#Fearless 2021 @theprofessorowens - Tumblr Blog

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Working to get better. The key word in that phrase is working. To me working is a continual process that requires me to really take the time to do things how in my mind I see them getting done best. That means my morning meditations and walks before I begin my day. That also means taking time to think through things at the end of the day. It also means being ahead and not behind. All of that to me is work. Which doesn’t even include time to study, review, update and check in and up on people. So when I say I am working to get better I really am working, to get better.

The Challenge. Finding the right harmony so that the band makes music and not noise. All the work that I listed above takes time and with time comes investment so my challenge is often in deciding where to invest, where to delegate and where to delete or as one person I talk to often states what to start, stop and continue.

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No Rush. Many times in our lives we are rushing to get to work, to get to vacation, and even to get the kids from after-school care. However, I was recently with my mom on a trip and we were not rushing. Man oh man - it was crazy how relaxed it all was. We were slated to arrive at our destination at 4P but we didn’t arrive until almost 7:30P why because there was no rush. We saw accidents - ate good food - and met good people along the way. It was really amazing how great life can be when you don’t put the pressure to rush on yourself.

The Challenge. Slow down. Have you ever tried going to bed a little earlier and waking up earlier. Why? So you aren’t rushing in the morning. You can take your time getting ready, take your time with your family, take your time in increasing your faith, and take your time and being thankful on your way to work. When you get to your destination you will be amazed how relaxed you are and stress free you are. This will probably make the first day of work, school or vacation much more pleasurable and setting a foundation like that is great!

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Meeting. Today is the first time I will have a meeting with my team, the team I lead. I am nervous, I am driving myself crazy, and I am totally overthinking everything. I have an agenda and an outline, but I am not sure how the team will take it. But I have sent it to them and hopefully, they understand.

The Challenge. This is my first meeting which I call the conclusion of my listening tour and will present the cool information to them with the hopes that we can keep the program the best in the country. However, we don’t want to be the worlds best kept secret we want to be the worlds greatest revelation that we are “the Ritz-Carlton”.

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Busy. Its the one component of life that for some reason many of us can’t seem to escape. It’s the one thing that keeps us distracted from the main thing in which we are supposed to be doing. It’s the one thing that makes the work day go by extremely fast. Busy is also the enemy of focus. That’s the part about being busy that’s really no good. Being busy can rob you of your focus because you are consumed with working and doing instead of making sure that the work that you do really and truly matters.

The Challenge. Do not lose focus. The focus that you have when you get busy shouldn’t be a distraction, but rather the fuel that is needed to keep the fire of your focus burning bright. When you get busy take a quick break and ask yourself is this work a distraction or is the work helping keep the focus fire burning bright.

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Short Time. With just less that 6 weeks left I started a journey almost a year ago with the goal to blog everyday. I started really strong, then got distracted and now we are where we are and it seems as if I am finishing really weak with just less than 6 weeks to go. In addition, I just found out that my IG account has been suspended based off it being hacked. So it seems as if I am not really finishing strong, but finishing at or below average with short time to go. As a football coach I always preached keeping your foot on the gas and never letting up or slowing down. Now would be the appropriate time to do that for myself. In addition, I have also been slacking on my daily schedules and journals with the same pace.

The Challenge. Know how much time you have left on the clock and don’t finish slow, average or even good - go all out and be elite. Remember why you started your journey and why you want to accomplish your goals. I know my why and it revolves around impact and influence. I want to be impactful and influential when it comes to envisioning, creating, sustaining and supporting high-performance learning teams. The fact of the matter instead of having visual/motion parallax (focusing on a constant target) I have focused on all the white noise surrounding me. Time to re-focus, lead my teams, and go be great!

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Lead from Strength. The goal of any good leader should be to lead from their area of strength and many times that has to due with your personality. Personally, I am a team player and I like learning, delegating, and excelling. This is true on my job, in my personal life as well as in a hobby or business adventure. Recently, I have been hearing the word purpose being used over and over again, I have come to the conclusion that I need to synergize my teams around purpose/mission. That’s a strength of mine and I will use it to assist my team moving forward because the teams I am leading are simply great people who are ROCK STARS and need to be pushed and exposed for the greatness that is within them.

The Challenge. Fighting status quo. Status quo is the way things have always been and the way people many times are comfortable with them always being. However, if the only constant thing in life is change then we shouldn’t get too used to status quo no matter how comfortable it makes us feel. I hope as I get older that I don’t get so caught up in what used to work that I don’t seek to understand how things are currently working. I would hope that the same is true for you. Don’t get caught up in what used to work, instead focus your mind and eyes for what is to come.

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Lazy. That has been the true topic of my life for the last 2 months. I have been so off my game that I have no other word to come up with but lazy. However, because I am not dead and because I refuse to let chaos and disorganization rule my life today is DAY ONE!

The Challenge. Don’t let busyness get in your way. When you encounter a thing, call the thing - the thing! I have been lazy and guess what probably so have many of you at this point. So let’s just make today DAY ONE and get better!

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Empathetic Leadership. Most of us have experienced a leader who has lacked in this area and we know the feelings that it created within us. On the other hand, we have probably experienced a leader who is empathetic and we know the feelings that leader created within us. One thing I have experience recently when making a decision was having my actions interpreted as lacking empathy. As a person who prides himself in leadership and leading what I failed to do was take into account culture. Culture does eat strategy for breakfast all day, every day. The result of my actions made it seem as if I was in a place of always defending myself which made me feel even worse as that violates my ABCD code of no arguing, no blaming, no complaining and no defending yourself. I use that ABCD rule as a way to always take ownership of any decision or action that I may do.

The Challenge. Lead with empathy or learn to lead with empathy. Making tough decision is and will always be tough but leading with empathy interpreted and intentional will always lead to the best result possible.

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Re-Do. I remember as a kid playing all types of games asking for a re-do or a do-over. However, the older I got the less and less many people asked for a re-do. I have always wondered why? Is it because as adults we feel that once we make a mistake we can’t get a re-do. I think that’s crazy we give people re-dos all the time I mean doesn’t the saying go something like America loves to give second chances.

The Challenge. Just because you are hard on yourself doesn’t mean that everyone is going to be hard on you. I would say take a moment when you make a mistake cry or get emotional, once that is over go and ask for a re-do. I get it sometimes you can’t get a re-do and we have to live with that. But living with it doesn’t have to be bad it’s called a learned experience. A combination of learned experiences, common sense, and faith will make you wise beyond what you or others think. So be brave and when needed ask for the re-do!

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Conquer. We have all had things in life that we wanted to conquer. Consequently, we have all had things that have conquered us. I have no doubt in my mind that we have all conquered something and then realized why did I even waste my time, talent, and energy trying to conquer it. When conquering things we should always be forward thinking and forward progressing, because conquering something that is regressive is 100% not worth it.

The Challenge. Know what to conquer and when to conquer it, timing is just as important as the task. The thing about conquering is that one must move with confidence and wisdom, the one thing I love and like about conquering is the wisdom it takes to be a warrior. So as you begin to strategically figure out what to conquer, make sure you use wisdom to know when to move and fight.

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Rewritten. Have you ever gotten through a draft of something only to realize that either you didn’t answer the right questions or didn’t provide the necessary detail in the document you were writing - the result was you needed to rewrite the document. Wondering time and time again how to be creative and either direct or indirect in your form of communication one stills to understand that having to rewrite anything is not a bad thing. It’s actually a necessary and good thing.

The Challenge. Find something that you have written or lived out and attempt to begin rewriting the story. I am not sure who stated it but, “success is not final and failure is not fatal.” That said, get busy writing!

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Grief. This is the stage that each of us go through after we lose something we like, love or have developed feelings for. Now it’s true grief hits all of us different at different times. However, what I am learning is that loss sucks. As an athlete I thought losing a game or match was bad, then as I got older I realized that losing someone to death was kind of bas as well. Yet, the worst type of loss is that which you could have prevented but only time and age teach you. Recently, that is the type of loss that I experienced. Let me tell you it’s rough and I don’t deal with loss due to my own immaturity well. I know some might say but you are almost 40 and they would be correct, but that doesn’t mean that I have it all figured out...too be honest they few things that I have figured out about life are going really well but there is a plethora of things I don’t know and man at times they hurt really bad.

The Challenge. Go through the stages of grief. It’s ok to cry. It’s ok to have regret. It’s ok to feel bad. It’s ok to know that you didn’t know. It’s ok to learn from your mistake. It’s ok to ask for forgiveness. Time will heal the wound, just know it may leave a scar. In addition, be mindful of others when expressing yourself. The challenge of grief isn’t easy for any party involved.

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Ethics. The is simply defined as knowing right from wrong. The ultimate question that goes beyond a mental process is the behavior. How do we move from knowing the right thing to doing the right thing. Then we must ask does that change from person-to-person if so why? Is right always right with shades of gray. Is wrong always wrong with shades of gray. The real question we must all ask is can we agree upon that which is right. If we can agree upon than ethic shouldn’t be very hard to uphold as it relates accountability. However, what we often realize is that we give more credence to the right that is gray versus the right that is right.

The Challenge. When we are faced with doing the right thing will we do or will we find a reason not to. I challenge all, when you know right and see right, do it and praise it. We all love to be acknowledged for doing right and the best way to do that is simply reward the behavior and thoughts we want continued.

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Regret. We all have been here in our life and man its a horrible place to camp out for a while. Recently, I went through my own bought of regret when I was trying to decide if I was making the right decision. I looked back at a previous situation that was loathed and lathered in regret. It was a decision that I should have made years ago and today I would be enjoying the fruits of that seed planted. However, I let other things distract me and possibly other people distract me and now, when it comes to that issue I have tons of regret, remorse and even guilt.

The Challenge. Be courageous when its time to be courageous. You don’t know the future and you don’t know how much time you have. When the time comes just be courageous even when you are scared. Your future will thank you for it, even if you present doesn’t quite understand it.

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Bespoke. How many of us have heard this word? Or use it on a regular? Today was the first day I have ever heard this word (actually saw the word). The word was on a job description. The word bespoke means, “made for a particular customer or user.” The word simply means to customize an item specifically for someone. As an avid reader I love when I come across new words that I have not used or heard used in my circle of friends or even read in books. I think as the culture moves forward everyone wants items that are bespoke, we want as many of out items and experiences to be bespoke and I don’t think that there is anything wrong with that particularly.

The Challenge. In a world that seek customization, how do you create a unique experience for everyone. Well, it call comes down to relationships. When we are in relationship with people, we know how to customize their items and their day. Customization doesn’t mean it costs more it means it just fits me better. Like a customized or tailored suit, its not that another person can’t buy the pattern and cloth - it just means that the one I have one fits me and me only perfectly. So instead of being like a factory that mass produces, lets take the time to bespoke our relationships so that the other person knows just how special they are.

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Tough Choices. Each day is filled with tough choices about what to do. Each day is filled with moments and opportunities where we can say that right thing or we can say the wrong thing. Recently, I was asked about a promotion I had gotten by a elderly person, she asked me if I could do one thing well what would it be and I said with no hesitation. I want to be able to make the right decisions. Touch choices and tough decisions seemingly go hand and hand in certain areas of leadership. I have had my share of leadership positions and leadership areas that have made me make a ton of tough choices.

The Challenge. Have the courage to make tough decisions and the wisdom to ask for help/seek guidance when you need it. There is nothing easy about making a tough decision - hence why it’s a tough decision. I would like to think tough decisions are what make leaders become great; however, I am most positive that faith does that. Yet, I would say that tough decisions do highlight the type of leader you are, it defines your style. That said when you are faced with a tough decision make sure you let your leadership style show really, really, really bright!

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It was professed from Day One that that Red Team was the Best Team. However, all the students who participated in the 2021 Digital Transformation Academy exemplified “Arete” (Excellence). They made learning fun, the made tech fun, and they made the last two weeks AMAZING!!! **Cant wait til next year…can we repeat as champs!!!*** https://www.instagram.com/p/CRblnR5JneWqpLZct6xGbHCd9VoBwdgFVJB_Ww0/?utm_medium=tumblr

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#Fearless 2021