Are you willing to follow a path that has not been previously defined?

Seth Godin writes,
"Anthropologists have found that we’re very motivated to divide into teams, and once on a team, we’ll work hard to degrade the other team. Over the smallest differences. For the smallest possible stakes. Even when we get no other benefit than thinking that we won something.

We spend a lot of time sorting people into buckets. We label them in order to treat them differently and establish expectations for how they’ll respond. Mostly to figure out which team they’re on. An email from a stranger causes us to spend some time guessing their status, gender and connection to us.

Which team?

Strangely, we don’t care so much about whether someone is right handed or left handed. We don’t waste cycles on dividing people by whether they can curl their tongue or even if they can play the piano.

I totally understand our caring about Yankees vs. Red Sox. About seeking out team affiliation when team affiliation is a choice, when it’s intentionally competitive, when it tells us something about what’s going to happen next.

But if we’re not sure of someone’s gender, religion, citizenry, sexual preference or race, we can get very uptight. Ambidextrous (unsorted) in these areas is a problem, apparently, even though there’s no relationship (zero) between the things that matter (attitude, skills, talents) and the easily measured team affiliation that we all seem so concerned about.

And that leads to a great opportunity. If you can be the person who coordinates the work of people regardless of their designated unasked-for affiliation, you’ll be able to find brilliant contributors that others foolishly overlook.

The room has more room than ever for those willing to be ambidextrous, to follow a path that’s not previously defined. Work with them or get out of their way."

Selfless

Thanks to Ann Voskamp

Can you change your attitude?

Marc and Angel remind us at Unbounded Spirit that even when we cannot change anything else, we can still change our attitude.

Have no clue how to change your perception of things – and improve your attitude? Here are seven easy ways to start:
1. Still you mind.
2. Change you focus. From the awareness of your thoughts and emotions you become able to consciously redirect your focus. There are no hopeless situations; there are only people who have grown hopeless about them. Don’t let the pain make you desperate. Don’t let the negativity wear off on you.
3. Surrender your worries and embrace acceptance.
4. Practice gratitude.
5. Reframe your struggles as growing pains.
6. Look for the beginning in every ending.
7. When all else fails, use your body.

Read more here.

Tough as they come

Is it any surprise to anyone that Amy Van Dyken-Rouen has an upbeat attitude about her new life as a paraplegic?



Nicki Jhabvala reports in the Denver Post that

Amy Van Dyken-Rouen wants to "rock out" her wheelchair. She wants it to have skulls and crossbones, and she wants it to be purple, with her hair to match. Then she wants to wheelchair race her father.

She's "excited" about this new phase in her life. It's a rebirth.

She will pose for photos from her hospital bed with a big smile and a thumbs-up.

She will joke on Twitter about missing her Keurig coffee but is looking forward to having good parking at Arizona Diamondbacks games in Phoenix.

She will have surgeries and spend days in the intensive care unit, and come out sounding as though life couldn't be grander.

The six-time Olympic gold medalist swimmer, who suffered a severed spinal cord in an all-terrain vehicle accident in Show Low, Ariz., on June 6 and is paralyzed from the waist down, has amazed her fans and followers with her upbeat attitude.

But those who know her aren't surprised.

Please read here what those who know her have to say about her attitude.

"She will find a way to challenge this new world"

Kieran Nicholson reports in the Denver Post:

Six-time Olympic swimming gold medalist Amy Van Dyken-Rouen completely severed her spinal cord in an ATV accident near her Arizona home and is in intensive care in a Scottsdale hospital.

"Amy awoke within hours of surgery acting like her typical spunky, boisterous, ebullient self and has spent the last 24 hours entertaining her family and her medical staff in the ICU," read a statement her family released to swimmingworldmagazine.com.

Van Dyken-Rouen, who was injured Friday near the couple's Arizona home, is in the third day of a critical period and is showing signs of improving, Rouen said.

After surgery, "she needed about three days before she is out of the woods," Rouen said. "She is strong and has a great attitude."

Van Dyken-Rouen, who graduated from Cherry Creek High School in 1991, won four gold medals — 50-meter freestyle, 100-meter butterfly, 4x100-meter freestyle relay and 4x100-meter medley relay — at the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta. She took home two more golds at the 2000 Summer Games in Sydney, repeating in the relay events.

The couple had been out to dinner near their home, and Van Dyken-Rouen was riding an ATV back when she hit a curb and the vehicle tumbled down an embankment.

Rouen, a former Broncos punter, raced to her aid on his motorcycle.

"She wasn't breathing," Rouen said. "I raised up the back of her neck with my hand, she started gasping for air."

A paramedic came across the accident and helped Rouen. When emergency responders arrived, Van Dyken-Rouen was conscious but was having trouble breathing, according to a police report. She was transported by helicopter to a hospital.

"Amy was unable to move her toes or her feet when asked by EMS," a Show Low Police Department report said. "When asked about feeling in her legs, Amy stated she could not feel anything touching her legs."

Van Dyken-Rouen will likely remain in ICU for at least several days.

"I'm really worried about her," said 2000 Sydney Olympics teammate B.J. Bedford Miller, who now lives in Fort Collins. "You don't want this to happen to anybody, but I don't know of anybody who's more of a fighter, who will figure out a way to look at this positively and find a way to challenge this new world. I don't know anyone other than Amy who can do that."

On Monday, the Van Dyken and Rouen families released a statement. "Amy's spinal cord was completely severed at the T11 vertebra, but, miraculously, a broken vertebra stopped within millimeters of rupturing her aorta," the statement said.

Please read more here.