The need to grow, home

Three ski jump ramps in Lahti, Finland.
Never dreamed of being a Senior Olympian. Yet in 2009, here i was. Lahti, Finland. Representing Team USA at the 2009 Masters Track and Field World Championships.
two black frames with personal items
From the office wall where i blog most days, these two photos are a few feet away. Photo: My ‘racing bib’ from 2009 and a newspaper article photo from 1977.

My greatest “personal-life” growth opportunity surfaced while teaching Disney Institute (DI) business principles for 15 years.

Disney has, since 1955’s Disneyland opening, operated with four foundational Quality Standards.

They are, in alphabetical order:

  1. Courtesy
  2. Efficiency
  3. Safety
  4. Show

The key however is putting these in an operational priority order.

While teaching this nebulous business wisdom to outsiders, the time-tested DI curriculum never (literally never) rallied outsiders to work through the pain, and risk, that comes from committing to a ‘carved-in-stone’ holy-grail operational imperative.

To help solve this i created a heretofore undiscovered prioritization filter:

  1. Non-negotiable
  2. Famous-for
  3. #1 Business-need

Watch how this becomes easy to put the four alphabetized quality standards into an operational-priority order.

Non-negotiable = Safety

Famous-for = Courtesy and Show (in that order)

#1 Business-need = Efficiency

This business wisdom is context neutral and can be applied in any domain. So, long ago i applied this (and still apply it) to create our family quality standards.

Note: Quality standards are simply a prioritized decision-making matrix. It’s applied by everyone, everywhere at Disney. Your work scope and department NEVER alters the order. Consistency is the hallmark of world-class organizations. This is how we do it at Disney. It’s also how i run my personal life. Safety, Service, Simplicity.

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This website is about our HOME. This is the fifth of five daily, differently-themed blog posts about: (1) mind, (2) body, (3) spirit, (4) work, (5) home. To return to Mid Life Celebration, the site about MIND, click here.

Nobody but you

man in the mountains wearing a mask
Deep in the wilderness. Not another human around for miles. Wearing mask in this photo to timestamp 2020.

Push yourself softly, early and often. Allow the magic of compound interest to fuel your personal growth.

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This website is about our HOME. This is the fifth of five daily, differently-themed blog posts about: (1) mind, (2) body, (3) spirit, (4) work, (5) home. To return to Mid Life Celebration, the site about MIND, click here.

Non-traditional home

warning sign
Vibrancy has no interest in neglect.

Non-traditional home.

Traditional, lots of stuff.

Non-traditional, lots of vibrancy.

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This website is about our HOME. This is the fifth of five daily, differently-themed blog posts about: (1) mind, (2) body, (3) spirit, (4) work, (5) home. To return to Mid Life Celebration, the site about MIND, click here.

Continuously improve your clarity

New cast screen of USA military help to Ukraine
$800-million in aid.

Continuously improve your clarity.

Texted a client because an invoice was past due.

It was my fault for misunderstanding.

The client mailed a check (fast) instead of doing an ACH wireless funds transfer to pay the invoice.

The mailbox is for business and gets checked once a week. The check had probably been sitting there a few days.

All i need to do is tell clients if they wish to pay by check, just let me know when it’s in the mail.

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This website is about our HOME. This is the fifth of five daily, differently-themed blog posts about: (1) mind, (2) body, (3) spirit, (4) work, (5) home. To return to Mid Life Celebration, the site about MIND, click here.

Turning the home page

gas purchase price at pump
Personally, in 2021 around town in my car, i drove 1,500 miles. Roughly 125 miles per month. Walked, jogged or bicycled to whatever needed.

Turning the home page.

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This website is about our HOME. This is the fifth of five daily, differently-themed blog posts about: (1) mind, (2) body, (3) spirit, (4) work, (5) home. To return to Mid Life Celebration, the site about MIND, click here.