Thinking Out Loud

Some years ago I wrote a post about introverts and extroverts to clarify the relationships between introversion, extroversion, interpersonal, and intrapersonal processing (click here). I think it’s time to revisit the discussion, furthering it a bit.

Those who are strong interpersonally, the thinking-out-loud-seeking-engagement types can be introverts or extroverts. Likewise, the intrapersonally strong—those who need to seek inner clarity before they meaningfully engage with others—can also be either introverts or extroverts.  Read More

Maintaining a balance between your work and outside life is a popular topic these days. HR professionals, bloggers, health care professionals, counselors, and others constantly discuss the importance of and how to achieve a balance. Much of the discussion has to do with the accumulated stress and subsequent fallout without balance. Balance, however, is a tricky word in this context. The dictionary definition for the balance tool provides a clear image that can help us visualize the problem: “an instrument for weighing: as a beam that is supported freely in the center and has two pans of equal weight suspended from its ends.” Theoretically, then, if we pile all the stress on one side of the beam, we should be able to pile a whole bunch of other stuff on the other side of that beam to create balance.  This implies that we can achieve equilibrium if we find the right counterbalancing stuff.  Read More

It’s past time to rename “soft skills.” Soft skills, as we all know, are people skills: getting along, communicating well, exhibiting interpersonal finesse.  Calling them soft skills has been a way of differentiating them from hard skills, although no one really uses that term. Hard skills are those associated with numbers: quantitative analysis, efficiency and making hard decisions “based on the numbers,” while you set aside your feelings. Read More

Donna was feeling bogged down by her lack of organization, as she put it. “I have so much stuff in my life (things!) that I can’t seem to organize, and it feels like it holds me back.” This is surely a common complaint and frustration for many people. From the outside, it seems like an easy problem to solve: devote small amounts of time regularly, sort items in boxes, and handle disposing of or packing for storing the easy stuff first. Donna, of course, knew that drill and had tried it many times without success. She had just turned fifty and wanted to “put her house in order,” literally and figuratively, but she was frustrated and discouraged. Read More