Category Archives: Modernization

Pujols Trade Take-Away

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Everyone wants to feel needed, appreciated, like a valuable member of the team. Even dudes who get nine figures for being good at baseball.

Jose Reyes is a very good baseball player who recently signed a six-year $106 million deal with the Florida Marlins. “The Marlins,” Reyes said, “showed me a lot of love.” Asked about the team that signed him when he was 16, he said, “The Mets didn’t make a real offer, so that means they don’t want me there. I need to move on.”

Albert Pujols is a decent player too. He just inked a ten-year $254 million deal with the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim Next to Disneyland Between Katella and Orangewood. Gregg Doyel’s disappointment, “Pujols could have had it all, but instead he chose $254 million,” makes perfect sense on the surface—Pujols would have always been beloved in St. Louis if had he settled for their $220 million.

One problem though. The handful of superstars at the top of each sport always want to be paid more than their peers. Their salaries are their measuring sticks, not fleeting fan appreciation. No coincidence he signed for $2m more than ARod’s old contract.

Unreal isn’t that even guys who make $100-200k per baseball game don’t feel appreciated by their teams when another dude somewhere else makes a little more? Even more than unappreciated, they feel “disrespected”.

As I wrote previously about Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, everyone wants to feel needed, appreciated, like a valued member of the team. How can those of us who supervise, manage, or coach others create environments where each person feels like an integral part of the whole, like their contributions are important?

A friend of mine, a high school principal, interviewed a grad student of mine for a math position which she got. During the interview process he learned she had a thing for Diet Coke. He told me he got a small fridge, filled it with Diet Coke, and put it in her classroom for her.

An admittedly subtle example, but maybe small, but thoughtful gestures like that are what make the difference in the end. Even when there’s a pay scale in place, like in public school districts, people want to feel like others care that they’re at work, are aware of and appreciate their effort, and genuinely miss them when their gone. My principal friend gets that. What other examples are there of supes, managers, bosses, or coaches getting it?

Everything Free Day

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Two weeks ago Megan McArdle reviewed a few books on consumption. Early in the review she reveals she recently bought a $1,500 food processor. Who knew one could drop 1.5 large on a food processor?

The Saturday morning after Black Friday my betrothed filled me in on the L.A. shopper who pepper-sprayed several other X-box shopper-competitors before fleeing the scene. The good news is I don’t think anyone was trampled to death in Toys R’ Us this year. On Black Friday I subscribed to consumerreports.org in the a.m. and then spent a chunk of the p.m. shopping for new kitchen appliances at home in my pepper spray-free environment.

I spent part of Thanksgiving Day shopping too. Well, kind of. While watching Ndamukong Suh stomp on a Packer o-lineman, I blew through 90% of the 90 lbs. of newspaper ad inserts. Took everything the labradude had to drag that bad boy to the front door. Who knew Wal-Mart sells decent looking jeans for $10? And a decent Timex Ironman-brand watch for $10? Maybe they won’t stop stomping their suppliers until they can sell everything for $10 or less.

Remember the crazy shopping spree marketing prizes in the 70’s or 80’s? Some lucky winner would get an hour in a grocery store and they’d sprint up and down the aisle frantically loading a few baskets with a little of everything? And we’d watch imagining how much faster we’d go or how we’d be more strategic and target the most expensive goods that take up the least space.

What if Black Friday was “National Reduce Inventory” day and everything was free? Nothing sold out, no servers crashed, perfect availability. What would you have brought home? What about those you live with? Where/how would you have stored everything? How would those new possessions have changed your life? Would you be much happier?

At minimum, I would have ordered a few new kitchen appliances and brought home some of Costco’s most expensive vino, a new bicycle computer, and a McArdle food processor in a new Seal Gray 2012 Porsche 911. Initially at least, I would have been much happier. Among other ripple effects though, I’d have to work more hours to pay for more expensive car insurance and maintenance costs and over the course of a few weeks, months, and years, I probably wouldn’t be any happier at all.

I don’t assume what’s true for me is true for you, but I’m learning the things that make me happiest—friendship, good health, film, literature, exercising in natural settings, writing this blog, helping others—can’t be purchased in a store or ordered on-line. I could spend tons of time and energy shopping in stores and on-line at this time of year, brag about my good bargains, but not improve the quality of my life.

If there’s ever a time of the year for reflecting on this dynamic it’s now. The thrill of even great purchases quickly fades so invest time and energy in the people and things that bring lasting joy.

Related Graham Hill TED Talk titled “Less Stuff, More Happiness”.

This Is Our Only Home

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I’m currently reading True Wealth by Juliet B. Schor. Subtitle: How and Why Millions of Americans Are Creating a Time-Rich, Ecologically Light, Small-Scale, High-Satisfaction Economy. Halfway through I’m depressed by the extent of our environmental problems, especially global warming, and our lack of resolve to reduce emissions. Here’s a December 2010, twenty-minute long global warming TED Talk by the always excellent Naomi Klein.

How to Increase Your Living Space Without Spending a Dollar

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By decluttering of course.

Jane E. Brody reviews a new book by Robin Zasio titled “The Hoarder in You: How To Live a Happier, Healthier, Uncluttered Life.” Brody says it’s the best self-help work she’s read in her 46 years as a health and science writer. That should help sales.

After that endorsement, I was disappointed by Zasio’s advice, which I’d describe as decluttering orthodoxy based on Brody’s highlights.

Here’s the gist of it. If you’re familiar with the decluttering literature skip ahead a paragraph. 1A) Tackle just one project at a time—a closet, garage, room, dresser drawer, file cabinet—and stick with it until it’s done. 1B) To create positive momentum, work from the easiest project to the most challenging. 2) Schedule time for decluttering—an hour a weekday or weekend day for example—until done. 3A) Use three containers labelled “Keep,” “Donate,” and “Discard”. 3B) Brody adds her own advice here. To force yourself to decide among the three, be careful not to add a fourth “Undecided” container.

Simple, huh? So why do I predict, six months after finishing Zasio’s book, that the majority of her readers will still live clutter-riddled lives? Because no matter how faithfully one implements that logical plan, there’s still a cultural, even spiritual element to our tendency to buy far more than we need.

Every day, all day, we’re subjected to a one-two punch of extremely sophisticated and ubiquitous advertising that plays on our insecurities and to what sociologists refer to as “relative deprivation” or wanting what others wealthier (or more in debt) than us have. Regardless of whether we have the three containers labelled correctly, we want what we see advertised and and we want what our next-door neighbors have. Until we figure out how to resist those two things, our “stuff” will continue to overwhelm us.

I’m not immune to the one-two punch. I owned a Porsche once, an incredible machine, but I sold it (at a loss of course) because I felt self-conscious in it. Weird, I know. Most Porsche owners want you looking at them at the light or getting out of it at the restaurant. I was the opposite. I didn’t like pulling into the church or school parking lot. Insufficient swagger I guess. But then after reading Irvine, and getting fired up about Stoicism, I learned Stoics aren’t supposed to care about what others think of them. There’s something to work on. With that in mind, maybe I should give it another shot. The new 2012 911 looks damn nice. An exercise in applied Stoicism?

Xmas 12?

Think Legacy not Longevity

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I think it was my ten year high school reunion somewhere in Orange County, California where I reconnected with one of my best friends from the 6th or 7th grade. At the start of junior high we were tight. I learned to ski on trips to Big Bear with his family and I spent a memorable week backpacking with them in the Sierras. He was a stud, a good running back and hurdler who gave both up for surfing and partying which he also excelled at. In high school, I was his designated driver.

Must have been the drugs, because at 28, he was pretty whacked out. Despite not looking especially healthy, he pigeoned-holed me and was going on and on about living to something like 125. I should have humored him and told him I was really looking forward to our 100th reunion. Pills; 1,000 calories a day; filtered carrot juice, can’t remember all the bullshit stuff he thought would get him to triple digits.

Granted, my childhood friend is more extreme than normal, but most of us don’t like thinking about dying. Many people spend lots of energy trying to delay it as long as possible.

In hindsight, I wish I had encouraged him to think legacy not longevity. It’s not the length of our lives, but the quality of them. Whether 40, 60, or 80, do you leave your world—whether it’s your family, the places you worked, the physical environment, or your community—better off?

I have to credit Peter Whybrow, author of American Mania, for this reminder. This sentence of his stopped me dead in my tracks. Pun intended:

In a collective denial of aging. . .we employ all available technologies to simulate youth, misunderstanding that the secret to immortality lies not in the individual but in the society we leave behind.

I can’t express it any more clearly than that.

And The Medium Sized Fish Eats The Small Fish

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I often get frustrated with the Michael Moore’s and Rush Limbaugh’s of the world because their ideological analyses slight endless economic, political, and cultural subtleties that require deeper thinking and more tentative conclusions.

Peter Whybrow, in his excellent book American Mania, explains Adam Smith’s work in ways few conservative free-market zealots probably understand. “Smith favored private ownership, with capital being locally rooted,” Whybrow writes. “He distrusted large institutions—be they government or corporate—as forces that foster greed, distorting and suppressing the dynamic market exchange and social intimacy that are essential to fair dealing.”

“As businesses merge and increase in size,” Whybrow contends, “and as manufacturing and services become geographically remote from each other, the behavioral contingencies essential to promoting social stability in a market-regulated society—close personal relationships, tightly knit communities, local capital investment, and so on—are quickly eroded.”

In other words, your less likely to exploit someone you know.

It’s in this context that I recently read Alpine Experience’s dead-tree newsletter that arrived old school in the mailbox. Alpine Experience is a local independent retailer that specializes in high quality outdoor gear of all sorts. If their website wasn’t so poorly designed I’d link to it. Here’s their slightly less bad Facebook page. I used to have an Alpine Experience t-shirt that said, “Friends don’t let friends shop at chain stores.” I shop at AE once a year when they have their annual sale. When their prices are marked down 30-40%, they almost seem normal.

I like their irreverent, personal newsletter, but I’m sure it’s probably more expensive to produce than they can afford. Inside this issue was an honest, interesting reflection on Olympia’s newish REI store’s impact on AE’s bottom line. The author, I think the store’s owner/manager, said the new REI is definitely impacting their bottom line. Admitted they’ve fallen behind projections and need to have a good winter. I really hope I’m wrong, but given REI’s economies of scale and vastly superior on-line presence, I anticipate AE going out of business.

REI is a large national chain, but its progressive business practices give it a positive, medium-sized, community-based essence. Like AE, it’s a groovy store. It has been voted one of the Top 100 businesses to work for the last 14 years in a row. Read more about its enlightened business practices here.

Recently I was cycling with an acquaintance, an independent architect who has fallen on hard times. He’s taken a job at REI to get by, working as a cashier 16 hours a week. We were discussing the AE-REI tug-of-war. He told me he needed glove liners shortly before getting the job and they were $20 bucks at AE and $7 at REI. Probably an exaggeration, but I suspect comparable products are often 30-50% more at AE. That would be a huge headwind to building a reliable customer base even in a good economy.

Back to Whybrow. REI is not a megacorporation that fosters greed, nor does it distort and suppress the dynamic market exchange and social intimacy that are essential to fair dealing. But it’s not as small nor as local as AE and it doesn’t share it’s long history.

What to make of this capitalist case study?

Personal Economic Balance

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First Born (FB) likes her Starbucks and thinks nothing of dropping 4 bills at Schultz’s stores. Last summer she capitalized on her selective private liberal arts education to secure a part-time job weeding a neighbor’s yard. Late summer, on the way to a concert in Portland, I asked, “Would you keep drinking Starbucks if each time after your last sip you had to immediately walk outside the store and weed for thirty minutes?”

The “probably not” look on her face was a thing of beauty. Maybe there’s a glimmer of hope she’s learning the value of a dollar, or more specifically, four dollars.

Gears spinning in her head, and captive in the Japanese compact, I decided to launch into my “economic balance” talk which was so brilliant it deserves this larger audience.

The economic balance equation is a simple, three-parter: One’s hourly wage + one’s hours spent working – one’s purchases also known as expenses, overhead, or standard of living.

If a person make’s $10/hour and chooses to spend $4 for a Starbucks drink, then the cost was 30 minutes of work time (rounding and after taxes). For a therapist, plumber, or attorney making $100/hour, the same Starbucks costs 3 minutes of work time. I would not weed for 30 minutes for a extra hot, nonfat, grande green tea latte, but I would for three.

Let’s zoom in on each part.

1) Hourly wage. The challenge here is that in the U.S. in the last ten to twenty years the average person’s wages have fallen relative to (very low) inflation mostly as a result of amped up global economic competition. U.S. consumers buy inexpensive goods from China; to try to stay competitive, companies shift their manufacturing operations to distant places where their labor costs are greatly reduced; a lot of workers lose their jobs; margins shrink; and then new workers are offered some of the previous jobs at much less than their predecessors made.

Or the domestic version. States experience massive budget debts as a result of recession, increased unemployment outlays, accelerating health care and higher education inflation, and unsustainable pension promises to public employees. Educators in Washington State get their pay reduced and the state is still $2b in the hole. Few people make $100/hour, most are much closer to $10.

2) Hours spent working. Unemployment is high as is underemployment and economists expect that to remain the case for the foreseeable future. Record numbers of unemployed have quit looking for work and don’t show up in the 9.1%, and for 20-24 year olds, unemployment is 15+%. The double whammy income challenge—how to increase one’s average hourly wage and hour’s spent working in a sputtering economy? Add in the 2007-2008 bursting of the housing bubble and it’s a triple whammy since many people owe tens of thousands more on their homes than they’re now worth.

Which leads to, 3) take your pick—expenses, overhead, or standard of living—the key variable in many, many people falling even further out of economic balance. Workers can’t throw a switch and increase their pay or their opportunities to work additional hours because the changes in the global and national economy are beyond their individual control. Those changes are not temporal either, they’re long-term and systemic. We live in a new economic reality of intensified competition from all over the globe. Don’t listen to politicians who want you to believe we’re special. We’re not.

Often there’s a debilitating time lag between workers’ lower wages, reduced hours, and accustomed standard of living.

Seneca said, “. . . the man who adapts himself to his slender means and makes himself wealthy on a little sum, is the truly rich man.” My 21st Century adaptation, “The person who adapts to making less money and learns to enjoy a less materialistic life, is the truly rich person.” Our expenses are the part of the equation we have the most control over. Worth repeating. Our expenses are the part of the equation we have the most control over. That means we have to do a better job of distinguishing between the few things we need and the neverending number of things we want.

One example. While it’s increasingly vogue to argue otherwise, many contend a college education is a necessity, but attending one that charges $50k+/year is obviously not. Due to a mix of factors—including off-the-charts economic anxiety, age-old social status concerns, and slick higher education marketing campaigns—too many high school seniors enroll in colleges that are more expensive than their families can realistically afford. As a result, many twenty-two year olds, whether they make it to graduation or not, end up deeply in debt. Some authors, comparing them to indentured slaves, are referring to them as “indentured students”.

If a young person’s scholarships, merit aid, personal and family savings, and part-time work can’t cover the cost of their preferred college, they should choose a more affordable path. If you’re a parent being asked to extend yourself beyond what’s possible, it’s okay to say, “Can’t afford it.” The double economic whammy will be challenging enough, why make it a debt-ridden triple one?

Stoic Insights on Materialism

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Stoics knew, in Irvine’s words, that luxurious living only whets one’s appetite for even more luxury. Exhibit A, the GalPal and I need hotel upgrades now. Consequently, they practiced poverty or voluntary discomfort—whether fasting, sleeping on the ground, or purposely not dressing warmly for cold weather—to harden themselves against misfortunes that might befall them in the future. They did this to extend their comfort zone, reduce their anxiety about future possible discomforts, and better appreciate what they already had. They also sometimes gave up pleasurable experiences because they knew pleasure seekers lose some self-control and end up serving multiple masters. Having written about this exact thing before reading Irvine means I’m well suited to modern-day Stoicism.

Even ancient Stoics knew that maintaining luxuries takes a lot of time. Musonius argued that luxurious living must be completely avoided, but Seneca said it was okay to acquire wealth as long as one doesn’t harm others to obtain it. He also argued it was acceptable to enjoy wealth as long as one was careful not to cling to it. Most Stoic teachers advocated simultaneously enjoying and being indifferent to the things wealth makes possible. Seneca and Marcus thought it was possible to live in a palace without being corrupted. Similarly, Buddha said, “He that cleaves to wealth had better cast it away than allow his heart to be poisoned by it, but he who does not cleave to wealth, and possessing riches, uses them rightly, will be a blessing unto his fellows.”

Seneca said “life’s necessities are cheap and easily accessible” and “the man who adapts himself to his slender means and makes himself wealthy on a little sum, is the truly rich man.” Socrates said “we should eat to live, not live to eat” and dress to protect our bodies and not impress others. We should favor simple housing and furnishings too.

Seneca, Marcus, and Buddha would have supported the non-consumerist, simple living, social justice orientation of the Occupy Wall Streeters. On the other hand, they would have rejected their knee-jerk antipathy towards the well-to-do.

Living Peacefully and Joyfully

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During Sunday night’s Skype session with Nineteen I learned she’d been on a nice walk with KN, the uber-nice mother of one of her best friends, who was visiting Midwest leafy liberal arts college for Parents’ Weekend. On that walk KN revealed that she has read three books that I’ve recommended. Cool dat. Note to self: Make a batch of “I read PressingPause.com” t-shirts to give to subscribers and loyal readers. No doubt a future status symbol*.

I have another book recommendation for KN. I don’t read books consistently enough, as a result I don’t get through all that many, as a result, I choose what I read carefully. I don’t know if I’ve ever chosen as well as in 2011. The ten month long hot streak continues with A Guide to the Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy by William B. Irvine (2009). So good I read it twice, the second time taking nine pages of notes since I plan on using it in a future writing seminar.

Irvine says the public’s preconceived notions about Stoicism are wrong. Stoics were fully engaged in life and worked to make the world a better place. The goal of the Stoics was not to banish emotion from life but to banish negative emotions like anger, anxiety, grief, and envy. Musonius Rufus (Is there a better jazz/funk name?) said that “a cheerful disposition and secure joy” will automatically follow those who live in accordance with Stoic principles. Would be Stoics, Irvine writes, will take to heart the Stoic claim that many of the things we desire—most notably, fame and fortune—are not worth pursuing. Instead they will turn their attention to the pursuit of tranquility and virtue.

The word “tranquility” is hardly ever used in conversation today, probably because few of us experience much of it, but it’s the central concept of the book. Irvine says “Tranquility is a state marked by the absence of negative emotions such as grief, anxiety, and fear, and the presence of positive emotions—in particular joy.” On a scale of one to ten, what’s your tranquility quotient?

The bulk of the book is about how to practice Stoicism. Irvine does a great job of adapting the Ancient Roman philosophy to modern times. He acknowledges that people should choose a philosophy of life that fits their personality and that Stoicism won’t be for everyone. He points out that in some significant ways Stoicism and Christianity overlap; consequently, they can be complementary.

For Irvine the greatest problem is that few people have any coherent philosophy of life. As a result, they succumb to mindless consumerism; consequently, at the end of the road they often regret that they’ve squandered their time. What is your philosophy of life? To what degree does it shape your day-to-day actions?

The body of the book is a description of five Stoic psychological techniques and Stoic advice on ten topics such as dealing with other people, anger, old age, and dying. Probably best read with a significant other or a small group of friends who you can discuss it with.

* Any graphic artists out there interested in creating a PressingPause logo? If so, please email me (see the “contact” tab at upper right).

Coaching’s Costs and Benefits

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My Atul Gwande bro-mance or man-crush continues to build steam. He begins his most recent New Yorker essay explaining he’s been a surgeon for eight years and. . . for the past couple of them, my performance in the operating room has reached a plateau. I’d like to think it’s a good thing—I’ve arrived at my professional peak. But mainly it seems as if I’ve just stopped getting better.

He points out that top athletes and singers have coaches and asks whether you should too. He asks the question in the context of his own story of contacting his mentor from med school, a well-known highly respected doc, to see if he’d be willing to observe him in surgery and offer suggestions. I recommend the whole essay, but long story short, Gwande breaks through his plateau as a result of his mentor’s objective, insightful, detailed feedback.

Mid-point in the essay, Gwande explains how teacher-to-teacher coaching is one of the most promising reforms being implemented in some school districts.

He also acknowledges that many of his fellow docs and many teachers probably aren’t quite secure enough to open themselves up to pointed constructive criticism.

But he fails to mention another at least equally significant hurdle, sufficient money to compensate experts for their coaching time. School districts have to release coaches from their own classrooms meaning substitutes have to be paid for or everyone has to teach larger classes. And I can’t believe he expects teachers, lawyers, dentists, and other professionals making far less than professional athletes or elite singers to pay for coaching out-of-pocket. It’s unclear how financially strapped school districts and hospitals are supposed to add in coaching costs.

If only I had a magical “financial resource” wand. Now that I’m in better touch with my stubborn, self-defeating self-sufficiency, I see areas in my life where I could benefit from coaching.

In late August the personal trainers in mom’s swanky FL health club were doing some intriguing exercises with their clients. Made me want to toss medicine balls and run around with giant rubberbands around my ankles. And I’m sure I could benefit from swimming, running, cycling, triathlon coaching. Listening/marital bliss coaching. Cooking/nutrition coaching. Gardening coaching. Bicycle maintenance coaching. Golf coaching. Social media coaching. Parenting coaching. Writing coaching.

You get the drift.