Matt Corker » Literature

Day 2 + 3: Distraction & Creative Action

Matt Corker — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 11:16:02 +0000

Day 1 was filled with temptation. The textbooks, the incoming letters from friends I haven’t heard from in years, the blog posts … all tempting to read. I did not give in.

Day 2, yesterday, was a day of distraction. Was there an episode of Community that I could kill some time with? What about perusing pinterest for some visual stimulation? How much time could I spend watching videos on YouTube? (When I found myself watching babies laughing and beagles, I knew it was time to stop.) My procrastination had turned from text to images.

Day 3, today, is the day of creative action. I started off my day with a meeting with the Department of Management, Politics, and Philosophy about their research in self-management. This is the department at CBS that asks questions like “What is money?” and “How do we use co-creation in today’s society?” and hires (read: pays) PhD candidates to do research in authenticity and vulnerability in the business world. It was 10 am and my mind was blown.

My day continued with the download of Danielle’s Big Beautiful Book Plan. It was time to answer the call and realize that this blog may have been the beginning of something bigger … stay tuned.

And now, I am moments away from taking on another artist task for the week: create a vacation and make plans to do it. Well – “all talk, no action” and I don’t go well together. When a plan is created, I commit to making it happen. So I am flying off to Basel, Switzerland with the European Yogi Nomads to enjoy 4 classes this weekend with some great people from across Europe. One of the classes is being taught by Nanna (my friend/teacher here in Copenhagen) and Chris Chavez – together!

Worlds are about to collide in Basel and it will be beautiful.

Pick of the Post: MC Yogi – Give Love

Day 1: “I want to read a book”

Matt Corker — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 09:49:42 +0000

That was the first thought I had when I woke up yesterday – Day 1 of reading deprivation week.

Yes, at 7 am, my bookshelf of textbooks and inspiring texts seemed more appealing to me than eating breakfast. I wanted to read because I knew I wasn’t supposed to.

I’ve experienced that before…

Someone tells me I can’t do something.
Out comes the “oh ya, watch me” response.

Someone tells me I’m not allowed to be somewhere/do something.
Out comes the “I think I could find a way” rebelliousness.

Someone tells me it’s going to be hard and horrible.
Out comes the “not for me, thanks” thoughts.

I think me and my inner rebel will have a good time together this week. Pick of the Post: Freesol ft. Justin Timberlake – Role Model

Creativity On Crack – Reading Depreviation Week

Matt Corker — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 19:00:13 +0000

At the beginning of my MBA, I committed to taking in meaningful learning and development opportunities that would pop up along the way. Ones that would compliment the spreadsheets and textbooks and challenge me all the same.

I was recommend and, since the start of the year, have begun the self-directed course/book The Artist’s Way. The author describes this 12-week course as “a spiritual path to creativity” and “a course in discovering and recovering your creative self.” (It sure isn’t Industrial Economics, that’s for sure!) I believe that tapping into our creative brains helps us see what can be possible and helps us find cool ways to make those ideas happen, so I was (and still am) game.

At first, the weekly chapters, tasks, and morning journal pages seemed too easy. “Am I doing this right?” “Is this really supposed to challenge me?” Over the last three weeks, I have come to love the journal pages and actually look forward to writing them. Then I read the assignment for this week.

No reading for one week.

No Facebook. No Twitter. No textbooks. No magazines. No blogs. No newspapers. No articles. For one full week.

The student inside of me scoffed it off in disbelief. “I have a paper due that I need to get sources for. The author must be kidding me.” “I have pre-readings for my courses that I have to complete.” “I have a trip to Basel – how am I going to entertain myself on the plane!?!” “What about my blogroll? Or my Google news!?” The author then reminded the students and working professionals that NEED to read textbooks or reports that we “wriggle out” of our commitment to read all the time – and call it procrastination. This week was an invitation to wriggle in to not reading. To use creative solutions to find ways of making “not reading” work rather than finding ways of making “reading” not work.

Ok. Now I feel challenged. I can write (phew – blogging galore!) and read my class notes (that I wrote), my e-mails, and the Artist Way tasks for the week. Other than that, as of tomorrow morning, I will be on a strict no reading diet.

So, to my online social networks and favourite blog authors, thanks for your patience.
I’m going to see you again on the 31st.
Be sure to create something rad while I’m away.

Pick of the Post: Casting Crowns – Courageous

Feel the Fear. Step Into Action.

Matt Corker — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 14:03:02 +0000

Sometimes I get really nervous. This usually happens right before I hit the stage, the morning before a marathon, or right before I press send to that e-mail I knew needed to be written yet have no idea where or how it will be received.

I am then reminded that nerves are the best thing I could be experiencing in that moment.

As Steven Pressfield says in “The War of Art,” (hat tip to Chloe for the great read):

The more fear we feel about a specific enterprise, the more certain we can be that that enterprise is important to us and to the growth of our soul. That’s why we feel so much Resistance. If it meant nothing to us, there’d be no Resistance. …

The professional tackles the project that will make him stretch. He takes on the assignment that will bear him into uncharted waters, compel him to explore unconscious parts of himself.

Is he scared? Hell, yes. He’s petrified.

(Conversely, the professional turns down roles that he’s done before. He’s not afraid of them anymore. Why waste his time?)

So if you’re paralyzed with fear, it’s a good sign. It shows you what you have to do.

Deep breath. Here we go!

Pick of the Post: Straight No Chaser – Buddy Holly

Causes of Happiness

Matt Corker — Thu, 21 Jul 2011 14:00:02 +0000

I was reading this article in the Sydney Morning Herald and just had to repost a portion of it focusing on 5 habits for everyday happiness:

5 HAPPY HABITS

Three years ago, the British government asked London think-tank the New Economics Foundation (NEF) to review studies on happiness from around the world and turn its findings into simple tips for daily well-being. These are NEF’s five tips for everyday happiness, with comments from speakers at the happiness conference.

1) CONNECT WITH PEOPLE AROUND YOU
“Humans are social creatures, and connecting with others is a basic human need. One of the best ways to build a social network is to become involved in clubs, courses and sporting groups e.g. bushwalking, singing, touch football, gardening and discussion groups.”
- Dr. Sarah Edelman, Psychologist and author of Change Your Thinking

2) BE ACTIVE
“Exercise is so important: it helps maintain our dopamine system, the neurological system that gives us feelings of pleasure and ecstasy.”
- Roko Belic, Director of the documentary Happy

Happy – A Documentary Trailer from Wadi Rum Films on Vimeo.

3) TAKE NOTICE
“I’m happiest when I’m not focused on myself. It sounds cheesy but as a science journalist I am totally awed by the natural world and the wildlife in my urban environment.”
- Natasha Mitchell, Presenter of ABC Radio National’s All in the Mind

4) KEEP LEARNING
“Although he’s one of the greatest geniuses of all time, Leonardo da Vinci made some colossal mistakes … Part of what made Leonardo a genius was that he never stopped learning.”
- Michael Gelb, Author of 12 books on creative thinking, including How to Think Like Leonardo da Vinci

5) GIVE
“If you dedicate one hour a week to charity or a community cause- whether it’s helping children suffering with cancer, helping animals at an animal shelter, helping the elderly in a nursing home- your levels of happiness and resilience will increase, and your levels of anxiety and depression will reduce.”
- Professor Paula Barrett, Childhood anxiety expert, University of Queensland

Pick of the Post: Classified – That Ain’t Classy

Work With And Without Ego

Matt Corker — Thu, 07 Jul 2011 05:00:05 +0000

I have also met others who may be technically good at what they do but whose ego constantly sabotages their work. Only part of their attention is on the work they perform; the other part is on themselves. Their ego demands personal recognition and wastes energy in resentment if it doesn’t get enough – and it’s never enough. “Is someone else getting more recognition than me?”

Or their main focus of attention is profit or power and their work is no more than a means to that end. When work is no more than a means to an end, it cannot be of high quality. When obstacles or difficulties arise in their work, when things don’t go according to expectation, when other people or circumstances are not helpful or cooperative, instead of immediately becoming one with the new situation and responding to the requirements of the present moment, they react against the situation and so separate themselves from it.

What is more, this “anti”-energy creates new obstacles, new opposition. Many people are truly their own worst enemy. People unknowingly sabatoge their own work when they withhold help or information from others or try to undermine them lest they become more successful or get more credit than “me.” Cooperation is alien to the ego except when there is a secondary motive. The ego doesn’t know that the more you include others, the more smoothly things flow and the more easily things come to you. When you give little or no help to others or put obstacles in their path, the universe – in the form of people and circumstances – gives little or no help to you because you have cut yourself off from the whole. The ego’s unconscious core feeling of “not enough” causes it to react to someone else’s success as if that success had taken something away from “me.” It doesn’t know that your resentment of another person’s success curtails your own chances of success.

In order to attract success, you need to welcome it wherever you see it.

- Eckhart Tolle, excerpt from A New Earth

(Hat tip to my rad colleague Jer for the reminder of this great passage.)

Pick of the Post: Kanye West – All of the Lights

How To Minimize Voluntary Turnover

Matt Corker — Sun, 03 Jul 2011 22:14:40 +0000

The answer is simple.

We take care of our people in order to do what a business is set out to do: make money.

For a business to be successful, we need to educate, empower, and inspire people so that they can be freed from the obstacles that prevent them from realizing their full potential. We need to take a sincere interest in helping the people we serve.

- Antonio Zivanovic, CEO of Corporate Occupational Solutions Inc

(excerpt from PeopleTalk Summer 2011 Edition)

Pick of the Post: Armistice – City Lights Cry

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Using Words That Change Minds

Matt Corker — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 06:03:47 +0000

How you frame your idea is key. By selecting the right words to use, you can either enroll your audience in what you’re saying, or leave them disengaged and unmotivated to take action. In Shelle Rose Charvet’s book “Words That Change Minds: Mastering the language of influence,” she suggests each other of us has motivation traits (how our interest is triggered) and working traits (how we handle information, people, decisions, etc).

One motivation trait that stood out for me was direction. Carvet defines direction as a person’s motivational energy centered on goals or problems to be dealt with or avoided.

Carvet groups people into three categories for this trait: Toward people (40%), Away From people (40%), Equally Toward and Away From people (20%). Towards people are motivated and inspired to achieve or attain goals. They have trouble recognizing problems, but are very good at managing priorities. Away From people, on the other hand, focus on what may be and is going wrong. They are motivated to solve problems and may have difficulty managing priorities because whatever is wrong will attract most of their attention. Note: At the extreme, Away From people are often perceived as jaded or cynical – especially by Toward people, who are perceived as naive by Away From people.

How do you identify a Toward/Away From person? Listen to what they say after the word because. It will either be a Toward or Away From statement.
Example: “I want a promotion because I would get more money and more influential work” (Toward) vs. “I want a promotion because I would not have all this routine work and debt” (Away From).

How do you change their mind? Use specific words that will trigger their Toward or Away From mindset in that context.
Towards people are motivated by words like: gain, attain, have, obtain, include, get, achieve
Away From people are motivated by words like: avoid, steer clear of, not have, get rid of, exclude, away from, unwanted
Example: “This new technology will help us to achieve our goal of being more efficient” (Toward) vs. “This new technology will help us get rid of the inefficiencies we currently have” (Away From).

Same goal. Same problem. Two different directions. Inspiring someone to take action on starts with how you frame it.

Pick of the Post: Brandon Flowers – Crossfire (official music video)

Sun Tzu says: “Burn the Boat”

Matt Corker — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 14:53:31 +0000

In the Chinese military treatise, The Art of War, Sun Tzu writes about military strategy and tactics. Since much of the text is about how to fight wars without having to do battle, it provides a great perspective on leadership and strategy. One of his lesson really hit home this week:

[The leader of an army] burns his boats.

Essentially, he suggests we need to remove any return routes (boats) to help us press onward into unknown territory. This doesn’t mean you set your team on the shore, burn their boats, and keep your boat afloat – ya know, just in case. This means you step on the shore as well, burn all your boats (and your reasons to back out with them), and put all your energy and focus towards moving forward – together.

Risky, right! But by doing this you replace safety nets with a stronger purpose and deeper drive amongst your ranks. It’s a huge act of faith and teamwork. “We’re here. There’s no turning around. We know our goal. So let’s go accomplish it!”

Now, imagine if we applied this theory to our own decision making. Isn’t it about time to commit to setting your life (and that boat) on fire!

Pick of the Post: N.E.R.D ft Nelly Furtado – Hot & Fun (official music video)

Dealing With Change – and lots of it…

What Linchpins Read

Matt Corker — Tue, 15 Jun 2010 14:16:40 +0000

Yesterday was Worldwide-Meet-The-Tribe-Of-Linchpins Day according to Seth Godin. Seth fans gathered together at over 790 meetups around the world and talked about his books/blog, shipping ideas, and many other topics of interest.

Chris Coldeway, another UBC Sauder alum and creator of redrovr, organized the Vancouver Meetup. My sis got up there and shared a bit about her time in NYC with Seth as part of his nanoMBA program. She was rad – as per always. Chris then led the attendees in creating smaller discussion groups where we talked about whatever topic someone wanted to take the lead on discussing. Didn’t like the conversation in that group? Implement the 2 feet rule! (You have two feet, so use them to walk to a new group.)

I wanted to know what these linchpins were reading so was excited to get some really rad folks at the table. This was the list that the 8+ of us created. I tried to organize them into some categories to help you pick out your next read:

Economics

Superfreakonomics – Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner
Startup Nation – Dan Senor and Saul Singer

Fiction/Memoirs:

Swiss Family Robinson – Johann David Wyss
The Glass Castle – Jeannette Walls

Blogs:

43 Folders
Brains on Fire
Life without Pants
Backpocket COO
Freshness Factor Five Thousand (Jason Mraz)
Blocquote
Chase Jarvis
The Art of Non-Conformity

… as if my to read list wasn’t already long enough! Happy reading linchpins!

Pick of the post: Hannah Georgas – Bang Bang You’re Dead