Strategy For Your Life. Excellence Is Expected. It Is All About Amal. The Humane Society. We Exist Against All Odds. NASA’s Lunar Strategy. A Great Performance.
- Three of my friends and I formed a small group over a year ago. We discuss the beginning of the year, avoiding New Year’s resolutions but discussing things in our life we are going to change. More than an excuse for a fun dinner fueled by a bottle of wine or two, our group discussion, as pointed out by this consultant in a Harvard Business Review video, really focuses in on our life strategy: “An integrated set of choices that positions a person to live a great life.”
The seven steps comparing corporate strategy and life strategy very much align, with step seven being the key: How can I ensure successful, sustained change? I really enjoyed how this consultant explained social comparison, where you are always comparing yourself with other people in certain areas. Who would have thought that your life can be divided into sixteen strategic life units, with the ultimate goal of creating and sustaining the life you want? The two-by-two strategic life portfolio is a great way to visually plot the level of importance compared to your level of satisfaction with your sixteen life units. The consultant gives us a great quote from the philosopher Seneca: “If you do not know which port you are sailing to, no wind is favorable.“
I will propose this exercise with my other group members at our next dinner. The video does have a short break that you can exit after five seconds, but this nine-minute video is worth the watch.
- Quote of the week. I did change one word:
“Be a yardstick of quality. Some MANY people aren’t used to an environment where excellence is expected.“ – Steve Jobs
- I am not one to watch award shows, though I do have to say that the presenters and winners have slowed their roll over the years with their political diatribes. I do remember Tina Fey burying the talented George Clooney many years ago. A classic salute to women – with Clooney taking it in stride.
- Whatever Humane Society you support, please donate to this great cause. This note is from my Atlanta-based friend Samir, who runs the Board of the Atlanta Humane Society. Please note the Atlanta chapter’s work in Gainesville, Florida. Dear Friends: The Atlanta Humane Society “Day of Giving” is on February 15th, and as I do every year, I am reaching out to seek your support. Thank you for the tremendous support you demonstrated last year, and I am hoping for a repeat 🙂.
In my role as the chairman of the board of directors of the Atlanta Humane Society, I witness the profound impact your donations have on the essential services we provide. In the past year, we distributed nearly 170 tons of pet food to families and small animal shelters in need, we facilitated over 175,000 interactions with pets and their caring families, and we rescued more than 300 abused and maltreated animals. Additionally, our East Lake low-cost vet center provided services to countless pets in desperate need for medical attention. This year, we expanded to a new location in Gainesville, Florida and our team is working on expanding the same low-cost model initiative in Georgia and throughout the Southeast.
In the last few years and due to the pandemic, my aim to organize “Puppies Party” for the children at Scottish Rite Hospital using your donations faced challenges. My hope is for the hospital to relax its policy this year so we can restart this wonderful tradition, and put smiles on the faces of these resilient children.
To make a tax-deductible donation, please visit Samir’s fundraising page for Atlanta Humane Society. https://give.atlantahumane.org/fundraiser/5137623
Your support is genuinely appreciated, and I encourage you to forward this email to fellow animal lovers in your network. Thank you, Samir.
I am not asking but suggesting that if half the people on the JustMyTake distribution list contribute $50 to this important cause, Samir will get off to a great start with his Humane Society fundraising effort.
- “We are alive against stupendous odds.” I have never thought about the reality of life this way, but as usual, Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson nets it out. A very interesting perspective.
- “It will open up the moon as a place where there’s so many companies doing business, that when we want to do something that’s more than just landing stuff on the moon.” This quote is not from Star Trek’s Admiral James T. Kirk. This quote is from Joel Kearns, NASA’s deputy associate administrator for exploration in the Science Mission Directorate. Kearns is explaining the hopeful launch of the New Vulcan Centaur rocket, the first of many missions under NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services contract. The rocket, from commercial space technology company United Launch Alliance (ULA), will travel for twelve days to the moon, enter several weeks of different altitude orbits, and on February 23, drop a lunar lander descending from sixty-two miles to the surface of the moon.
If the landing is goes off as planned (only half of the previous missions deploying equipment and materials to the moon’s surface have been successful), the Astrobotic Technology lunar lander will deploy its payloads, which include a myriad of equipment to measure and indicate levels of water, carbon dioxide, methane and lunar radiation. Along for the ride are five lunar rovers, as well as payloads from five different countries.
The cause and effect of commercial space exploration continues to be mind-boggling as the U.S. Space Force command leverages the private sector to strengthen U.S. commercial and military space systems. Cross your fingers that this mission and lunar deployment are successful – the go-time is early tomorrow morning, January 8th.
- We have all attended events that have started off with someone giving it their best shot with the U.S. national anthem. I have been told many times that the anthem is a difficult song to perform, and unfortunately, we have experienced talented singers having a tough time with Francis Scott Key’s Star-Spangled Banner. Kudos to the L.A. Galaxy staff member who elected to have this young lady perform. Wow!!