. SIT. TALK TO YOURSELF. READ A BOOK— Comedy or love stories beat news-related drama.

6. PICK OR BUY YOURSELF FLOWERS. PAY MORE ATTENTION TO NATURE.

7. TAKE MORE WALKS. SMILE MORE. CURSE LESS. SPEND MORE “FAMILY TIME.”

8. BE THANKFUL FOR WHAT YOU HAVE. AND MAYBE EVEN TRY CHURCH AGAIN.

And no, it’s not irresponsible,

or global withdrawal, or pretending all’s well.

It’s a break. You need one. It’s a choice.

Do something about it.

You won’t believe the difference in just one week!

# # #

 Hal@BusinessWorks.US or 931.854.0474 or comment below

How REASONABLE is the risk

of combining client interests?

It may very well be that when you decide to merge the activities of two or more clients who you think have compatible interests, you will get stung! You may be setting yourself up to suffer the consequences of their inadequacies.

It’s not just what you see on “COPS”–Odds are that more police officers will be killed and injured in response to a “domestic (family fight) call” than even a robbery or high-speed car chase. Why? Because battling relatives often turn on the police who are entering their home. They see the officers as invading their space and interfering in their private dispute.

Police crisis intervention training calls for officers to immediately separate warring or arguing members of a household to physically go to different rooms, or at least different sides of the same room as a tactic for diffusing the anger, preventing themselves from being set upon, and for setting the stage to encourage reasonable discussion and negotiation.

When you attempt to combine interests of different clients you service on the grounds that you see some mutually beneficial commonalities, you need to be careful in your assessment that you are not an unwanted invasion of one or both clients’ privacy.

Maybe, for example, they simply don’t WANT to work with one another. Maybe they’ve tried it or talked about it in the past (even generations ago) and decided NOT to combine interests. Maybe one suspects the other of undermining. Maybe there’s some professional (or industrial) jealousy present. Maybe one of them suspects you of having ulterior motives. Maybethe employees of one business don’t like the empoloiyees of the other business. Maybe…

ASK each client to be forthright about the idea…what each thinks of it, what each thinks she or he can gain by it, how–exactly– each feels about the other entity. ASK each to reassure you that each is totally supportive BEFORE activating any part of the plan. Meet ahead of time with each separately, and then with both together. Make sure they share the same understandings and goals.

Starting to sound like pre-marriage counseling?Absolutely! In fact, if you perceive even the slightest edge to any of these discussions, a pre-combined-interest agreement might even be in order. OR you may simply decide the winds are not favorable, and back off the deal before anyone steps up to the plate.

Let the track-records of the clients and your personal instincts be your guide in deciding between pursuit, abandonment and modification. Make certain the risks to all involved are “reasonable.”

 # # #  

Hal@BUSINESSWORKS.US

Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals and God bless you!