My priorities for 2020, as they have been for the last couple years, were to focus on my family, and to grow my coaching business. Having those priorities clear for myself made it easier to navigate the volatile year of 2020. Family came first, then my clients and coaching business, and everything else got dropped […]
Category: selfdesign
Clarity and Focus
People occasionally ask me what I’ve learned in my first couple years as a leadership coach. The unspoken question is “What is the secret to being a better leader?” And while there is no secret per se, there is a formula I see consistently among people who have more impact: Clarity plus Focus. As context, […]
What You Do is Who You Are, by Ben Horowitz
Amazon link Ben Horowitz is best known at this point for being half of Andreessen Horowitz, a leading Silicon Valley venture capital firm. He wrote this book to answer the question: How do you as an organizational leader create and sustain the culture you want? As his book site summarizes, “To Horowitz, culture is how […]
It’s About Damn Time, by Arlan Hamilton
Amazon link Book site I first heard of Arlan Hamilton on the Startup podcast a couple years ago, and her story was amazing as a queer Black once-homeless woman without a college degree who decided to diversify Silicon Valley venture capital through sheer force of will. I was recently reminded of her when she opened […]
The Willpower Instinct, by Kelly McGonigal
[n.b. This may seem like a weird time to publish this book summary given my last couple posts, but I actually got this book from a physical library in the pre-Covid times, and the library is re-opening, so I have to return it soon. Plus, I do think it is relevant to anti-racism work to […]
Letting go of the Hero mindset
I’ve been thinking about personal responsibility this week, and how I align what I take responsibility for with what I control. In my own work with a coach, we’ve identified that I can get into a “Hero Eric” mindset where I try to make everything go right – I feel responsible for holding everything together […]
The Interruption Opportunity
As the coronavirus is wreaking havoc with our lives, I have been reflecting on what opportunities can be found in this tumultuous time. I wrote on LinkedIn about the value I am finding in an abundance mindset where I appreciate and give thanks for what I still have, and I wanted to expand on that […]
Tiny Habits, by BJ Fogg
Amazon link Book site I went through BJ Fogg’s Tiny Habits course back in 2014 with limited success in creating my intended habits. I was planning to skip the book since I figured it was more of the same, but after hearing a podcast interview with him, I realized he covered more in the book […]
The Last Word on Power, by Tracy Goss
Amazon link Tracy Goss is an adherent of Werner Erhard, who developed the est methodology that was later monetized into the Landmark Forum. What I knew of the Landmark Forum seemed pretty dodgy (see this 2003 rant on how I thought it was an evil cult), so I didn’t even want to open this book […]
Changing behavior by changing identity
When you picture yourself five years from now, who will you be? Most of us assume that we will be basically the same as today. We’ll have the same friends, we’ll do the same activities, we’ll make similar decisions as we make today, etc. Now compare yourself to who you were five years ago. Do […]
