Emotions

One of the first decisions a writer makes when writing a novel is to decide if he or she wants to write in the present tense or past tense. Either choice works, and it’s purely a matter of preference. The biggest mistake is going back and forth between tenses—not knowing when the action is taking place, which often confuses the reader.

For many, age brings up fierce resistance. We hide the fading of youth with hair dye and facelifts. We no longer have sleeveless tops in our closets. I do not judge that. I sought those “fixes” too. Until it occurred to me that acceptance of myself was at stake and up for grabs.

It’s hard to be wise and worried at the same time. Almost all anxiety can be traced to two sources: ambiguity and a perceived lack of influence. I’ve found when anxiety strikes, I create a balance sheet of what I know and what I can influence. Anxiety lurks in the dark, so this balance sheet acts as an illuminating flashlight.

When America declared its independence, we embraced our inalienable right to pursue happiness. In some dictionaries, “pursuit” is defined as “to chase with hostility.” It describes a shopping mall around Christmas or the energetic, type-A behavior of a newly-minted MBA. Pursuing happiness, often on the hedonic treadmill of life, is what we do during the first half of our lives.

A wailing siren and a soft, reassuring hand. That is all I remember from my ambulance trip in suburban St. Louis in August 2008. My heart had stopped just as the paramedic team arrived right after my giving a speech. “Break a leg,” is what they tell you before going on stage. Well, I’d broken my ankle a month earlier, had a serious bacterial infection in my leg, and was on strong antibiotics (as it turned out, the heart failure was likely an allergic reaction to the medication).

Lost and clueless. That’s what I felt six months after I launched my boutique hotel company at age 26. I had quickly renovated the “no-tell motel” we’d bought in a dodgy San Francisco neighborhood—partly due to my putting a beer keg in the courtyard each weekend, so my friends would come over and help paint the place (learned a thing or two from Tom Sawyer).

Jaws drop when I answer the question, “What’s your favorite leadership book of all-time?” Improbably, I consistently answer, “Man’s Search for Meaning” by Viktor Frankl. What does this rumination on life inside a Nazi concentration camp written by a psychologist have to do with leadership? Frankl chronicles how meaning can be the fuel for life even in the most challenging of situations. He articulates that character can overcome circumstances, which is an extremely valuable lesson for leaders.