Unraveling the Emotional Source Code of 20 years in Afghanistan, Cults and Bad Boyfriends

The Last C17 aircraft lifted off from Hamid Karzai International airport at 3:39 PM (EDT) on August 30th, ending a nearly twenty-year occupation of Afghanistan. I’m sure that at that moment, mothers of both Americans and Afghans wept for their own valid reasons.

Regardless of which side of the aisle you find yourself on, we all know that there was no love lost between President Donald J. Trump and President Joseph R. Biden. Withdrawing from Afghanistan may be the only thing they agreed on. What’s more, 70% of Americans also wanted the US out of Afghanistan.(1)

We can get upset…

Traffic was lighter than he expected, and, on top of that, he had gotten the time mixed up. His time was 7:45, not 6:45. He was a full hour early. It was the first date, and he knew he should have waited to order, but he hadn’t eaten all day, and he was ravenous. A little appetizer of chicken wings couldn’t hurt.

About 45 minutes later, she walked in, and he was instantly taken by her beauty. As she sat down, he felt an instant connection. Within a few minutes, they were laughing together. “Oh my God, she might be…

Why becoming a Mr. Spock-style leader would be a disaster!

“It’s really hard,” the CEO in my office was speaking about the chairman of the board of a global organization. “He prides himself on his ability to rationally, or as he likes to say, ‘dispassionately’ make every decision. He says we have to remove our emotions in order to make right decisions.” The CEO drew a sharp breath. “Yeah, okay. I understand that being too emotional creates problems, but his way is really putting off a lot of our best people.” She explained that he was about to lose his…

Jeff Bezos the founder of Amazon Inc and Blue Origin, isn’t interested in following his passion, so why are you?

In November of 1972, Richard Nelson Bolles released his bestselling book, What Color Is Your Parachute? What followed was a flurry of books and coaches telling a generation whose parents had worked to survive to instead, “Follow their passion,” with promises of greater levels of happiness and success than they had ever imagined.

Did it work? Yes, but only for the rare few. The rest who followed that path often found themselves struggling to make it in a work-world that…

Communication skills are the bedrock of every great leader. Most outstanding leaders spend time and energy practicing both verbal and non-verbal communication. But there is one strategic communication tool that is often overlooked — the sound of silence.

Silence is a powerful communication strategy that can best be used by those who have learned to befriend it. Sadly, even many “successful” leaders are not comfortable with silence until they are, by circumstance, forced to be. However, when a leader learns how to be comfortable with it, silence becomes one of the most powerful strategic communication skills a leader can employ.

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If you met him at a social event, I’m fairly certain that you would see Samuel as a smart and upbeat man in his mid-fifties. If you spend even a few minutes around him, you would see a warm, engaging man who lights up around people.

You might not recognize him as a chihuahua. But he is one.

Let me explain. Most of us have encountered a chihuahua at some point. They are little tiny dogs who just make you want to scoop them up and cuddle them. But cuddle at your own risk. Chihuahuas, despite their size, can be…

As a leader, you know sometimes decision-making can be difficult. The reason making decisions can be difficult is because very often, we know there’s a logical, rational way we’re supposed to approach a choice, a way that can be diagrammed and outlined with absolute logic.

And then there are those moments when we make a decision based purely on gut instinct.

Let me tell you about my daughter and me.

For about three years, my daughter didn’t speak to me. Now, as you can imagine that was a pretty difficult time. You don’t need the details other than to know…

What if there is something you naturally did as a child that could make adult success far easier?

Imagine yourself standing in a park as the sun breaks through the clouds to light up the face of a small child standing next to an adult. They are watching a butterfly that has landed on a nearby flower. You notice that both the child and the adult are totally engaged with each other and the butterfly. However, what you see on the face of the child and not on the face of the adult is a state of pure awe and…