Aviation for Women

MAY-JUN 2017

Aviation for Women is the flagship member publication of Women in Aviation International. Articles feature women who have made aviation history, professional development ideas, and current-topic articles.

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44 Aviation forWomen M A Y / J U N E 2 0 1 7 The first one is from an odd (really) former co worker who rarely spoke, but one day in a meeting he said, "The char acters can only play their parts." What? That got my atten t ion—he wa s Ne w A ge y and Zen y and that saying hit home. To me, it means that people show you who t he y a re, a nd when t he y do, believe them and don't think they are going to be d ifferent. In ot her words, you r hy perc r it ic a l mot h er in law is going to be hy p e rc r it ic a l, e ve n to you r children, even on vacation. Don't expect anything dif ferent. Don't think she's go i ng to t u r n i nto Gra nd ma Pollyanna just because ev eryone else is having a good time. I c a n hea r you now. Pe ople c a n change! Yes, I know, but they rarely do. Personally, I love redemption. Ground- hog Day is among my favorite movies. What's more, one of my personal Christ mas rites is to watch every version of A Christmas Carol ever produced. I know them all, and I could watch Scrooge transform on Christmas morning 1,000 times, and probably have. But until redemption happens, make your life easier and understand that the characters can only play their parts. My second "greatest hit" comes from the 12 step tradi tion, and it is, "Progress not perfection." That applies to everything from unloading only the top rack of the dish washer to mak ing an incremental improvement in how something is done, the speed it's done or what you want. It's a cousin to "baby steps," and I have often thought if Bill Murray's screen psychologist in What About Bob? had ac tually written that book on baby steps that it would have been a best seller. So many of us (and I include me, though I've gotten way better) are so hard and demanding on our selves that we operate with an all or nothing mentality. I used to t hin k un less I did a l l t h e l a u n d r y i t d i d n't count. I used to think unless I cleaned my entire apa r t ment, it didn't count that I had "just" cleaned the kitch en and the bathroom. Give yourself a break; be gentle with yourself; and keep re peating "progress not per fection," whether it applies to you or someone else in your life. And now for my original wise saying. Here's the back story: A client had asked me to write a 50 word description of their company for a trade show exhibitors di rectory. It was the kind of thing where you'd read, "XYZ presents state of the art training materials for…" I sent my description back to them and heard nothing. Of course, I thought they hat ed what I wrote, so I emailed asking if there was something they wanted me to change. No, no, it's fine—just mak ing the rounds. I then bugged them a few more times, finally writing, "The deadline is tomorrow." No response. I was up set, until I realized that I cared more about this little descrip tion than they did. They were fine missing the deadline and having only their company name and booth number in the show directory. For me, when I see that empty space in a director y, I think, "The company couldn't get their act together enough to write the description and get it in on time." I hate lost op portunities. If you're in aviation and your company is XYZ Aviation (made up name), potential customers don't know I was talking to a friend who calls me for advice from time to time and in this call she praised me for my wisdom and said I should collect all my sayings into a book. Flattering, maybe, but I don't see it as a best seller. Out of curiosity, I asked her for my top three advice sayings, and I'll share them with you. Only one is original with me, but all have served me—and others—well. P E R S O N A L D E V E L O P M E N T P A T R I C I A L U E B K E WORDS TO LIVE BY I just let go of my snow boot crusade, realizing I couldn't care more about her cold wet feet than she did.

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