Tag: collective challenge

Collective Challenge Day 9 (a new week, a new opportunity)

Posted on by Carl Weber

For those of you keeping track there was no post for Day 8.  I took the day off to rest because I was tired.  I hope each of you took the day off, rested, and are ready for the upcoming week.  Taking a day off, a day to yourself is important.  This rest is not only important during this collective challenge, but important in our lives to maintain ongoing balance between our work and our life.

Recently at work, a few people from another department were heading to lunch together and saw me in the parking lot.  They shouted out to me.

“What is the deal with that SKOOK sticker on your back window?  We noticed some members of your team have it too.”

“It is a long story, come and find me later.”

They found me later that day.

It all started a few years ago.  My team and I spend a lot of time in the car driving all around New Hampshire.  Just north of Franconia Notch there is a road sign.  It reads: Skookumchuck Brook.  To give you some perspective it is just under 100 miles from my house.

Over the years it became a ritual when you passed that sign to stop, snap a photo, send a message, or call the team and yell “SKOOK!”  SKOOK was our way of saying, “hey, I am 100 miles from home, but working hard, finding opportunities, and most likely putting in extra hours to make this happen.”

Everyone who received the message would chime in with encouragement and sometimes a little taunting, and it became a little club, or almost a subculture.  We would notice the times of these messages: 6:00 AM meant someone was on the road around 4:00 AM, 6:00 PM meant that someone still had a few hours until they were home again.

Striving to be a SKOOK on the team meant you thought about each day, how to make a difference, and how to maximize the opportunities right in front of you.  Being a SKOOK required a little more effort, a little more dedication, but the reward of knowing that each of us was giving their all to a cause larger than ourselves made it worth it.

After about a few years of this, I was searching the web and found a website that sells SKOOK stickers.  Apparently Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania (the Coal Region) has a nickname: SKOOK.  And they sell merchandise!  And from that moment forward we have stickers on our cars.

There is another week before us.  We have a choice.  We can let the time pass by like any ordinary week, or we can try to be a SKOOK.  We can make the choice to see each day, each hour as an opportunity to make things happen.  An opportunity to make a difference.  Let’s get out there and earn our stickers!

Collective Challenge Day 7 (Week 1 Recap)

Posted on by Carl Weber

Week 1, done.  Just three weeks and three days left.  Today seemed a bit harder than normal to stay away from the news.  I had gotten into the habit of spending Saturday mornings getting caught up on the news and happenings in the world.

During this week I found myself spending more time in silence, especially in the car.  When the particular podcast I listened to was complete, I couldn’t switch to the radio or news. Instead, I just shut it off.  It was strange at first, but as the days wore on, I found comfort in the absence of noise.

Silence is important.  It gave me time to think, process, and just let go of a few things.  As I was reflecting in silence, I remembered a book that I read by A. J. Jacobs, “The Guinea Pig Diaries: My Life as an Experiment.”  A.J. takes on different experiments with his life and one that came to mind was when he decided to “unitask” (only doing one thing at a time) because in his words:

“I’m trying to do this because I realize I have a problem focusing.  My brain is all over the place.”  Chapter 8 – The Unitasker

I related to his words and the need to be less scattered and more focused.  And this challenge has helped bring some of that.  In my attempt to also be healthier this year, I have been trying to bring my lunch to work each day, and take 15 minutes or so to actually eat it.  This “lunch-time” has also been a great time to either watch a video on Ted.com or just read.  Coincidentally,  A.J Jacobs was on the front page this week and I watched his talk and he spoke about the importance of silence.  His talk appears below.

So far this week has felt less stressful, and the large sense of impending doom around the world seems to be slowly lifting away.  It is January and here in New Hampshire it is going to be sunny and 50 degrees today.  Let’s see what week two brings.

Collective Challenge Day 5

Posted on by Carl Weber

At this point, we have this first week in the bag.  Only a few more days left in Week 1 of our collective challenge.  Enough about me, I would like to hear from you.  How are things going?  How does your world feel?  Are you feeling better?  Worse?  Stir crazy?

Did you find a way to be generous?  Was there a creative way that you inspired hope to someone else?

Are you starting to dream big?  What is that thing you would really like to do?  This one can be hard.  Our lives periodically seem to adjust into autopilot and just cruise along maintaining what we already have.  What did you want to be when you were growing up? Was there something you wanted to do?  Someplace you wanted to go?

Keep up the challenge, you can do it!  Don’t be afraid to share your progress, it may just encourage the rest of us.

Collective Challenge Day 2

Posted on by Carl Weber

A few books I am reading

This morning I realized that I had to change my routine in order to adhere to our collective challenge.  Typically I wake up, get coffee, and go online to review various news sites.  I found myself a little stuck on what to actually do instead.  I decided to check out a few blogs instead, drink that coffee, then go read a few books.

In case you are looking for a few suggestions of what to do instead of the news, I am offering a few suggestions.

http://wordpress.com/#!/topics/  This is the topic section of WordPress and you can find some great blogs by clicking on the topic.

http://talinorfali.wordpress.com/  A writer from Canada who somehow found my blog. Her tagline says it all.

http://sethgodin.typepad.com/  Seth Godin’s blog.  Some great stuff in here.

As for the books, I have a habit of reading more than one book at a time.  In the current queue are Tribes, by Seth Godin, Magnificent Mind at Any Age, by Dr. Daniel Amen, and IMC – The Next Generation by Don and Heidi Schultz.  The first two are for pleasure, the last is for a class I am taking.

I hope this helps, I had to take down the news sites from my Chrome home page, but I am feeling better already.  One thing I realized was the more I read about crime in my own community, the more my opinion of where I live became negative.

Thanks for participating.  I am looking forward to how this 30 days plays out.  You can do it, and 2012 will be great!