Author: Mike Balof

A retired Air Force Master Sergeant, Mike used to lay in bed at night and worry about what would happen if his plant closed or found himself without a job. One day his plant closed. Rather than panic and hysteria (OK, maybe a little) Mike found himself carried away on the adventure of his life. Mike started with the best job he ever had working at Home Depot. He spent 8 years working with job seekers at a local workforce center, helping them to find employment. He then started his own company developing courses, writing books and urging others to follow their own paths into the future. Mike holds a Master of Arts in Adult Education and Training and a Bachelor of Business Management, earned through the University of Phoenix and an AAS degree in Electronics Systems Technology from the Community College of the Air Force. Mike is a member of the Delta Mu Delta Business Honor Society.

Toys or Tools

Many things can be both toys and tools. With so many things doing multiple jobs, it is easy to lose sight of their primary use in life. And that is okay. Remember it’s not all the tasks that a piece of electronics can do, its how people use the electronics to start with.

Many of the major electronic systems on the market will overlap each other in use by a large degree. They were designed to do this. What once was the purview of a desktop computer quickly became the use of a laptop, which allows us to take our office with us wherever we need or desire to go.  Downloaded work on the laptop can be accomplished almost anywhere, although it is easier if you have a connection to the internet.

The tablet took over from the laptop, doing most of the same work on a platform you could carry in your hands and a 7 to a 12-inch screen that was easy to read and handle just about anywhere. The tablet can do anything from playing games, to face to face conversations, to reading books, playing games or even running your business, the modern tablet far outstrips the old desktop computer, and the better computer tablets give laptops a run for their money.

Nowadays, with a smartphone, you can do almost anything that a computer or tablet can do. It can do this work over a cell tower or an Internet. And many tasks not requiring connections can be done without either a cell tower or an Internet. The phone can take a picture of what you want to organize. The phone can take a picture of the excellent work you did so that later on when other people mess things up, you can explain why it’s their turn to fix it. You can record and save your shopping list, control your calendar, your library, read books, watch movies, and do many more fun activities.

So are electronics time stealers who rob you of precious moments that you could be doing something else? Or, are these machines safety devices which keep you connected to the world allow you to perform most of your needed tasks and required planning? It depends. Electronic or not, a machine is just a machine. A computer can either do or not do whatever the user desires. They perform safety and emergency functions as well as communication and services of relaxation and enjoyment. The machine has no real intent of its own. It only does what is asked of it.

Thank you for being with me today. I hope to be with you again tomorrow.

Time to Organize Our Fall

The vacation Summer is over, Labor Day is all but gone, and it is time to make and keep plans to accomplish the work for Fall. Before you get worried that I’m about to berate you with how we need to work harder, I am not. I should begin by telling you that I’m advocating you work less and enjoy more of the fruits of your labor.

Instead of starting 100 tasks one at a time, getting so far and then tiring or growing bored, plan ahead. The hardest part of anything is starting. It takes far more energy to put something into motion than it does to keep it going. The trick is to keep the movement steady. And the only way you can do that is to have a plan for what’s next.

So, set up a plan for what you want to do, and when the best time would be to do it. If you’re watering the lawn is usually early morning or in the early evening, or maybe both. There is a time for laundry, time to clean the kitchen, and a time to vacuum the house. Don’t forget there’s also a time to read a book, write a friend, watch a TV show, or playing a game.

When you set up your schedule, figure out what you want to do and when. You may have to adjust times, and on occasion, you might even have to change which chores are done when. And make sure you include everything. When you start the day, keep moving with the schedule in mind. Does it have to be exact to the minute? No. Should it be steady? Yes. This is because even if you sit down to read a book or watch a TV show, it is still part of your forward movement in time.

As long as you are on the same plane of movement, the forward motion does not have to be restarted, it just continues to flow. You are running your schedule, which you have already invested the energy of getting started into, and therefore, each additional task you do does not take any extra energy to start. It is just a continuation of the plan for the day.

Please consider this, and like everything, don’t take my word for it. Try it out in small doses and see if it might work for you.

Thank you for being with me today. I hope to be with you again tomorrow.

Together We Can

Yesterday, I talked about why I could not do everything for you. And why there were some things you just had to do for yourself. Today is a little bit different. Today, I would like to let you know there are things we can do together.

First, without getting boring or bragging, let me tell you a little about myself. I’ve been teaching professionally both in the classroom and online since 2003. I started off as a corporate trainer and then moved into private training. Although I still teach online, and occasionally in the classroom. When the factory I taught at was scheduled to be shut down in 2007, I helped over 200 people research, and apply for positions in other businesses. The majority of people who tried and were serious found a job in about five months. I went on to help others through the local workforce center. I am now retired and work at helping others wherever I can.

The reason I say this is to let you know that I mean what I say. Please don’t let the word retired worry you, I am up on the new trends and just completed training last year, and now I am a life coach. I get a lot of people who ask me why I wanted to become a life coach. Two reasons. If you study something, it’s because you’re interested in it. Secondly, I find a lot of my friends who have fallen into holes, ruts actually, and since I’ve been in some of those ruts before, I want to be prepared to jump in and help them out.

What I can do is be a sounding board. I’m willing to work with you, listen to you, and help where I can. I have many tools we can use to work together. We can connect via Zoom or other video applications. I’m trained in long-distance education which plays well into long-distance coaching. Throughout my life, I’ve lived in various parts of the world, so I understand a little about customs and social needs and variations found in different geological areas. And I can be at your service if you think I can help.

If you are interested, please send a comment with how I can contact you, or, you can contact me at mikeb@reveille.com.

Thank you for being with me today. I hope to be with you again soon.

Can’t Do It For You

We’ve been talking this week about tools, mentors and other things that can help you. You need to remember, though, that every person is different. Tastes, desires, strengths, and weaknesses are all individual traits. If anybody else does something for you, they are working with their physiology even though they are thinking of you. This means that they would do their best, yet they could not exactly match your needs and desires because they were working off their own.

It is much better to build your own life and your own paths into the future. You will be happier with your results because you did the work than you would with anyone else’s. After all, there’s only one you, and only you know what you truly want to do.

This does not mean that you are totally alone. You need to talk to people, ask questions, listen to responses, and then put all that together to make your own decisions. You are the one who knows what you want to accomplish. Only you know what you’re willing to do to get to where you want to be. And only you can make those decisions.

Don’t sell yourself short. You can do this. Ask, talk, reach out, and try. Will everything go perfectly? I can’t promise you this, and no one else can either. Just because you don’t get a guarantee does not mean that you should not at least try. This is your life, and you are the one who is going to go out and live it. Everyone else is here to help, but the decisions and the rewards are yours.

Think about this for today, and tomorrow I’ll send you a blog telling you the things that we can do together to help you. Remember, if you really want something and you are willing to do what it takes, I for one will not get in your way. After all, I’ve seen so many thrive and win when it seemed everything was working against them.

Thank you for being with me today. I hope to be with you again soon.

How You Use Your Tools

I used to be much more substantial than I am now. I wanted to be thinner. I wanted to have the energy and the stamina to go out and do more things. I would go down to the store and pick out exercise tapes and bring them home. They never really worked, and I am not sure why. I used to lay on the couch for hours and watch them, and they never seem to do much good for me. I wonder why?

I know people who buy bug-spray they never use. Their kitchen cabinets overflowing with cleaning supplies, to the point they can’t get the newest purchase into the shelves. Tools that don’t get used and camping gear that just sits idle. And yet, the actual answers are easy. Get up and go do it!

The tools to make your life easier is great. Yet any device by itself is of little use to anyone if not actually used as intended. Does this sound like work? Might we break a sweat? Can I do it in 15 minutes? Yes, yes, and probably not. If you’re going to do something you must get up and go do it. Very little ever happens from the couch or the La-Z-Boy recliner.

It’s great that you have an exercise video. The fact that you purchased cleaning supplies means you know what needs to be done. And camping gear shows motivation. Now you have to make plans and go do it. Cleaning up the house? Try an hour a day. If you don’t have an hour, break it up into two 30-minute sessions. Maybe one at the beginning of the day and one in the evening. Plan a hike. Choose a weekend afternoon or morning, a place to go, and then make sure you do it. Just remember to make it fun.

If you’re going to use exercise tapes, check with your doctor to make sure that you are healthy enough to do so, and then try them out. At first, do so in small doses, maybe 30 or 45 minutes at a time. You might even consider making exercise a social venture. Find a gym or group in your area that has exercise programs or dance programs that you might enjoy.

There are many areas you could use these ideas in, not just the ones I’ve mentioned. Tools are great, but things don’t do the job, you do. The exciting thing is, usually the more you do it, the happier you become with the results.

Thank you for being with me today. I hope to be with you again tomorrow.

What Others Do for Us

Many people are living and working in the world, and those who know us are always helping us, even when we do not realize it.  We need to recognize this assistance and use it to our advantage.  We grow, not by our own work alone. We grow by all the interactions we have along the way with others.

When I met my wife in college, we talked about many things. I talked about how nice it would be to go and live in Alaska for a while and enjoy the scenery and the animals and the climate. My wife told her mom about this conversation, and her mom told her to stay away from me. Her mom was worried and said that I was a dreamer. The fascinating part of this is that my second son was born at the Elmendorf Air Force Base hospital in Anchorage, Alaska.

 We all have relatives and friends who would sometimes doubt our ideas. Tell us that we have to give up foolishness and get serious. I mention these folks first because they are the ones who helped me the most. When I heard all the reasons why I could not do something, it gave me pause to double-check my work and assumptions and to strive even harder. To the naysayers, I owe my most considerable debt of gratitude. Thank you.

We all have those who will challenge us. The friends and family who will egg us on. Those who will dare others to do what they may not do themselves. I appreciate these folks because they help us to stretch. Because of them, we explore our farthermost reach and begin to understand where we can and cannot go. These are often the question askers. Just remember neither you nor anyone else has all the answers. We are often judged by others who listen to what we say. If we are correct in talking about things other people know about, we are more likely to be believed in things that they do not know. If we get what they know about wrong, people are often less likely to trust us.

I like the people who make us think. They will ask why more often than a three-year-old. But each why gives me something to check out and explore. Almost everything we know today started with one word, ‘Why?’

My favorites are mentors. The best mentors don’t just tell you and answer, they ask you questions. They are having patience with you so that you can explore and learn the things which they have learned. It’s the process, not the answer, that helps you grow. This is a gift you cannot afford to keep to yourself, you must share this with others. You do this because when one person grows, all those around them grow also.

Please remember that on the highway of life, knowledge, information, and learning are always a two-way street. If you keep your gains only to yourself, they wither on the vine. As you share what you have learned with others, a magical thing happens. You flourish and grow.

Thank you for being with me today. I hope to be with you again tomorrow.

What Can You Do?

We all have things we enjoy doing, and we do well.  We also have tasks that we have to do, and yet we hate.  My question for today and this week is, “How do you arrange your work so that you have more time doing the tasks you enjoy, and less time doing the tasks you hate?”

I can see the eyes rolling and people tiptoeing to towards the exits already.  Yet I am asking you to hold on and let me make my case.  There are actually many ways to lessen the load of work you hate to do.  Today I would like to show you a couple of those ways.

The easiest way to avoid the work you hate is to have someone else do it for you.  As you grow in a company, you have others working for you.  You can have one of them do the task for you.  Not there yet? Workers will trade assignments, so they can avoid an unpleasant task.  Need other ideas?

At home, you can hire someone to do the task for you.  Professionals usually do a better job, and you find the price is often worth it. If you don’t have the price for the tasks you required to be done, don’t worry. If someone does something that you need to do, they may need help with something that they despise, and you prefer. Rather than trading money, you are trading task completion. I am willing to believe that you find trading tasks better than trading money. Check to see if there are any co-ops in your area which trade tasks rather than cash.

Tomorrow, we will talk about other ways to do the things you like and avoid some things you do not. As I give you these ideas, I must tell you that we don’t get to prevent doing everything we hate in life. Some things will sneak up on us when we are least expecting them. We must always be on the lookout and wary of such events that life sometimes holds in store for us.

For now, I want to thank you for being with me today. I hope to be with you again tomorrow.

Your Plans Hands-On

I have a hard time believing we have been talking about plans for the last week. It seems like we just started on Monday. And although we have barely scratched the surface, being here today is a perfect thing because you cannot only read or talk about planning. To actually learn about planning, you have to get out and try it for yourself.

Is planning easy? That depends on what you’re planning. Is it foolproof? Not for anyone that I’ve known. Yet if you practice, and you work on planning, it will get better. You will learn what to anticipate, what you can account for, and things like the weather which you absolutely have no control.

The more you plan, the better you will get at it. The trick is to start early and start small. Plan how you want your bedroom to look. Start planning for yourself and your family. It is you get used to planning reach out for larger projects.

You may have heard that forgiveness is often easier to get than permission. Here is something else you also need to know. The higher you go in your profession, the more difficult forgiveness becomes. A worker on an assembly line is more likely to get leniency and mercy than a supervisor. A level one manager is for more likely to have an error overlooked then someone in the board room. This does not mean you should want to make mistakes, but they do happen, and it is not the end of the world.

The trick to making affirmative plans is to keep everyone in the loop, making sure they understand the goal and the means to get there. Not everybody will be thrilled at first because change is a hard thing for some people to accept and do well. If you work with them, they will come around.

Thank you for being with me today. I hope to be with you again soon.

At the Push of a Button

This week we are talking about planning.  Planning is a must to get to where you want to go.  Getting there is also going to take action on your part.  The first action I wish to recommend is not hard to accomplish, although it may have not been achieved yet due to psychological influences. 

I would like to give you an action that will definitely increase your power to think and to reason.  The first part of completing this is to stop for a moment and listen. Are there any outside influences that are stealing brainpower from you? Is that the TV set on? Shows make you think about what they want you to consider. Advertisements are designed to take your thoughts and attention. Even a radio that plays soothing music has its occasional ads.

Turning these things off removes obstacles that would cause you not to do your best work. The psychological part comes because when you turn off the electronics, you feel that you are separating yourself from the rest of humanity. If this anxiety shows up, just remind yourself it will be okay.

Without the distractions, you can think clearer. Thinking clearer means better plans. Lack of distractions means getting your work done faster. Getting your planning done more quickly means you can do more, accomplish it sooner and if desired, have more time to do other things which you want to do and may enjoy.

Removing advertisements that you have heard many times before and will hear many times in the future does not hurt. It merely removes a distraction. Eliminating television shows podcasts and other interruptions may just hand you a clear mind with which to think. And concentration on your subject matter has never hurt anyone.

Of course, as you have heard me say all week long, and I will repeat it today. Try this out for yourself. Start in small increments and try larger ones as you go. If it works here, maybe it can work in other areas of your life. Just a thought.

Thank you for being with me today. I hope to be with you again tomorrow.

Are Your Plans Working

We’ve been talking about making plans this week. Even though most plans will fall apart, the fact that you built a strategy gives you knowledge and forethought that will still help you to win the task. The question you want to ask yourself is how good are your plans, and how successful are they.

Your plans don’t have to work precisely as written to be valuable. Your ideas should be a good start and the basis of you completing the task before you. There will always be some rough roads and even some blockades as you execute your plan. And you will have to think on your feet to overcome them. This is true whether you are speaking with the customer, in the board room, or working with your own staff.

There are many people who, when hit with their first obstruction, call it a day and fail to even try to continue. When you run into insurmountable obstacles, you need to quickly look for a plan B, C, or D, and move off in the new direction. If you can keep your momentum driving forward, you have a chance of overcoming and succeeding.

The trick is to have faith. Faith in your product, your people, and your goals. If you believe you can, and are willing to do what it takes, you can do almost anything. The trick is to not give up on yourself.

Is this easy? Not really. Is it foolproof? No. Is the planning absolutely guaranteed? There are no guarantees in life. Yet, if you try this and you work at it, you may find these ideas to be useful tools that will help you as you plan what you want to do and where you would like to go next.

As with all my suggestions, there are no guarantees. Try something in small increments and if you find success try a little more. You will know what works for you and what does not.

Thank you for being with me today. I hope to be with you again tomorrow.