"Handle with Care"

"How we handle our tough times stays with us for a long time..."
- Max Lucado in "Facing Your Giants"

I have often wondered what makes an individual great. If you're like me, visions flash before you of individuals you have come to deeply honor and respect. There is an "epitomic" view we each have of what a great individual looks like. We each have what is called an Implicit Personality Theory (IPT) about people; that is, our own sets of hypotheses about what people are like. Armed with our IPTs, we envision what these Champions of Life look like and set our lives against that mold and standard.

The common thread, for the Champions of my world, is tied very closely to how they each handle(d) tough times. That is, what they did when:

• They stumbled...over and over again
• They lost things and people important to them
• They encouraged themselves when discouraged by failure
• They were disappointed and betrayed by others
• The machinery of life simply would not cooperate in their favor

How these individuals handled these and other situations ranks high in my IPT of great individuals. See, I believe that to traverse the world leaping from one mountaintop to another builds less backbone than having to ascend and descend multiple mountains while spending large amounts of time in the valley. To me, the Champions of Life are those individuals who have learned how to handle tough times with clarity and sensitivity to the effects that the decision(s) at hand have for the future...

Our IPT builds on previous and current experience; equally, our ability to handle tough times improves with each tough time. If we can handle tough times with maturity (please note that I did not say we will handle them without fading, failing or falling), we set ourselves up for even better performance the next time another tough time comes. So, today I have two questions for you:

What's your IPT about Champions of Life?
How are you handling tough times?

(c) 2009, Dr. Kozhi Sidney Makai. No part of this blog post may be reproduced or stored in a retrieval system without the written consent of the copyright holder.

I want...OUT!

...the only way out, is through!!


I woke up this morning thinking about the challenges I have faced in the last ten years. As I prepared my decaf Chai Tea, I considered my response to every storm that has come in the last 120 months: death, loss, pain, betrayal, financial tornadoes...
I decided to take inventory because I was concerned about my progress; I wondered if I had grown at all. I wondered whether I was responding to every storm in the same way. I asked myself if I was avoiding the storms again...
Unlike the physical storms that Mother Nature orchestrates, the "storms of growth" cannot be avoided. For those who feel they have successfully avoided them, they become repetitive patterns in their lives until the lessons are learned...
The "storms of growth," I have found, must not only be faced head on, they must be traversed through. Last year, the Gulf Coast experienced Hurricane Ike and the constant word by our local metereologists was to "hunker down" once the storm hit. Again, being a storm whose maestro was Mother Nature, this makes perfect sense.
However, for "storms of growth," the only way out of them is through. I was speechless as I thought about how the only way I would grow ("survive") after the storm was to go through it - not try to drive around it, fly over it, or burrow underneath it...
Did this comfort me? Not really. I just realized that I cannot avoid the highway leading to my growth and improvement. As one friend said, "the highway to heaven is in the desert." I don't know what your "heaven" is, but I can assure you, my friend, that the only way for you to get there is through - not under, through, or over...
What storm(s) are you avoiding?

(c) 2009, Dr. Kozhi Sidney Makai. No part of this blog post may be reproduced or stored in a retrieval system without the written consent of the copyright holder.

Tough Psychology

"Feeling inadequate has a universal zip code"
- Victory Ford on Season II of NBC's 'Lipstick Jungle'


I'd like to meet anyone who does not have "crises of quality" - OK, fine; this is a phrase I use to mask the feelings of "inadequacy" or "impotence" we all get to feel at some point(s) in our lives. This is a time when we doubt the quality of God's workmanship in us and feel completely useless and lacking in viability. For many of us, this is a tough season marked by picking through the rubble of the financial tornado that has hit many of our businesses and homes...


I have to say, however, that the great challenge of our age is not at the bank or on the job, but in the mind. Fighting feelings of inadequacy is a full time job. Things may even be going wonderfully for us, yet we still feel inadequate. I had to counsel a friend recently who had just began a relationship and was basically sabortaging the relationship because of a "crisis of quality" - also known as "insecurity". There was little wrong with the relationship; she was just feeling threatened and inadequate by, don't laugh, ghosts! Yes, ghosts! The things she'd experienced in the past extended their long arms and were sucking life out of her present!


Our mental health is vital to any success we might enjoy - with family, with work, or with others. Nothing threatens our mental health more than feeling inadequate and letting those feelings linger and fester. Chasing ghosts leads only to frustration. Looking at life as a gift daily, changes our approach to things. Then, when we feel inadequate, we realize that it's part of our experience as living human beings; and, armed with that knowledge, we press on knowing that we can and will overcome...

What are you feeling today?

(c) 2009, Dr. Kozhi Sidney Makai. No part of this blog post may be reproduced or stored in a retrieval system without the written consent of the copyright holder.

Persevering through Adversity...

"In the confrontation between the stream and the rock, the stream always wins - not through strength, but by perseverence."
- H. Jackson Brown, Jr., Author of "Life's Little Instruction Book"



I have always wondered about people who stop just short of the goal...those who give up when a little more would have turned the battle. I am not one to judge; simply pointing out a simple observation. We tend to give up too quickly!

I recently discovered something about myself: I have no desire to run a marathon...not for ego reasons or for accomplishment's sake. I can give a plethora of excuses, but it all boils down to this simple fact: I-have-no-desire. There are, however, other things I wish to accomplish in life - things I greatly desire to see through. For those, I will put my head down, like a Tour de France cyclist, and fight a strong headwind towards the finish line.
When it comes to fighting through adversity, we must put our heads down and keep "cycling" - for some, it's training, writing, learning how to be cordial, or simply giving it the best you've got; for others, it's swinging even when there's no fight left in you...running when you can't feel your legs.

When our desire meets a determination to overcome and do whatever it takes to reach the finish line, we have already attained success. You see, crossing the finish line is the prize; however, we cannot get to the prize at all if we do not have a potent mix of desire and determination. Some say we need to "live life on purpose"...I say that we must be deliberate about life. Nothing "happens" on it's own (see Newton's Laws of Motion) - an object, according to Newton, will remain at rest unless acted upon by an outside force...

So, dear friend, what are you not acting upon? Is it your education? Perhaps your finances? Maybe your marriage? Could it be your career? Are you waiting for things to happen? Or are you being deliberate? Fighting for your end result and causing motion?
Will you act upon the feeling you now have to act?

(c) 2009, Dr. Kozhi Sidney Makai. No part of this blog post may be reproduced or stored in a retrieval system without the written consent of the copyright holder.

Adverse Conditions and Attitude...

"The greatest works of admiration, and all the fair examples of renown, out of distress and misery are grown"
– Samuel Daniel, Earl of Southampton


During a recent online conversation with one of my college buddies, I was asked how I was doing. I responded "well" and added a "smily face" to my post. At that, he asked if that was genuine joy or if I was "hysterically smiling in the face of adversity" (nice one, Doug!) - this, of course, prompted me to LOL. Oops...I mean...that prompted me to laugh out loud (really loud). Doug and I have been friends for about five years now and he's come to know me as the boy who pops an optimism pill as much as Dr. House (on Fox's hit show "House") pops pain killers. Needless to say, in this instance, I was simply genuinely overjoyed; but that phrase prompted a thought process that led to what you are now reading...

Taunting, I have found, can be an effective tool to discourage and, in essence, disarm one's enemies. While my opponents during a basketball game are not enemies, they tend to become potent targets for a little dose of trash talking (though limited to people I know). I was always told that basketball is a thinking game; so, all things being equal, athleticism accounts for much but is useless without solid "basketball IQ." In taunting, I get to test the IQ of my opponents and see if their game can withstand a barage and torrent...no, deluge, of taunts. The best of them tend to only play better; the worst of them, become puppets...and I, the puppeteer.

Adverse conditions are universal; no matter one's station in life, challenges will come. What seems to differentiate those who overcome and succeed and those who do not is this: attitude. I believe that we must constantly evaluate our "Life IQ" to see if we are tooling and retooling regularly to match changing conditions. Those with a high "Life IQ" know that if one is not coming out of a challenge or in one presently, then the challenge is around the corner; so, they prepare. It's been said that "chance favors the prepared"...so the chances of one overcoming and withstanding the deluge and torrent of adversity greatly increase when one is...well...ready.

One amazing tool to use is to "hysterically smile in the face of adversity". It helps you change your perspective, and, in turn, helps you change your attitude. I am sad to report that we make ourselves victims far too much; we choose to be overcome by things we ought to know are common to all. Just like Christmas comes once every year, and at the same time, yet people fail to prepare (and in turn prepare to fail), adversity is going to come; we just need to learn how to be ready.

Are you ready? Is your life boarded up for the storm? Do you have supplies to last you through and past the harsh conditions? Do you have insurance to cover any damage? Or are you simply hoping against hope that the storm will miss your city and go elsewhere?

(c) 2009, Dr. Kozhi Sidney Makai. No part of this blog post may be reproduced or stored in a retrieval system without the written consent of the copyright holder.

More on the Past and Learning...

"Our world is changing faster than ever before, and the importance of learning is growing even faster. Any significant improvement in life...is based on learning."
- Ronald Gross in 'Peak Learning'

I'm not certain how this has happened in the recent past, but I am finding myself in the middle of discussions about the past a lot lately. Just recently, I met with a friend who was sorely disappointed by the actions of someone close. The results of those actions were far-reaching, and also were causing much present grief. I could not help but think how this was a potent situation for growth - after all, I thought, what could be a greater impetus for higher level living and thinking than learning [in the words of the title of Dr. Seligman's book] "what you can change and what you can't"?

"The knowledge of the difference between what we can change and what we must accept in ourselves is the beginning of real change," says Dr. Martin P. Seligman. It worries me, this lack of appreciation for who we are. That is, our inability to change some things - especially those things that are in the past. As I sat with my friend, I realized just how much pain the situation was bringing - I could empathize. At the same time, I was concerned that a viable learning opportunity was being wasted; all in the name of "venting". What was being missed, however, was that nothing could be done about the past - all that remained was the present.

I know that some situations come down on us like a ton of bricks, but our reactions to them matters much more than anything else (after proper medication attention, of course). In essence, what have we learned from the situation? What is the take away? How does this affect our future? Where do we go from there? All these questions, and more, are key to the understanding requisite for self-improvement. You see, we cannot truly improve unless we are willing to accept that each experience in life can be and should be used as a learning tool. There is so much unpredictability in the world; we tend to flow better in life when we learn to not only live life but experience it. The full experience of life is based on an honest evaluation of ourselves, daily.

That said, how are you doing? Are you experiencing life? Or are you merely...living?

(c) 2009, Dr. Kozhi Sidney Makai. No part of this blog post may be reproduced or stored in a retrieval system without the written consent of the copyright holder.