Click this Link…You won’t be sorry!
Susan Boyle - Britain’s Got Talent
Does Britain ever have talent! What if she’d been too scared off by the assumptions to sing?
What the world would have missed. Let’s pay attention to the assumptions we make…be sure we’re not missing anything important.
I hope you all enjoy this as much as I did. Thanks to Debra LaQua for pointing this out!
Strange happenings abound this month, March…in like a lion, out like a lamb, I hope. A friend of many on linked in has died under seemingly strange circumstances, a friend of mine was swarmed by buffaloes on a gravel road, another friend caught a cheating husband.
Trust can feel ephemeral, something that grows until the next bad experience comes along. If you can’t trust life, you can’t trust driving on a gravel road, and you can’t trust your husband… where does that leave you?
It leaves you aware.
Pay attention to your gut instincts. When you see that glint on the road ahead that says something isn’t quite right, slow down, as my friend did.
I received an email today that described someone’s experience – and I use that word lightly – with accepting money orders over E-bay. The email had been forwarded several times. The person’s email address was still in the email, and so I emailed and asked: True or not true? Turns out the email had been forwarded several times with changes made to it, the intention and experience changed and thwarted by the passing of the voice.
Trust. It’s good for you. But don’t be afraid to check things out either.
Top: Icy Streets, Remembrance Day 2008
Bottom: Grandpa, Mike Turchak
We woke to grey skies and slick streets. Remembrance day has been an event we’ve attended for as long as I can remember. Even back to age five in my slick new red velvet coat. Sometimes it’s been cold, sometimes warm, sometimes there is snow, sometimes there isn’t.
Traditionally the ceremonies have been held outdoors. City Hall, and the Cenotaph is just half a block away from my home. We would stand in rain or shine and pay homage to the veterans, and to those still fighting. We would peer to find grandpa in the group of marching veterans. Grandpa was quiet, but revelled in his family. He spoke little of the war, perhaps feeling that he needed to carry the burden alone. But Remembrance days were always jolly…we ate too much, and we drank too much, and we laughed…and remembered.
About six years ago, they moved the ceremony indoors. A testimony to the aging of the veterans. We woke up this morning to shiny streets, slick with ice, and thoughts of how this wasn’t going to be good for all the elderly folks who would be about. Sure enough the Remembrance Day Ceremony garnered about half the attendants that it usually does. But you can bet that most of those who had to stay home were observing thier moments of silence at 11:00
Since Grandpa died in 2004 a few more tears are shed each Remembrance Day in our family. We bring pictures of grandpa and put them on the table and we eat, and we talk and we drink, and we remember. The young adults in our family feel it’s important enough to return home for Remembrance Day. And that’s important. We all need to stop and remember and think about the return of peace.
I’ve written a full school bullying prevention and intervention program that has been sitting on my shelf as we’re not actively using or promoting right now. What bothers me about htat, is that there is a great definition of bullying that goes with it. The defnition was written by Ken Rigby in Australia, and I’ve expannded on it somewhat.
I’ve decided to release this information for public use in hopes that school employees, parents and children will find it valuable. It can be found at
http://knol.google.com/k/kelly-karius/a-bullying-definition-and-incident-form/16k9f1721y7l1/3#
Please do return to the blog and let me know what you think!
Kelly
Bill of Rights and Responsibilities
The basis of assertive communication is believing in Every Person’s Bill of Rights and Responsibilities.
1. You have the right to be treated with respect. You have the responsibility to ask for respect, to respect other in return, and to respect yourself.
2. You have the right to have and express your own opinions and feelings. You have the responsibility to do that respectfully and to take responsibility for owning your feelings and opinions.
4. You have the right to set your own priorities. You have the responsibility to take the time and effort to follow through.
6. You have the right to ask for what you want knowing that others have the right to say “No”.
8. You have the right to make mistakes. You have the responsibility to accept that you don’t have to be perfect and the responsibilty to learn from your mistakes.
10. You have the right to not know the answer. You have the responsibility to accept that you don’t have to know everything and can research the answer.
12. You have the right to choose not to assert yourself. You have the responsibility to accept the effects of not asserting yourself and feel okay about it.
I am putting forward an invitation from Margit Selvey to participate in in an academic study on the factors which influence how companies work with external consultants. Margit is a postgraduate student at Aston University in Birmingham, England who is seeking potential participants who have had positive and negative experiences working with external consultants.
She summarizes her project as follows:
“Public and private organisations spend billions annually on external consulting services. Even with this commitment of funds, some find they are unable to effectively use the information yielded or implement the recommendations. At the same time, others find the experience tremendously valuable, the results and information gleaned from employing the external consultant are put into practice and viewed as gold. Why such a dichotomy? The quest to find the answer is the focus of this study and my Master’s dissertation.
The participants should be directors, human resources professionals or anyone within the organisation who is or has been in either a decision-making or advisory role for the selection, evaluation, authorisation and/or commitment of budget towards external consultancy services.
The extent of the participation is a voluntary questionnaire about your experience working with external consultants in your organisation which should take no more than 10 minutes to complete. The questionnaire is completely confidential with no personal data asked for or retained within the questionnaire itself.
In exchange for participation, respondents are eligible to receive a free report containing the results of the study along with recommendations based on research for how organisations can effectively evaluate, choose and maximise the value of external consultants.
Studies like these help contribute to understanding for how to maximise the value, and improve the dynamics, of external consulting relationships. The significance of these relationships is ever-increasing with the continuous fluctuations in economies and changing marketplace. Your participation does make a difference!”
The questionnaire is online at:
http://www.survey.bris.ac.uk/aston/consult
She thanks anyone who takes part in advance! Isn’t it wonderful that the internet can be used to gather information from around the world. Communication abounds!
by Amber Stromberg
When faced with a burnout rate of five years for people in some helping professions, it hardly seems worth the four years of school and all the late nights that go along with it.
We are told that we must leave our work at work, and to let people go once they walk out the door. But the reason so many of us go into the helping professions is that we care. I have numerous friends who can not comprehend why I would want to stress myself out over someone problems. They believe that everyone should just sort out things on their own, just like everyone else. But what they don’t see are the people who do not have friends to talk to or family to support them when they are in need.
I am still new to this so when a client tells a sad story, they are usually not the only ones reaching for a tissue. So how do people who have been at this for years, make it?
Do they cease to care? Is it just another sad story? Just another case? Or are they too struggling to find their place between empathy and apathy?
