Don Sutton Quotes

How many of them have secrets they don't want the world to know? How many of them wear masks wherever they go? We're anything but typical.

if you want to convince children of the power of books, don’t tell them stories are good. Tell them a good story.

I keep staring, and I wonder why we push people away. There are a thousands reasons, really, but I think the biggest one - the most important one - is if we don’t, they get close. And then they can see.

Time is a thief, but he's not subtle. He's a thug. And youth is a little old lady walking through the park with a pocketbook full of cash. You want to avoid being like youth? You want to keep time from robbing you? Hold on for dear life, boys. When time tries to snatch something from you, just grab tighter. Don't let go. That's what memory is. Not letting go.

Listen to those under your supervision. Really listen. Don’t act as if you’re listening and let it go in one ear and out the other. Faking it is worse than not doing it at all.

[Fear] can be a pleasure to look at, and I understand how some other humans love to experience his essence. We can sense beauty, even if we don’t see it.

Nightmares may be lies, but we don’t have to be liars.

Truth has its place. In a courtroom, certainly. A boardroom? I don't know. I think truth is in the listener. Truth is something the listener bestows on a story-- or not

I love to read sir. I always have. But when I walk into a library or a bookshop, I get overwhelmed. I don't know where to start. Start anywhere. How do I know what's worth my time and what's a waste? None of it is waste. Any book is better than no book. Slowly, surely, one will lead you to another, which will lead you to the best.

It just wasn’t supposed to end like this.” She looks at me with red-rimmed eyes and yellow skin. Colors should be a good thing, but now, they’re marks, omens of bad tidings. “I was supposed to grow up, go to college, get a job,” she continues in that gut-clenching croak. “Meet my dream guy, marry, have k-kids. You were going to live next door and we would grow old in the same nursing home. Chuck oatmeal at each other and watch soap operas all day in our rocking chairs. That was my daydream. My perfect life. I don’t want to keep asking myself why until the end, but … ” A lone tear trails down her sunken cheek. This time I don’t reach out to wipe the water away; I let it go. Down, down, until it drips off the side of her jaw. This is humanity. This is life and death in one room.

We don't plant trees like we used to. A yard without trees is a yard without a future. It might as well be a cemetery.

The best management is sometimes less management or no management at all. William Coyne, who led 3M’s Research and Development efforts for over a decade, believed a big part of his job was to leave his people alone and protect them from other curious executives. As he put it: ‘After you plant a seed in the ground, you don’t dig it up every week to see how it is doing.

Please don’t ever leave me. I love you Kelly. I love holding you. I love laughing with you and arguing with you and just plain being with you. I love the way you accept everything about me without trying to change me. I love making love to you and holding you when you sleep. And I don’t ever want to give that up. Not in a year, or two years, or ever. When I’m with you, I know that I finally found the kind of love that my parents had – the kind of love that will last forever.

He was afflicted with what I call “Asshole Blindness,” where people don’t realize or underestimate how dire an asshole problem is, how much they and perhaps others are suffering, and how important it is to get out as soon as possible.

Do you even feel anything, Chad? Will you for once stop walking around, all in control and f'ing calm? Do you have any idea what you all have done. I lost everything, Chad. Everything, when Kyle died. I lost myself. I had finally begun to build a new life with new friends. With people I thought cared about me. I have started to be just a little bit happy again. Was it too much to ask? Did I ask for too much by just wanting to have a little bit of a life again? Now, it’s all screwed up again and you walk around here like you don’t feel anything about what’s happened.” Chad spun around, and for only the second time since she’d known him, she saw the flash of anger so fierce her breath caught in her throat and she took an involuntary step back, away from him. Jennie knew Chad would never hurt her on purpose, but the anger rolling off of him was palpable. It seemed to force her backwards as if it had a life of its own, a power of its own. “Not feel anything, Jennie? Are you f'ing kidding me? I walk around here every day and I ache every f'ing minute I’m with you. I’m so twisted up with loving you and hating you, I can’t breathe. I can’t keep my hands off you, but I can’t let myself kiss you because I might lose myself in you. I can’t make love to you because I’m afraid you’ll pretend I’m him. I know you want his arms around you, not mine. I know you want it to be his baby inside you, not mine. And I know you can’t love me back, no matter what I do, because you’re still so in love with your husband, you can’t even begin to see me.” Chad didn’t stop and Jennie didn’t try to stop him. “And every day, I have to sit here and wonder how I’ll be a part of my baby’s life. I wonder if you’ll let me be in the delivery room, if you’ll let me help you name the baby. I wonder how much money I’d have to offer the people who live across the street from you to get them to sell me their house, just so I can see my child grow up. If you’ll let me...” Chad stopped as if he’d run out of steam. They stood in uneasy silence for a long time before Chad spoke again. He sounded worn out and bitter and angry, mirroring Jennie’s chaos of emotions. “Am I feeling anything? Yeah. I’m feeling some f'ing sh**, Jen.

Organizations that learn from their failures forgive and remember, they don’t forgive and forget.

good advice to live by: never trust women who don’t like other women.

Sutton, I have to talk to you," Mr. Mercer said... "I'm sorry," she said preemptively. "You don't even know what I'm going to say yet.

No matter how many times I say the words, they don't become true.

We don’t see things as they are, we see them as we are.” Anais Nin

people “who don’t have a chance to take revenge are forced, in a sense, to move on and focus on something different.

Assholes are like cockroaches. If you shine a light on them, they run for cover. At our workplace, we’re starting to insist on more transparency, less backroom chatter, and an end to the secrecy that allows our resident asshole to carry on his antics. We share information with each other, refuse to let him trap us into private discussions of our coworkers, and generally don’t give him permission to manipulate us. It’s driving him nuts! He’s run out of allies (who were never very willing to begin with), and he doesn’t know what to do next.

Perry “puts all the bad apples in one barrel” so they don’t wreck other teams. He then assigns a no-nonsense coach to lead the bad apples or does it himself—he is adept at dispensing tough love.

Bill Lazier’s advice means that you ought to do your homework before taking a job. Find out if you are about to enter a den of assholes, and if you are, don’t give in to the temptation to join them in the first place. Leonardo da Vinci said, “It is easier to resist at the beginning than at the end,” which is sound social psychology. The more time and effort that people put into anything—no matter how useless, dysfunctional, or downright stupid it might be—the harder it is for them to walk away, be it a bad investment, a destructive relationship, an exploitive job, or a workplace filled with browbeaters, bullies, and bastards.

As we’ve seen, such jerks don’t need to hold prestigious positions—they just need to be adept at recruiting allies to help them backstab, intimidate, and spread vicious lies about anybody who stands in their way.

I get what you're saying, but my hanging with the ladies is mostly for publicity when I'm on tour. I don't sleep with that many girls. Well, not all of them. Okay, I'm trying to behave myself. It's not easy being famous!

I worked my entire life to be at this moment. I can allow this to be good.” It gives me permission to own my talent. It calms me down. I don’t have to apologize, make myself small. And I can still be nice while doing it.

But an occasional strategic outburst seems to be effective because “targets” construe their temporary tormentor as trying to motivate them to try harder and to be smarter—they don’t dismiss it as just the usual ranting from a certified asshole who berates them constantly

He (Kris Medlin) has a communication with a force in pitching that most of us can’t talk to. It’s an awareness; it’s a sixth sense. When he steps in and stares in to that catcher, that little man on his shoulder’s going to take over and tell him what to do. And he’s done it well.

Working with Kelly Bishop was a lifesaver. She played Lorelai’s mother on Gilmore Girls and was Sheila in the original Broadway production of A Chorus Line. She is a broad through and through—and she taught me how to navigate this new world. 'Don’t focus on learning the entire script,' she advised early on. 'Prep for what you need to do three days ahead. Learn it in little chunks. And when you’re done filming a scene, let it go and move on.

When I am in a situation where I feel uncomfortable about speaking but it is necessary for me to speak, or if I feel 'put on the spot' my voice sounds strained, really weird, and it feels as if I have no control over how I sound in these situations. Sometimes then my voice is barely audible and I am frequently asked to repeat myself. Attempts at speaking are often embarrassing, shaming experiences for me. I sound quite different when speaking with someone I am more relaxed with, but I don't like the way my voice sounds at the best of times; I was horrified when I heard a recording of myself. Because of this inhibition about speaking, I have never learned to project my voice or to use it effectively. I often feel that I could no more use my vocal cords to break a silence, to get somebody's attention or to initiate an interaction than I could run through fire or do something dangerous in my life.

As if he could read her mind, Chad chose that very moment to look up from his What to Expect book. “Says here some women get really horny when they’re pregnant,” he said, waggling his eyebrows with a shit-eating grin. “It does not!” Jennie said, feeling two hot spots form on her cheeks. How does he know? “Does too. They don’t phrase it that way, but that’s essentially it. Anything you need help with, Jennie? Any cravings I can take care of for you?” Chad laughed as he leaned in suggestively. “Gah!

At first, it’s like you’re walking around with this gaping wound in your chest, and it seems impossible that no one else can see it. Every time they pretend not to, you want to scream. But then, if they actually do notice, you don’t even want to think about the pain, much less talk about it. Try to explain it. Nothing you do will quicken the process or dull it, either. You just have to survive moment to moment, day to day, until one morning you wake up and it hurts a little less. There are setbacks, of course—you’ll have a thought or see something that reminds you of him, and it’s like you picked at the scab. But it does eventually fade… into a scar.

THE 11 COMMANDMENTS FOR WISE BOSSES Have strong opinions and weakly held beliefs. Do not treat others as if they are idiots. Listen attentively to your people; don’t just pretend to hear what they say. Ask a lot of good questions. Ask others for help and gratefully accept their assistance. Do not hesitate to say, ‘I don’t know’. Forgive people when they fail, remember the lessons, and teach them to everyone. Fight as if you are right, and listen as if you are wrong. Do not hold grudges after losing an argument. Instead, help the victors implement their ideas with all your might. Know your foibles and flaws, and work with people who correct and compensate for your weaknesses. Express gratitude to your people.

I told you we should have put her in the second-class carriage with Sutton,” he said to Kathleen. In the week since the episode in the morning room, they had both taken care to avoid each other as much as possible. When they were together, as now, they retreated into mutual and scrupulous politeness. “I thought she would feel safer with us,” Kathleen replied. Glancing over her shoulder, she saw that Clara was sleeping with her head tilted back and her mouth half open. “She seems to be faring better after a nip of brandy.” “Nip?” He gave her a dark glance. “She’s had at least a half pint by now. Pandora’s been dosing her with it for the past half hour.” “What? Why didn’t you say anything?” “Because it kept her quiet.” Kathleen jumped up and hurried to retrieve the decanter from Pandora. “Darling, what are you doing with this?” The girl stared at her owlishly. “I’ve been helping Clara.” “That was very kind, but she’s had enough. Don’t give her any more.” “I don’t know why it’s made her so sleepy. I’ve had almost as much medicine as she’s had, and I’m not a bit tired.” “You drank some of the brandy?” West had asked from the other side of the railway carriage, his brows lifting. Pandora stood and made her way to the opposite window to view a Celtic hill fort and a meadow with grazing cattle. “Yes, when we were crossing the bridge over the water, I felt a bit nervous. But then I dosed myself, and it was quite relaxing.” “Indeed,” West said, glancing at the half-empty bottle in Kathleen’s hand before returning his gaze to Pandora. “Come sit with me, darling. You’ll be as stewed as Clara by the time we reach London.” “Don’t be silly.” Dropping into the empty seat next to him, Pandora argued and giggled profusely, until she dropped her head to his shoulder and began to snore.

How do you feel, my lord?” “Well enough to go downstairs for a while,” Devon said. “But I’m not what anyone would call spry. And if I sneeze, I’m fairly certain I’ll start bawling like an infant.” The valet smiled slightly. “You’ll have no shortage of people eager to help you. The footmen literally drew straws to decide who would have the privilege of accompanying you downstairs.” “I don’t need anyone to accompany me,” Devon said, disliking the idea of being treated like some gouty old codger. “I’ll hold the railing to keep myself steady.” “I’m afraid Sims is adamant. He lectured the entire staff about the necessity of protecting you from additional injury. Furthermore, you can’t disappoint the servants by refusing their help. You’ve become quite a hero to them after saving those people.” “I’m not a hero,” Devon scoffed. “Anyone would have done it.” “I don’t think you understand, my lord. According to the account in the papers, the woman you rescued is a miller’s wife--she had gone to London to fetch her little nephew, after his mother had just died. And the boy and his sisters are the children of factory workers. They were sent to live in the country with their grandparents.” Sutton paused before saying with extra emphasis, “Second-class passengers, all of them.” Devon gave him a look askance. “For you to risk your life for anyone was heroic,” the valet said. “But the fact that a man of your rank would be willing to sacrifice everything for those of such humble means…Well, as far as everyone at Eversby Priory is concerned, it’s the same as if you had done it for any one of them.” Sutton began to smile as he saw Devon’s discomfited expression. “Which is why you will be plagued with your servants’ homage and adoration for decades to come.” “Bloody hell,” Devon muttered, his face heating. “Where’s the laudanum?” The valet grinned and went to ring the servants’ bell.

Don't wait for children's toys to fall into your garden Part of eliminating compassion is stopping other people from trying to pull it out of you. A guaranteed way to do this is to follow this exercise. Many children will undoubtedly be playing games near your home, and perhaps a Frisbee or a ball will land in your garden. The typical grumpy old man won't give it back. You must go one step further. On these same strolls where you locate charity workers, locate children playing. Playgrounds are a good place to start, but you want to be careful you don't look like a pedophile. Remember, you love nothing, children included. When you see children playing a game quickly run up and pop their ball or hurl their Frisbee into a nearby tree. Word will spread and no one will try to drag you down to their pathetically weak levels with feelings and caring. Caring is for the dead. If they had cared less they wouldn't be zombies now. So remember to pop balls, tear kites, hide Frisbees, kick sandcastles, and decapitate teddy bears. Spitting into open lunch boxes will take you over the top but isn't necessary.

Last year, I was teaching a group of executives who were arguing about whether it was possible to do creative work with people who had poor social skills and who preferred to work alone. One executive from a computer hardware firm squirmed and turned red, finally blurting out, “These are exactly the kind of people I manage.” He went on to say: They hide in their offices, and don’t come out. We divide the work so they each have a separate part. We slide their assignment under the door and run away. They ignore us when we tell them it is good enough—they won’t let us build it until it meets their standards for elegant designs—they don’t care what we think.

Who Are Your Stars? That is the first question I ask when a boss has performance problems, is plagued by caustic conflict, or is losing good people at an alarming rate. I want to know if the anointed stars enhance or undermine others’ performance and humanity. Unfortunately, too many bosses have such blind faith in solo superstars and unbridled competition that they hire egomaniacs and install pay and promotion systems that reward selfish creeps who don’t give a damn about their colleagues. Or, even worse, they shower kudos and cash on credit hogs and backstabbers who get ahead by knocking others down. As

Coincidences are acts of God. They may seem random to us, but they aren’t to Him. If I’m going to believe He’s all powerful – and I do – then I have to believe He’s in control of everything that happens.” “Even the bad stuff? I thought God was supposed to be good. Loving.” Lana shifted to give Alex her full attention. “He is, but you know better than most people that there’s a lot of evil in the world. He could’ve made us puppets, but He wanted us to be able to make our own choices. Choices have a way of affecting others.” “Oh yeah? Then what about natural disasters? Nobody chooses for an earthquake or a hurricane to happen.” “Yeah and He protects countless people during those events. Who knows how many casualties we’d be looking at if He didn’t intervene. I know it doesn’t really answer all the questions, but part of faith is believing that God knows what He’s doing and trusting Him even when we don’t understand.

When people (regardless of personality) wield power, their ability to lord it over others causes them to (1) become more focused on their own needs and wants; (2) become less focused on others’ needs, wants, and actions; and (3) act as if written and unwritten rules others are expected to follow don’t apply to them.

THE ATTITUDE OF WISDOM Smart Versus Wise Bosses Smart Bosses: Have the confidence to act on what they know, but feel and express little doubt (in public or private) about what they believe or do Actions Make definitive statements Answer questions Talk well Give help, but don’t ask for help and refuse it when offered Defend and stick to current course of action – have strong opinions that are strongly held Wise Bosses: Have the confidence to act on what they know and the humility to doubt their knowledge Actions Make statements (often ‘backstage’) that reveal uncertainty and confusion Ask questions Listen well Give help, ask for help, and accept it when offered Challenge and often revise courses of action – have strong opinions that are weakly held

Most of us don’t realize that real estate investments allow our money to accelerate at a greater pace than typical paper investments.

I love to read sir. I always have. But when I walk into a library or bookshop, I get overwhelmed. I don’t know where to start. Start anywhere. How do I know what’s worth my time and what’s a waste? None of it is a waste. Any book is better than no book. Slowly, surely, one will lead you to another, which will lead you to the best. Do you want to spend your life planting roses with me? No sir. Then—books. It’s that simple. A book is the only real escape from this fallen world. Aside from death.

Diego Rodriguez (who also teaches at Stanford and writes the blog Metacool) asks bosses who want more creativity: ‘Where is your place for failing?’ I adore this question because creativity requires generating many ideas – most of which are bad. It requires judging ideas honestly and openly and then discarding most. In the hands of a bad boss, this process embarrasses and stifles people who develop ideas that don’t make the cut – and degrades the quality of those that are selected, developed, and thrown into the marketplace.

Again, creative incompetence must be used with great care, but it is something that every good boss keeps in his or her tool kit. If you are a boss, ask yourself: Are there required (but irrelevant) procedures your people ought to perform in less time-consuming and more half-assed ways? Are there boring or demeaning chores that keep them from doing exciting and more important things? Also consider if your willingness to do low-priority and downright trivial tasks enables other bosses and teams to devote their full attention to more intriguing and crucial challenges. Are there things you are known for doing willingly and well that sap time from work that is more important to your people, your organization, and your own career? For example, do you seem to lead every time-sucking but insignificant task force and organize every holiday party (because no one else will or they always screw it up)? Are you entertaining a constant parade of visitors whom other bosses don’t believe are worth wasting time with? If you can’t wiggle out of such chores, perhaps it is time for a bit of creative incompetence.

Be wary when people tell you that they don’t produce a lot, but when they do, it will be “brilliant.” Remember that innovation is largely a function of productivity.

GETTING STUPID CAN BE a mighty smart thing to do if you want to build an innovative company. Thinking up the dumbest, most ridiculous, and most impractical things you can do is a powerful way to explore your assumptions about the world. It helps elicit what you know and believe but may have a hard time articulating, perhaps because it is so obvious you don’t even notice it. It also helps you imagine what might happen if your dearest beliefs turn out to be dead wrong. And thinking up the most ridiculous things you can do—and then thinking about why you might do them—creates a broader palette of options. This weird idea works because it sparks two essential forces for constant innovation: variance and vu ja de.

During the early stages of a project, don’t study how the task has been approached in the company, industry, field, or region where you are working.

Recall that it is hard to change behavior when it becomes ingrained and mindless. Also recall that “mere exposure” research shows that people will have positive reactions to anything familiar and negative reactions to anything unfamiliar. The longer a group has been together, the stronger these forces become. What happens inside the group becomes increasingly familiar to members, while what outsiders do seems less familiar or interesting. As time passes, motivation, experimentation, and learning may diminish so gradually that no one on the team realizes that these changes are actually taking place.22 To make matters worse, I’ve noticed that after a group of people have been together for a long time, they spend more and more time talking about things outside of work—their families, sports, hobbies, and so on—and less and less time talking about their work. After all, they don’t really think about the work; they have decided who in the group is good at what, and they don’t feel compelled to waste time talking with outsiders, so they have plenty of time to talk with their pals about other things!

When everyone in a group always agrees, it may mean they don’t have many ideas. Or it may mean that avoiding conflict is more important to them than generating and evaluating new ideas. It may even mean that people who express new ideas are ridiculed, ostracized, and driven out of the group. Regardless of the reasons, lack of conflict and dissent means the group is unlikely to express and develop many valuable new ideas. Groups—and societies—that stifle people with new, untested, ideas undermine both imagination and personal freedom.

Low self-monitors are pretty much the opposite. Their feelings and actions are “controlled by inner attitudes, dispositions, and values, rather than to be molded and shaped to fit the situation.”7 Even when low self-monitors do figure out what others expect, even when they do “get it,” they will have trouble producing the “right” response in sincere and convincing ways. For better and for worse, low self-monitors are relatively unfettered by social norms. These mavericks and social misfits can drive bosses and coworkers crazy, but they increase the range of what is thought, noticed, talked about, and done in a company. High self-monitors tend to be yes-men (and -women), who can’t stop themselves from telling others what they want to hear. Low self-monitors can’t stop themselves from saying and doing what they think is right, because they don’t notice—or don’t care about—pressures to follow the herd.

Spread a mindset, not just a footprint. Running up the numbers and putting your logo on as many people and places as possible isn’t enough. 2. Engage all the senses. Bolster the mindset you want to spread with supportive sights, sounds, smells, and other subtle cues that people may barely notice, if at all. 3. Link short-term realities to long-term dreams. Hound yourself and others with questions about what it takes to link the never-ending now to the sweet dreams you hope to realize later. 4. Accelerate accountability. Build in the feeling that “I own the place and the place owns me.” 5. Fear the clusterfug. The terrible trio of illusion, impatience, and incompetence are ever-present risks. Healthy doses of worry and self-doubt are antidotes to these three hallmarks of scaling clusterfugs. 6. Scaling requires both addition and subtraction. The problem of more is also a problem of less. 7. Slow down to scale faster—and better—down the road. Learn when and how to shift ears from automatic, mindless, and fast modes of thinking (“System 1”) to slow, taxing, logical, deliberative, and conscious modes (“System 2”); sometimes the best advice is, “Don’t just do something, stand there.

Hire people you know you don’t need now, but you think you might need later.

to find a few ideas that work, you need to try a lot that don’t.

If you are determined to be an effective shield, start by working on yourself. Great bosses avoid burdening their people. They invent, borrow, and implement ways to reduce the mental and emotional load they heap on followers. In particular, meetings are notorious time and energy suckers. Yes, some are necessary, but too many bosses run them in ways that disrespect people’s time and dignity – especially self-absorbed bosses bent on self-glorification. If you want to grab power and don’t care much about your people, make sure you arrive a little late to most meetings. Plus, every now and then, show up very late, or – better yet – send word after everyone has gathered that, alas, you must cancel the meeting because something more pressing has come up. After all, if you are a very important person, the little people need to accept their inferior social standing. Sound familiar? Using arrival times to display and grab power is an ancient trick. This move was used by elders, or ‘Big Men’, in primitive tribes to gain and reinforce status. An ethnography of the Merina tribe in Madagascar found that jostling for status among elders meant that gatherings routinely started three or four hours late. Elders used young boys to spy on each other and played a waiting game that dragged on for hours. Each elder worked to maximize the impression that the moment he arrived, the meeting started. If he arrived early and the meeting didn’t start right away, it signaled that he wasn’t the alpha male. If he arrived late and the meeting had started without him, it also signaled that he wasn’t the most prestigious elder. I’ve seen similar power plays in academia. I was once on a committee led by a prestigious faculty member who always arrived at least ten minutes late, often twenty minutes. He also cancelled two meetings after the rest of the five-person committee had gathered. I tracked the time I wasted waiting for this jerk, which totaled over a half day during a six-month stretch.

As a boss, you need to establish a pecking order where people who know the most about a problem wield the greatest influence over what is done. You especially need to watch who talks the most (and least). Don’t let your people fall prey to the blabbermouth theory of leadership. At least in Western countries, people who talk first and most frequently usually wield excessive influence over others – even when they spew out nonsense.

Say Alex and Sutton come over to my house for dinner. You may be friends with Sutton, but that doesn’t mean you hang out with us. You’re Ben’s nanny. That’s your place. I don’t want you to be confused because we’re having sex. I don’t want you to think that implies membership into the family unit I have with my teammates and their women.

The easy thing would be to give up and move on, but it’s the fight that makes the end result worth it. Don’t give up on what you want, Sutton Grace, even if you get hurt. If he has feelings for you—like he should—don’t give up trying.

We don’t think enough about the steps required to achieve those ends, and when we do we underestimate how much time and effort they will take. But thinking only about looming deadlines and short-term goals is a mixed bag as well. We focus on what is feasible, on the steps to take right now, but we forget or downplay long-term goals. So we direct our efforts toward achievable milestones even when they undermine our ability to reach our ultimate destination.

As engineer Sanjeev Singh explained, if you keep waiting for people to tell you what to do, don’t ask for help when you get stuck, and won’t show others your work until it is perfect, “you won’t last long at Facebook.

He read each juror’s name: Cynthia Haden, Martha Salcido, Verbe Sutton, Alfredo Carrillo, Arthur Johnson, Lillian Sagron, Felipe Rodriguez, Mary Herrera, Choclate Harris, Arlena Wallace, Don McGee, and Shirley Zelaya.

Don’t hit me. But, I mean, would you want your boyfriend shopping for lingerie with his girl best friend? You know, if you had one.” I nearly choked on my sip of alcohol. “Eloise, we weren’t lingerie shopping!” Though Elijah did correct me on my cup size. Maybe that was a little weird. “We just wandered over to that side of the store. It couldn’t have been more than five minutes tops.

Just remember you don’t have to be perfect at everything. We all make mistakes, and sometimes the best things come from those.

you don’t want a lot of assets in one LLC (or LP). An LLC that holds ten properties is a much bigger target than ten LLCs each holding one property. In the first case, a fall at one property exposes the other nine properties to attack.

Let go of me,” she whispered. “Let go of me and go away. I don’t ever want to see you again.

I guess you know she loves you,” Peter said. Trey stopped chewing toast and stared at the other man. “That’s love?” “They don’t get that mad at a man unless they care about him. The madder they get, the more they care.” The devil in his head slowed down, just a little. “If that’s love, it’s no wonder men avoid it.

She wanted to lean her forehead against his arm and cry. Instead she disinfected the wound and the needle and thread and started stitching. “I’ll marry you if you’ll go far away.” “Just me? You won’t come along?” “Yes, I mean we’ll go far away.” “Thank you for the offer, but I don’t want you to marry me so I’ll run away. I like it here.” “But you asked me. You said you would go if I married you.” “You turned me down and gave me time to reconsider. I don’t want you to marry me to get me to rabbit off to Alaska. I want you to marry me because you can’t live without me.” He sucked in a breath and held it as she started the first stitch, let it out while she tied the knot. “I don’t suppose there’s any chance you can’t live without me?

You didn’t like this kiss?” “Well, yes, but then.... It was too much, and he could tell, and he stopped.” “Too much?” “I started to feel dizzy, and some places were—doing strange things.” “Oh, sweetheart, that’s supposed to happen. If things—progress to their natural conclusion, that all makes it better.” “I don’t want things to progress.” “Kiss him a few more times, and let his hands wander. I think you’ll change your mind.” Deborah gaped at Norah, unable to believe what she just heard.

I’ll give you a weenie,” Pacey says, shoving his crotch into Carson’s face with an overexaggerated thrust. “Don’t threaten me with a good time, big boy.” “Want it? Take it, Daddy.

So wet for me, Little Dove. You like when I touch this pussy, don’t you?

You taste like heaven, Little Dove. I don’t think I’ll ever get enough of you.

You don’t just leave. You don’t act on emotion. Feelings are fickle and fleeting. Love isn’t a feeling, Carter. It’s an action. The Good Book says love isn’t self-seeking. It says love always perseveres. And I’ve never known the Good Book to be wrong, son.

Here’s what I think we face. Here’s what I think we should do. Here’s why. Here’s what I think we should keep an eye on. Now talk to me (i.e., tell me if you (a) don’t understand, (b) cannot do it, (c) see something that I do not).

One of Satya’s first moves was to abolish stack ranking. He worked to reverse the traditional emphasis on rewarding the smartest person in the room, who dominates and pushes around others. He encouraged people to ask questions and listen—to be “learn-it-alls” not know-it-alls. He pressed people to live the One Microsoft philosophy, that the company is not to be “a confederation of fiefdoms” because “innovation and competition don’t respect our silos, so we need to transcend those barriers.” To support this new culture, Satya changed the reward system so that the superstars were people who worked across silos and teams to build products and services with pieces that meshed together well. And so that people deemed as superstars were those who helped others succeed in their careers. The backstabbers who’d flourished under Ballmer changed their ways, left the company voluntarily, or were shown the door.

Clara Shih is the founding CEO and executive chair of Hearsay Systems and the CEO of Salesforce AI. She agrees “with the notion of embracing the mess while working to clean it up.” Clara adds that, especially when you are doing something new, even though you don’t know which messes will arise, it’s best to expect that things will go wrong. Rather than being shocked or freaking out, be ready to make repairs if you can, but as David Kelley suggests, keep moving forward through the muck.

Following Amy and Anita, friction fixers make it safe for “noisy complainers” who repair problems and then tell many others where the system failed. Friction fixers praise and protect “noisy troublemakers” and “self-aware error makers,” who point out mistakes they and others make so people can avoid repeating such failures and improve the system. Sure, sometimes it’s easier to be quiet and compliant. But if your goal is friction fixing—rather than fueling the delusion that everything is just fine—be loud and proud about the mistakes that you and others make and flaws that you spot and fix, and reward that behavior in others. And don’t stop questioning what your organization does and pressing others to figure out how to do it better.

Friction fixers avert trouble before it happens—they don’t just repair or remove problems that flare up. As Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the Nobel Peace Prize winner who was a powerful force in ending apartheid in South Africa, said, “There comes a point where we need to stop just pulling people out of the river. We need to go upstream and find out why they’re falling in.

The second way is dealing with the symptoms of friction troubles. This work includes the “therapy” that Sandra talked about: keeping others and yourself sane and motivated so that you can survive broken systems together and be fortified with the grit and gumption to repair them. Friction fixers also help others deal with symptoms by guiding them through the best—or least bad—paths through the muck. Friction fixers serve as shock absorbers, too: doing routine chores, dealing with reasonable and unreasonable demands and interruptions, and enduring unwarranted cruelty so that others don’t have to.

In all primate groups, members direct attention up the hierarchy rather than down. We humans are a lot like baboons and chimpanzees, who check every twenty or thirty seconds to see what the alpha male in their troop is doing. This lopsided attention is adaptive because more powerful creatures dispense rewards and punishments. Human bosses often don’t realize how closely underlings monitor their every word and deed—and are oblivious of the gyrations that subordinates go through to protect themselves from and please those at the top of the pecking order.

prestigious leaders who spend their days interacting with colleagues and clients, reading internal reports, and studying spreadsheets, conclude, “It is my organization, I spend my days learning about the details, I know everything important that is going on here.” Yet they often don’t know, or they reach the wrong conclusions, about what is (and ought to be) harder and easier in their organizations—and cling to their flawed beliefs.

Absorbing and deflecting friction so others don’t have to often requires more courage and self-sacrifice than reframing and navigation. Shielding is a symptom of friction troubles and, sometimes, a prevention and cure—so we rank it above navigation on our Help Pyramid. When people need intense protection to feel safe and to concentrate on their work, it’s a symptom of a bad system. But designing roles and teams to shield people so they can work unfettered by intrusions and insults is a hallmark of healthy organizations, too.

You don’t belong here.” He smiled at my expression. “You belong on Sutton Station. It’s a part of you. The vastness, the open spaces, the red dirt.” “It’s who I am.” He smiled. “It’s who I love.

I don’t recall giving you permission to address me at all.

Anita and Sara explain that their findings don’t mean that leaders should stop using MBWA. Rather, as that silly saying goes, it means “problems are like dinosaurs. They’re easy to handle when they’re small, but if you let them go, they’ll grow up to be big and nasty.

But Seinfeld’s belief that streamlining creativity can kill it is bolstered by piles of studies—especially the folly of trying to reduce your team’s or organization’s failure rate. As psychologist Dean Keith Simonton documents, the most creative people don’t succeed at a higher rate than others. Renowned geniuses including Picasso, da Vinci, and physicist Richard Feynman had far more successes and failures than their unheralded colleagues. In every occupation Simonton studied, from composers, artists, and poets to inventors and scientists, the story is the same: “The most successful creators tend to be those with the most failures!

Celebrate People Who Don’t Add Unnecessary Stuff in the First Place As the Chinese philosopher Lao-tzu put it, “Do nothing, and everything will be done.” Smart friction fixers never forget that, if they add nothing unnecessary, excessive, or destructive, then no subtraction will be needed.

Such leaders yielded to subordinates’ technical and cultural expertise by deferring to their judgment and delegating authority. Like the Brazilian leader who told his Singapore team, “Let’s invert the jobs here, right? You don’t work for me. I work for you.

Paul said, again and again to different groups, that this focus on safety would inspire employees to choose to devote more of their “discretionary energy” to their jobs, that “you don’t actually have to ask for, you need to turn them loose.” He argued that creating a place where no one ever gets hurts is a “down payment” on treating people with dignity and respect—which creates pride “that swells up into everything you do.

What’s the matter with you? Are you deaf? I don’t want that wood. Go away.” “I wish I could. The trouble is I owe you, and we’re both stuck dealing with it.

And you, Caleb Sutton? Are you just made a certain way? Couldn’t you live some other way?” “I don’t want to live another way. Look around you. Everyone you see is either predator or prey, wolf or rabbit. Wolf is better.

You don’t want me around good people.” “What does that say about me?” “You lose your way now and then.

All right,” he said. “How do we get married?” She crossed her arms and tipped her head at him, “Are you sure? If you marry me you can’t have someone else later, you know.” “I know.” “Are you sure you don’t want someone younger? Some beautiful young blonde?” “Now who has cold feet? If you’ve come to your senses, say so.

When she outlined his lips with a forefinger, he drew the tip into his mouth, nibbled gently. “You’re beautiful.” “Don’t spoil it by lying,” she begged. “We both know pretty is the best I can do.” He shook his head. “Pretty is when your hair is pinned up, and your collar is buttoned up. Pretty is for those times. Beautiful is for times like this, good times, wild times, sharing secrets times.

I don't have a twin. That's impossible." - Sutton "You do have a twin." - Becky

And I know something you don't know... I know where your twin sister is. Emma. I've been watching her for weeks. I found her for you, Sutton. - Ethan

So,” Cal said, drawing out the word, “that was Margo. Your roommate. The one you’re not attracted to. The one you don’t think about ‘that way.’” Jake snorted. “He thinks about her ‘that way’ and a thousand other ways, too, I’ll bet.” “At least a thousand,” Cal agreed. “In the car. On a bar. Against a door. On the floor. In the shower. In a tower.” He paused. “I’m channeling Dr. Seuss.” Jake snickered. “On a bed. In a shed. In a tent. Under a vent. On a slope. With some rope.” “Rope is too rough. It chafes delicate skin,” Cal noted. “I prefer to use one of my ties.” Zeke crossed his arms over his chest. “Are you done yet?” “Why are you still here? Don’t you have anything better to do?” Cal asked. “Yes, you do. Her name is Margo.

Well, good. I figured you were, but…” He turned down our street and glanced at me. “Wait, there’s another guy, isn’t there?” He grinned. “Ugh, Dad. I’m not talking boys with you.” “What’s his name?” I feigned a scowl. “Does he go to Sutton?” I rolled my eyes. “Where’d you meet?” A smile cracked. We pulled into the driveway. “What’s he do?” I sighed then rattled off his answers. “Cade. He’s a therapy dog handler who volunteers at the hospital where I did my internship, and he works at the university rec center.” Dad let out a low, long whistle. “I approve.” I rolled my eyes again. “If you tell Mom, I’ll deny everything and tell her I’ve started dating girls.” “Your life choices don’t change how I feel about you, though your mom may be slow to come around.” “I’m not a lesbian, Dad.” “I’d love you even if you were.” “Dad.” I covered my face with my hands. “This conversation is so over.” He chuckled. “C’mon, short stack. Later, you can show me a picture of this young man or special lady in your life, that’s your choice.” I groaned. “That was meant to deter this conversation.” With another laugh, he hopped out, grabbed my suitcase from the back and unlocked the front door.

Even though they’re not ballplayers, Paul and Chantal understood the psychological significance of this story. Sutton was saying, Okay, Lasorda, this is my day to pitch and my mound. I’m in control! Don’t you dare screw with that again. And a pitcher who’s got that sort of cojones—giving a batter a free pass to second base just to make a point to his manager—will also have the guts and the grit to figure out how to keep winning ball games. He will make adjustments.

There are so few things that make sense and countless things that don't." -Fain