sweet

Yeah, so get this. I went to a grocery store and bought wine. They must all be alcoholics around here.

Back in the future

I am here for a few days, before the final move next week, and I am enjoying the city from a unique perspective of being both tourist and resident. WHAT A CHANGE OF SCENERY! Diversity and vibrancy at their best. Walked a few familiar blocks in search of dinner (Basha did not disappoint). Did not feel any old demons bothering me like they used to.

I should remember these days. I have never been happier as a person. 2010 has been great so far.

A Quiet Moment

These moments are rare.

D. is asleep.

I. is at the art crawl.

I am chilling on the trusty futon.

But first things first. There is a creepy religious fan of Glenn Beck who lives down south and has my last name. Now, if you know my last name, you can see how that can be a weird combination. The man looked me up on facebook and thought that was sufficient grounds to be my “friend”. I expressed silent regret over the fact that the most negative action I could take was to “ignore this request”. Thaaanks.

The house is tentatively sold. We are moving to Mtl at the end of March and will temporarily reside at a hotel, which should be good: I still like hotels. We are thinking about this area to live in next.

I took a two-day leadership seminar at work this week. I thought it was pretty constructive. My guess is the corporate indoctrination machine has finally got the best of me. I did meet a few very funny people from BC, Manitoba and Nova Scotia. I now have a theory that Canadians’ sense of humour is proportional to how far they live from Toronto. On a slightly more serious note, I got to network with interesting people and heard a lot of rumors about the future of this company. It doesn’t sound bad from my vantage point.

I have been thinking a lot about this move. In my current job, people have known me for 3-5 years, and although I have changed significantly over time, old perceptions remain, and they drag me down. Moving to the new office presents an opportunity to recreate people’s perceptions from scratch. Here are advices to self that I will try to follow going forward.

1. Kill the ego. Ego is poison. There are no exceptions. Just shut up, listen and ask questions. No volunteering unsolicited information. No one-upping. No talking about your hot ex-model emerging artist wife and beautiful daughter. No one wants to know how perfect your life is.
2. Always know what you want to happen next. Do not try to influence thoughts or beliefs. You are no Dalai Lama. Strive to influence behaviors and outcomes.
3. Be more aware of perceptions and create good ones. With superiors, present issues you have thought about and already started to address. Always share problems you are resolving at present and then give the summary of your thought process upon resolution.

Three is enough for now.

Non-rant

I’ll be honest, this post was going to be a rant. But I regained control of myself and course-corrected. I am now in a better emotional place and can focus on positive stuff. We are still in suspense with the house sale. There are a few good leads, and hopefully there will be an offer soon. The transition to the new job is moving along nicely, I am already learning the new role, people and business. It’s exciting. It’s hard. And it’s good.