Time to Consider a Change

Time to Consider a Change

After Ryan Seacrest brings down the Waterford Crystal Ball at Times Square for the 17th time on ABC and Miley Cyrus and Pete Davidson host a dance party on NBC, you’ve got 2022 front and center.

Few will mourn 2021. It’s been rough personally, politically, and professionally. We had enough of isolation and mask-wearing with Covid during 2020. I hoped we could bid the Pandemic adieu by January 2021. But, no, we were destined to take another dive into vaccinations and boosters, as the divisions reigned between those who agreed to take the former. While vax-ers are not immune to Covid, they’re not filling hospital beds or straining the medical staffs for the fourth time, like those resisting vaccination and masking.

Granted a date certain for the official END of the Pandemic cannot be predicted. But the 1918 Pandemic coasted to a close after a mild opening, then a lethal blow, like Delta in the U.S., but petering out on a mild tail, resembling uber-contagious Omicron that is rushing through neighborhoods and families throughout the globe, but without the lethal consequences.

Now 2022 stretches out in front of us as a time when the Pandemic could no longer dominate our lives as it did in 2020 and 2021. It’s time to consider a future when we would no longer be isolated if we no longer choose it.

My suggestion: Take the clean slate 2020 presents you and put it to good use. Select one element of your life that you would like to change. Before you complain that you don’t make New Year’s Resolutions because you disappoint yourself before the end of January. You fail every time.

Maybe you should try another strategy.

Kay Milkman in How to Change-The Science of Getting from Where You Are to Where You want to Be lays it out. “Making hard things seem fun is a much better strategy than making hard things seem important, according to Milkman.

Behavior change requires setting tough goals, breaking them down into the component steps. Visualize your success as you create tiny working habits that you build your own customized strategy. In doing this, identify the weakness that has prevented you from making progress and succeeding.

Milkman began her research into human behavior as a assistant professor of Wharton. She realized why Americans die earlier than they should: 40 percent of premature deaths are the result of personal behaviors we can change—small decisions about eating, drinking, smoking, and vehicle safety. Her work helps us identify the obstacles that keep defeating our efforts to move forward.

Agassi Used this Strategy

Andre Agassi used this approach to get out of a slump—focusing on the adversary, not perfection—to win in 1994 and thereafter. He’d been focusing on landing a perfect shot EVERY time. Impossible! A new coach showed him how to determine his opponents’ weaknesses and capitalize on his own strengths.

Pairing Drudge Work with Pleasure

Reading novels was a guilty pleasure for Milkman, but as her grades dropped, she decided to read assigned papers while getting a manicure, she listened to James Patterson’s murder mysteries and Harry Potter while on the treadmill, and folded laundry while watching Netflix. She allowed herself a glass of wine at the stove when she prepared a home-cooked meal. This motivated her to accomplish her must- do activities with pleasure.

Locking Out Temptation

Milkman points to literary examples where the author finds ways to force themselves and their characters to carry on, despite the more appealing options. Odysseus in The Odyssey has himself tied to the mast to avoid the temptation of the Sirens’ song and to steer his ship off course. French writer Victor Hugo, who enjoyed the life of the socialite, procrastinated on completing his first draft of The Hunchback of Notre Dame. He locked up all his clothes, except a shawl to cover himself. By staying home, he focused on the manuscript and finished on deadline.

Cash Commitment

Twenty-six-year-old tech entrepreneur Nick Winter worried his life no longer met his expectations. Life lacked adventure. He wanted to transform himself into an adventurer—skydiving, skateboarding, and trimming five minutes off his 5K—and to write a book about it in three months! To accomplish this, he would need to set the stakes high–$14,000, everything he had. He wrote what became a popular book, The Motivation Hacker, and went skydiving with his girlfriend, who wasn’t afraid of heights like he was.

Flake Out

Sometimes life’s details– transporting kids, doing laundry, fixing meals—keep us from keeping our commitments to ourselves and our communities. Sometimes people just forget. One of her colleagues applied what they learned to registered voters. He found that huge numbers of registered voters said they planned to vote but failed to show up at the polls. In one election he studies, 54 percent of registered voters intended to vote, but they “flaked out.” They forgot. Actually, this is not so uncommon. In one study they found that we forget nearly half of the information we’ve learned within twenty minutes. After twenty-four hours, about 70 percent of it is forgotten; a month later, the loss can be 80 percent.

Bottom Line: Make a Plan and a Checklist

 Developing a planned attack to tackle your goal. Break the goal into little, easily achievable stops to build your confidence as you move forward. Build in your own nudges to remind and encourage you. Figure out where you most need help to follow-through. How will you do it? When? Where? Schedule a reminder that will cross your eyes at just the moment you need to act. Put it all together in a simple checklist on a whiteboard you will see each day. Mark off your progress. Schedule your reminders to keep you on track. The more distinctive the cue, the more likely it will trigger recall and action.

We’ve been part of a Universal event, suffering through a Pandemic—together. I’m listening to the neighbors in southwest London play Abba’s “Dancing Girl,” a song that crosses borders. It is two hours from New Year’s, five hours ahead of the U.S. Here’s to making the best of 2022, if not for us, then for the generations to come. Let’s start by making one personal change.

Life in London is different from what it had been pre-2020, but we have found little pleasures closer to home. A wreath at the door is inviting, along with our elf.

Christmas is a banking holiday in England, but shops are open, so Americans can find last-minute coffee and rolls or add to the meal if unexpected guests arrive. Boxing Day, which may be unfamiliar to Americans, is a more important holiday here. Larger family gatherings and Premier League football games take place all day. But instead of the National Football League in the U.S., these the leading European soccer teams.

What is Boxing Day?

Boxing Day has been a bank holiday in England since 1871. British tradition regarding the holiday on Deceemer 26: The servants of the wealthy were required to work on Christmas, so they were given the day off on the 26th and received food and a gift box. Post men and errand boys also received a “box” and leftovers from the Christmas meal. In keeping with the season of giving, churches opened their donation boxes on the 26th and distributed the money to the poor. Mainly families exchange gifts and had a meal.

We celebrated Christmas Day with a full-on American brunch with plate-sized pancakes, bacon and eggs, and sausage too thin to be British bangers. The kids squirted whipped cream faces on their pancakes. This after opening presents and the children clicked together their Lego sets.

Earlier in the week, I saw a spectacular outdoor lights and fountain display at the Kew Gardens in southwest London. Christmas music perfectly coordinated with digital lights moved with gigantic snowflakes up the sides of the greenhouse, which stood four stories tall. In the next blog I will feature the Kew presentation, which will lack the mulled wine, hot chocolate, and mince pies, or the opportunity to walk among the spacious grounds on a three-mile tour to see the lights dance through the Kew acreage.

While Kew outdid itself, London’s neighborhoods are generally subdued when it comes to Christmas. Green wreaths are common at the doors. Lights, when displayed, are usually white. Blue lighting occurs at a few houses.

  

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Big Ben

At home some decorations represent British stereotypes, including the double-decker, which I rode the week I arrived before the Omicron warnings were out. Then there is Big Ben—the clock that keeps time for Parliament.

Enjoy your Christmas and 2022, wherever you may be!

London’s Marylebone High Street offers an eclectic mix of buttons, an independent bookseller and Bond Bingo.

I arrived here, in England’s capital, late last week. I came early to ensure the Omicron variant would not prevent me from sharing our first family holiday in nearly two years. For those Londoners still able to shop, we will head over to the High Streets—the equivalent of Main Street in the U.S.–where we find the one-of-a-kind gifts that small stores provide.

When the city rebuilt after London’s Great Fire in 1666, High Streets were designed to avoid congestion. Narrow alleys and lanes ran behind them. The 19th century marked the hallmark of the High Street when fine ladies and their gentlemen would go “promenading” to show off their finery and their intended—lady or squire.

Today there remain about 5,400 High Streets in the UK and six hundred in London’s boroughs. Retail businesses, like those on High Streets in London and Main Streets in America, depend on steady foot traffic that will come with the winnowing of Covid restrictions.

Shopping did not top my list of must-do activities after I landed at Heathrow, but there are tempting opportunities here. High Street at Walthamstow Market offers the greatest variety with five hundred stalls on the “longest street.” Here you will find an eclectic mix of fresh produce, ethnic foods, craft supplies, fabric, and the William Morris Gallery.

If it is women’s bespoke couturier you seek, we will head to Bermondsey on London Bridge Street. If you have a favorite four-legged creature, Holly & Lil offers homemade dog leads and accessories. Or if you fancy a Cuban Cigar, try Shepherd’s Market for Alfie Turmaus Tobacconist in London’s Mayfair. One of the city’s favorite French meals is nearby at Le Boudin Blanc, where we could stop for lunch or even a mid-day croissant.

For booklovers, Daunt Books on Marylebone’s High Street, so quintessential you will swear Hugh Grant could pop out as the Nottingham Hill bookseller. Here you can find James Bond’s Bingo with all seven main characters, ranging from Sean Connery to my favorite, Daniel Craig!

Continuing our quest for unique goods, we cannot skip the only button retailer in London: “The Button Queen,” also at Marylebone. You never know when you will drop a one-of-a-kind button. Bet you can find it here.

King’s Road in Chelsea, the hippy hangout from the 1960s, staged the Birth of Punk in the 1970s, and now is home to the Bluebird Restaurant. We move on to Gabriel’s Wharf, behind London’s South Bank, where we find Southbank Printmakers’ contemporary art, Wagumi’s Japanese design products, and Ganesha Indian homeware.

Near Hyde Park in the heart of the city, Connaught Village, has become a center for luxury goods and fine wines. Mud Australia serves up ceramics and Cocomaya sweet treats. These are but a few of the delights available in London.

Small businesses are essential to the economies in the US and UK. In the US, sixty-seven cents of every dollar spent with small businesses stays locally. Just forty cents of every dollar spent with national companies in America comes back to the original community where it was spent.

Every Christmas, parades occur in small towns, like where I grew up in Indiana. Inevitably the sheriff or the mayor would always ride in a car right behind Santa Claus and his sleigh. Figuring the first President to employ Santa Clause to win over public sentiment could be challenging. Here are a few hints about Christmas’s entry into the U.S.:

• 1822  “Twas the Night Before Christmas,”   by Clement Moore

• 1843  “A Christmas Carol”  by Charles Dickens

• 1848   Britain’s Queen Victoria’s Christmas tree appears in the U.S.

            Via telegraph and expanded newspaper circulation.

• 1849  “It Came Upon a Midnight Clear,”  by Edmund Sears,

1850    Melody  to Sears’ poem by  Richard Storrs Willis

• 1850s  Christmas trees and Poinsettias first went up on Christmas Eve.

Here is the biggest hint: The Civil War tore the nation apart in the 1860s. President Abe Lincoln felt the weight of leading a nation torn North from South, 1861-1865. Yet, he could not ignore Christmas for his family, while many Americans prepared for a traditional holiday.

The Lincoln’s Christmas 1863-64

He purchased a toy for his son, Tad, at D.C.’s Stuntz Toy Store at 1207 New York Avenue (see picture above) on December 24, 1863. Then their eldest son, Robert, attended Harvard Law School. Two other sons, Eddie (1848-1851), died of typhoid, and Willie (1850-1862) died of tuberculosis while the family lived in the White House.

The Lincolns’ followed the low-key family traditions of the time. In December 1860, after the election but before the Lincoln’s moved to Washington, Abe visited a shop in Springfield to purchase gifts to fit into Christmas stockings. His notes record on Christmas Eve that Lincoln bought three linen handkerchiefs, three silk gentleman’s silk scarfs, and four child’s silk handkerchiefs. He might have stopped off at another store to purchase popcorn balls for his sons or a fancy perfume or soap for Mary. These were customary gifts at Christmas in1860.

Lincoln’s Strategic Move

Lincoln understood the reach of publications like Harper’s Weekly to carry his message to Americans on both sides of the Mason-Dixon line. Thomas Nast, Harper’s artist, already worked with Lincoln to design campaign posters for the 1860 campaign. For the 1864 Christmas season, Lincoln and Nast devised messages to reach both sides in the Civil War. Tad Lincoln accompanied his parents to D.C. hospitals to visit Union soldiers. After the visits, Tad wanted to give books and clothing to the soldiers. His father made it happen, then worked with Nast to craft an editorial cartoon picturing Father Christmas/Santa drawn from the side as he gave Union troops books and clothing with tags that read “From Tad Lincoln.” Historians believe this to be the first time Santa Claus’s image appeared in print.

The following year, Lincoln sought to move Confederate troops closer to the Union. First, he had Nast draw Lincoln standing in a doorway, inviting cold and frost-bitten Rebels to rejoin the Union, titled “Union Christmas 1864.” Finally, an editorial cartoon named “Christmas Box” depicted Lincoln offering Confederate President Jefferson Davis a present with the question: “More war or peace and Union?”

Lincoln and Religion

Earlier in Lincoln’s career, questions arose about whether he believed in God because when he ran for the Illinois legislature, Lincoln said he did not belong to a particular church. In 1846, Lincoln said he had never denied the truth of the Scriptures and could not support for office a man “I knew to be an open enemy of religion.” After his election, Lincoln voted against making Christmas a holiday for state workers. He said he looked at it from the cost to the state budget to offer another holiday to state workers. Lincoln worked Christmas like any other day during the Civil War. He attended New York Avenue Presbyterian Church regularly when living in the White House. Grant would be President in 1870 when Congress approved Christmas as a national holiday.

President Lincoln depended on the Bible as the only book available to read as a youngster and came to depend on the wisdom he found there, particularly during the Civil War. This Lincoln quote from the war years is one indication of his sentiment. Likewise, we could apply the ending sentiment to the crisis we face today:

“I fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the Nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace consistent with Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquility, and Union.”