An unexpected life-enhancing change occurred for me starting on June 8, 2020, when my wife Terri and I enrolled in a community of practice (Writing In Community) dedicated to writing a book over a six-month period. We committed to showing up daily for at least 15 minutes. The process took hold of us, and we both fell in love with writing, which helped us bring clarity to our world. Writing helps us make sense of our thoughts, and we both advocate for encouraging others to adopt regular writing practices!
“My efforts have resulted in four unpublished memoirs that I have completed. I have gained tremendous enjoyment from writing these memoirs and fulfillment knowing the thoughts, appreciation, and memories I ultimately leave for my family. The four memoirs have now made it possible to think about and more clearly articulate my body of work through the blessing of my 65-plus years of life.”
“A few years ago I was at a dinner party and another woman went on a rant about how people who weren’t talented at writing and hadn’t been published by “real” publishers had no right to call themselves writers. All I could think as she blathered on was, “You poor thing. How badly you must want to write and how harsh someone must have been to you once upon a time.””
“When you use writing to pass what’s in your mind and heart to someone else’s mind and heart, that’s amazing. It’s magic as far as I’m concerned. When you carve meaning out of this chaotic cacophony of life, I applaud you. When you dare to be seen in your own writing, to be seen by you or someone else, what you believe, what you know, what you’ve experienced, that’s glorious. When you offer a hand made of words to another person or yourself, a hand that says, “Take this, use what you need. You are not alone,” that’s making a miracle.
Nobody gets to stop or judge your desire to write and create. And those that try are most likely like the woman at the party — terrified they will die without having declared their stories, their ideas, their spirit. Terrified by the ghosts of judges and gatekeepers and other stifled creatives into a silence that chokes.”
Writing isn’t just for published authors – it’s for everyone. It’s a gift you give yourself and others. So if you want to write anything, please write. You don’t need a published book to be a writer. You need only the courage to put words on a page.
Through writing, I found clarity I never knew I lacked. You, too, will uncover hidden depths within yourself, illuminating your thoughts and experiences in ways you never imagined. Whether you share your words with family and friends, on a blog, or in a book, you’re offering a precious gift.
As Jen beautifully puts it, “When you offer a hand made of words to another person or yourself, a hand that says, ‘Take this, use what you need. You are not alone,’ that’s making a miracle.”
Don’t let anyone discourage your dreams. Don’t let fear silence your voice. Write for yourself, for others, and the sheer joy of creation. Go now and start making your miracle. The world is waiting for your words.
December 2021 – Terri and Bill Tomoff with Books Written
Let’s empower ourselves by recognizing the critical importance of our choices with the time we are blessed with. In my blog post,Time Wealth: Prioritizing Mental Bandwidth in the Knowledge Economy, I discussed my time crisis and the resulting awareness that my choices of priorities were essential to surviving my son Ryan’s battles with childhood cancer and beyond.
Shortly after, a Daily Stoic email resonated deeply with the core of my message. The post, titled ‘Do You Dominate the Battlespace?‘ by Ryan Holiday, echoes the importance of our mental battlespace. He urges us to take control. He explains:
“All of these things are vying for what military strategists today would call “the battlespace.” Our mind is a contested bit of territory, with many people seeking to control what we call “the empire between your ears” – Why? Because your brain, your attention, is valuable. People want you to think about certain things and not think about certain things–because it’s good for business, because it makes you easier to control.”
“So you must dominate this battlespace. It is you who must assert yourself over yourself.”
“We too must grab the reins of our mind, set up boundaries against distraction, push away intrusive thoughts, tune out nonsense and noise. That’s what Stoicism is, as we wrote recently, it’s the gladiator stepping out into the arena of the mind, dominating the battlespace, controlling their own mind…because the alternative–letting the enemy dominate, letting your mind be controlled by someone or something else–is just unthinkable.”
This passage sums up well that our mind is under our control. Yet, too often, we give away our time by allowing our minds to be engaged in meaningless or dangerous activities. This is why we must be aware and establish boundaries to protect our mental well-being.
In addition to maintaining healthy boundaries around where we are willing to apply our precious time and minds, we must strive to continually learn and grow in ways that permit us to maximize the use of our time and mental bandwidth.
I have discovered several posts that resonate with the importance of managing our minds and being judicious about where we prioritize our time. Rajesh Setty is a favorite follow on my LinkedIn. This post, “One Approach to Cultivate a Beautiful Mind Garden,” was inspiring and thought-provoking. I encourage you to follow Rajesh and read his entire post, but consider this insight he shared:
“A beautiful garden has good plants and trees that bear fruits and flowers. It also lacks weeds that grow easily on their own. Removing weeds takes effort. If you don’t maintain the garden, weeds will grow, requiring more time to remove them. This means less time for nurturing the beautiful parts of the garden.
The same goes for the mind. Information doesn’t come with nutrition labels. When information enters your mind through news, ideas, conversations, projects, and work, there’s usually no filter. Your mind will use it’s previous capacity to process this unfiltered information even to determine the nature (good, bad, relevant, irrelevant etc.) of it. In the world where both people and machines are creating content at breathtaking speed, you can easily get carried away in one or the other content rabbit holes.
To make a beautiful garden of the mind, use the power of curation. In my life, I prioritize curation highly. I don’t watch news or read newspapers unless someone points out something relevant to the projects I am involved and something that’s within my sphere of influence. Occasionally, I let my mind wander by design to ensure that there is room for some surprise and serendipity.”
In addition to remaining aware and informed of our choices to prioritize our mind share, we should filter what we dedicate our time and energies to as best as possible. Here are a few steps to quickly help in assessing choices:
Do I need to be involved? Eliminating unnecessary involvement of your energy is the number one time hack.
If I need to be involved, how can I maximize my impact with the least mental energy and time commitment?
Will my involvement allow me to grow and help others in the future? Note that having opinions, being judgemental, and expending energy toward gossip and mainstream news are time sucks, taking away from making a meaningful contribution to ourselves and others.
Once I dedicate my time, am I prepared to make the best use of it, or am I doing something I love, like spending time with family and hobbies? Think of thePareto Principle, also known as the 80/20 rule.
A few additional resources that have resonated with me:
A Learning a Day blog shared two concepts that are worth understanding. For many decisions, we must be aware of the time we commit and contemplate, “What is the minimum viable information I need to get moving and get comfortable with a decision?“
“I use a simple rule of thumb for the difference between attempting to convert a directional answer into a precise answer—10x+ time investment.”
In our lives and with our #TwinzTalk initiative, Don and I have given ourselves a disproportionate advantage by seeking directional answers to get us moving forward. Technology testing and adoption have always started with a vision of the potential rather than a precise answer to the ultimate benefit. Seeking directional insight vs. [often unattainable] precision, we can reach more learning opportunities and possibilities to leverage technology.
“Barry Schwartz’sresearch showed that people tend to fall into one of two groups when making decisions – he called these groups satisficers and maximizers. Maximizers desire the best possible result, while satisficers desire a result that is good enough to meet some criterion. That doesn’t necessarily mean satisficers settle for crap. Their criteria could be lofty – but, as long as it meets that criteria, they don’t care about it being the best.
Barry Schwartz argues that satisficers tend to be happier than maximizers as maximizers spend a lot of time and energy on many decisions that just don’t matter as much.”
Don and I both share the satisficer tendency. We have saved ourselves time and energy, while also being content with our decisions. Talk about a win-win!
Maximizing everything is time-consuming. The number of choices available to us is overwhelming. Settling on “good enough” is a gift we can give ourselves. If you have yet to see Barry Schwartz’s TED Talk, The Paradox of Choice, prioritize time to watch it. I guarantee a few laughs and several “aha” moments.
In today’s world, where information is everywhere and everything moves fast, managing what we think about and focus on is important. By understanding how valuable our time and attention are, setting clear limits on what we let in, and being careful about what we think, we can live a more focused life, get more done, and feel more satisfied. The secret is making smart choices on purpose. Our most valuable thing isn’t money or material possessions – it’s our limited time and brain power. If we focus on what’s really important and let go of the rest, we can build “time-wealth.” This means we have time to grow, do good things for the world, and live happier lives. We all have the power to control what goes on in our minds – so let’s make wise choices.
I have joined an initiative with Katy Dalgleish, Julie Rains, and my wife, Terri. We meet virtually once or twice weekly to discuss Seth’s lessons in “This is Strategy.”
While we quickly cover a lot of ground, and Seth’s messages deserve greater focus and discussion, I enjoy the process from the perspective that “we never know where thoughts/ideas will collide,” and a practical use application will surface.
During a drive to Ocean City, MD, for the Maryland Government Finance Officers Association (MDGFOA) conference, I was contemplating Seth’s video five, which highlighted “16 questions to begin” as we approach the work of strategy.
While Don and I find our personal development work very compelling, convincing others of the value of committing their time to investing in themselves is a huge obstacle. As Seth notes in video five, “They don’t know what you know. They don’t want what you want.” These two sentences sat with me while we were driving and talking about the presentation Don would share over three and one-half hours starting at 1:00 PM.
How could we modify the presentation to turn the attention of the attendees and emphasize our mission is to enhance their professional performance and ability to contribute exponentially?
June 26, 2024 | Don and Bill Tomoff at Maryland Government Finance Officers Association Conference
Within the 16 questions, the following five reminded me that answers to these questions might help inspire the attendees to dedicate themselves to embracing personal growth. With each question, I have added brief thoughts on how our work impacts those on the receiving side:
Am I changing someone’s status quo?
Learning and development do change someone’s status quo. Embracing the initiative of personal growth is a commitment and a change that many find difficult. It often involves discomfort and requires time prioritization involving tradeoffs we would rather not deal with. The easy answer is to avoid changing anything in our daily lives that is already working for us.
Why would anyone voluntarily choose to be part of this work?
If you ask anyone, “Would you like to improve your critical thinking, skill set, and ability to contribute more significantly?” Most people would respond with a resounding “YES!” Choosing this more challenging yet rewarding path of personal development will change your life as the daily effort compounds over time, and the gratifying reward of growth becomes a part of your daily life.
What will they tell their colleagues?
Don and I think the magic can begin when word of mouth spreads to colleagues. As we learn and experience the rewards of learning, helping others must become an individual practice. Avid learners love to help others by sharing their expertise. And when we teach, we learn more.
Who gains in status, affiliation and power by supporting this work?
When personal development is embraced, the enhanced talents are noticed in the long run. By their example, learners inspire others to learn and can be recognized for their contributing abilities. The learner reaches levels of performance that are noticed by others. As learners are noticed, their status, affiliation, and power will grow.
Will early support translate into more support later?
Early support and the possible success that others achieve can elevate word-of-mouth and create a snowball of support as even more learn about successes achieved because of an individual decision to invest in themselves. Witnessing the growth of others and the successes they reach is very gratifying for Don and me.
We hoped to change the “vibe” of the presentation, so we started with a heartfelt question. This start was as if we were sitting down and sharing a sincere conversation, saying, “We are on your side, and we want to help you.”
“Before we get started, I would like everyone to take a minute and reflect on the following: “What are two or three of the most important things in your life? Not only professionally, but overall.”
Posing this question and the ensuing brief conversation about “What is important to YOU?” made the audience more curious and receptive.
The responses we have received were in line with our thoughts and included the following:
Family
Focusing on self-care
Enjoying hobbies
Making a difference
Feeling a greater purpose
“Our goal today? We want to help you reclaim your time to enable you to prioritize more time for the most important aspects of your life.”
Then, towards the end of the day, to wrap the session, Don reiterated:
“Remember, the overall theme of what we are doing today: We want to help you reclaim your time for the most important things in your life.”
The session and the audience engagement were inspiring. Had our last-minute modification to starting the presentation made a difference for the entire day? We believe so and plan to continue using and refining this change in future presentations!
During our debrief of the presentation, Don and I agreed that starting with the personal question, “What is most important to you?” changed the tone of the entire day. The attendees’ engagement during the session and one-on-one discussions afterward led us to conclude that we must build this momentum into the future!
To help evaluate and evolve the approach in the future, I collaborated with ChatGPT to assess our thoughts and then asked for suggestions for improvement. The response from ChatGPT has spurred our creativity. The prompt and response are provided below.
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Collaboration with ChatGPT
Prompt:
My twin Don and I are working on modifying the kickoff to our discussions about technology and gen AI adoption (e.g., ChatGPT) when making presentations. Focusing on the audience and asking them to consider what is most important in their lives is a way to increase interest and curiosity and ultimately encourage the adoption of our suggestions.
Please read the revision below and let us know your thoughts. You are an expert presenter who can inspire others to take action. Please take a deep breath and carefully think before you respond. This change is significant, and we want it to have the maximum effect on the success of our efforts.
“Before we get started, I would like everyone to take one minute and reflect on the following: “What are two or three of the most important things in your life? Not only professionally, but overall.”
Started the session with this question. Posing this question and the brief conversation about “What is important to YOU?” made the audience more curious and receptive.
Responses included:
Family
self-care
hobbies
greater purpose
“Our goal today? We want to help you reclaim your time to enable you to prioritize more time for the most important aspects in your life.”
to wrap the session:
“Remember, the overall theme of what we are doing today: We want to help you reclaim your time for the most important things in your life.”
Response:
Your revised approach for the kickoff of your technology and AI adoption discussions is well-crafted and focuses on what truly matters to the audience. Here’s a refined version to enhance clarity, engagement, and the impact of your presentation:
Opening:
“Before we get started, I’d like everyone to take a moment and reflect on this question: ‘What are the two or three most important things in your life, not just professionally, but overall?'”
Pause for reflection.
“Take a minute to think about it. What truly matters to you? Responses included:
Family
Self-care
Hobbies
Greater purpose
Starting our session with this question often makes everyone more curious and receptive.”
Transition:
“Our goal today is to help you reclaim time to prioritize what’s most important in your life.”
Wrap-up:
“Remember, the overall theme of what we are doing today is to help you reclaim your time for the most important things in your life.”
Thoughts and Suggestions:
1. Engagement: Starting with a reflective question is a great way to engage the audience and make the session personal. This strategy fosters a connection between the technology you’re discussing and the audience’s personal lives, making your message more relatable and compelling.
2. Clarity: By clearly listing typical responses, you guide the audience in their reflection and make it easier for them to relate.
3. Consistency: Repeating the theme of reclaiming time throughout your presentation reinforces your message and keeps the audience focused on the ultimate benefit of adopting the technology.
4. Empathy: Your approach shows empathy and understanding of the audience’s needs and values, which can increase their openness to your suggestions.
This refined structure ensures your presentation is engaging, clear, and impactful, helping you achieve your goal of fostering curiosity and adoption of your recommendations.
“Your child has cancer.” My wife, Terri, and I heard these words on October 17, 1996. Our son, Ryan, at two years and two months old, was diagnosed with childhood cancer (Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia). In an instant, our lives, and the lives of Ryan and our four-year-old daughter Olivia, were changed forever.
As I write this in June 2024, 27+ years later, Ryan is [closely monitored and] doing well today. He is a five-time cancer survivor – 3x childhood leukemia and 2x adult tongue cancer (secondary malignancies resulting from the extensive treatments he received through his wars with leukemia). In March 2021, Terri published her memoirThe Focused Fight: A Childhood Cancer Journey from Mayhem to Miracles, detailing Ryan and our family’s journey through what often felt like impossible times.
Our heart breaks every time we hear of a family receiving the news that their child has cancer. A child and family stricken with cancer through no fault of their own. I pray no one reading this is facing a childhood cancer situation, yet we know bad things happen, and our lifelong mission is to be a gentle shoulder of support for others impacted as we have been. Maybe this helps one person, one family, piece together the swirling insanity that is happening in the center of their lives.
With this introduction, I will offer my list of “Life lessons learned from dealing with a childhood cancer diagnosis:“
October 1996 – Ryan and Bill Tomoff – Georgetown Hospital
Life is not fair.
If we are blessed to live long enough, realizing the randomness and unfairness of life events will strike us. There is tragedy and heartbreak happening all around us.
“Life breaks all of us, but some of us get stronger in the broken places.”—Ernest Hemingway.
Work is important. Family is EVERYTHING. Carpe Diem.
Treasure each day. Life contentment is in the small, everyday, ordinary moments. Recognize and embrace the “ordinary.”
Be determined and unapologetic in identifying and setting boundaries around your priorities. Learning to kindly yet firmly say “no” is imperative.
People need people.
You are not alone.
Thinking “I/we can handle this” is dangerous and not helpful. Seek, be open to, and be willing to ask for help. People want to help – accept their generosity and commit to “paying it forward” into the world one day.
The Postcard Project was a wonderful initiative that gave Ryan hope and inspiration as he endured treatments to get him to his life-saving bone marrow transplant on November 4, 2004.
Embrace communities of support. Special Love is our community of support that brings joy through their summer camps dedicated to children fighting cancer and their siblings.
“In a tough situation, few people wake up every morning and say, “I’m going to be resilient today.” Most people under extreme stress wake up with heavy hearts but with a quiet voice that tells them never to give up. Resilience is listening to that small inner voice and finding people and organizations to help you slowly turn up the volume.”
September 1997 – Tomoff Family – Special Love Under 7 Weekend
Your environment matters.
Surround yourself with the best. Lift others up, and they will lift you up.
Self-care is imperative.
Self-care is not selfish. We cannot pour from an empty cup.
Kindness matters. Prioritize kindness to yourself and others.
Sometimes we cannot see a path forward, and are hanging on doing our best. Everyone, in some way, has these moments. “The next step,” a moment of kindness given or received, may propel you or someone else forward for the day.
Express appreciation and gratitude. Never default to “this person is just doing their job.” Everyone deserves to be seen.
“Don’t underestimate the power of a chocolate chip cookie.”—Terri Tomoff.
April 2022 – Terri Tomoff and Chocolate Chip Cookies
Don’t ask. Do.
Choose to take the initiative.
There are many moments in life where we can help meaningfully. In small ways and without permission, a difference can be made.
Everyone has unique gifts. Identify and nurture those gifts.
Ryan’s relentless fight and inspiration to the world.
Olivia and the gift of soccer to our family.
Trust and know that everyone has a story.
“Be gentle. Be kind – you have no idea what someone is going through.”—Bill Tomoff.
“Whether the valley is a personal one or a societal one or both, there’s a lot of suffering. You’re enduring a season of pain, a season of feeling lost. This can be a period of soul-crushing anguish, but it can also be one of the most precious seasons of your life.
John Keats said that we live in a mansion of many apartments. When we’re on the first mountain, we’re living in what Keats called the “thoughtless chamber.” This is the default chamber; we just unthinkingly absorb the values and ways of life that happen to be around us.
We want to stay in this chamber. It’s comfortable, and everybody nods at you with approval. In The Age of Anxiety, W. H. Auden wrote,
We would rather be ruined than changed
We would rather die in our dread
Than climb the cross of the moment
And let our illusions die.
Seasons of suffering kick us in the ass. They are the foghorns that blast us out of our complacency and warn us we are heading for the wrong life.
There’s nothing intrinsically noble about suffering. Sometimes grief is just grief, to be gotten through. Many bad things happen in life, and it’s a mistake to try to sentimentalize these moments away by saying that they must be happening to serve some higher good. But sometimes, when suffering can be connected to a larger narrative of change and redemption, we can suffer our way to wisdom. This is the kind of wisdom you can’t learn from books; you have to experience it yourself. Sometimes you experience your first taste of nobility in the way you respond to suffering.
The theologian Paul Tillich wrote that suffering upsets the normal patterns of life and reminds you that you are not who you thought you were. It smashes through the floor of what you thought was the basement of your soul and reveals a cavity below, and then it smashes through that floor and reveals a cavity below that.
Suffering teaches us gratitude. Normally we take love and friendship for granted. But in seasons of suffering we throw ourselves on others and appreciate the gifts that our loved ones offer. Suffering puts you in solidarity with others who suffer. It makes you more sympathetic to those who share this or some other sort of pain. In this way it tenderizes the heart.
Suffering calls for a response. None of us can avoid suffering, but we can all choose how we respond to it. And, interestingly, few people respond to suffering by seeking pleasure. Nobody says, I lost my child, therefore I should go out and party. They say, I lost my child, and therefore I am equipped to help others who have lost their child. People realize that shallow food won’t satisfy the deep hunger and fill the deep emptiness that suffering reveals. Only spiritual food will do that. Many people respond to pain by practicing generosity.
Finally, suffering shatters the illusion of self-sufficiency, which is an illusion that has to be shattered if any interdependent life is going to begin. Seasons of pain expose the falseness and vanity of most of our ambitions and illuminate the larger reality of living and dying, caring and being cared for. Pain helps us see the true size of our egotistical desires. Before they seemed gigantic and dominated the whole screen. After seasons of suffering, we see that the desires of the ego are very small desires, and certainly not the ones we should organize our lives around. Climbing out of the valley is not like recovering from a disease. Many people don’t come out healed; they come out different. The poet Ted Hughes observed that the things that are the worst to undergo are often the best to remember, because at those low moments the protective shells are taken off, humility is achieved, a problem is clearly presented, and a call to service is clearly received.”
I hope that my perspective provides you an inspiration to move through whatever challenge you are dealing with or enduring. Take this journey of life one day at a time. Do your best. Be kind to yourself and others. Embrace and treasure the ordinary. Believe in better days. We got this.
2004 – Bill and Ryan Tomoff – Bald heads before Duke PBMT tripJune 2024 – Kelleys Island 5K – Ryan walks with Aunt Stephanie
Throughout my career and then in life challenges (son Ryan battles with childhood cancer and beyond), I learned to deeply understand my time and how I prioritized everything in my life as the most important variables within my control. Time is a nonrenewable asset, and I quickly understood that I had to own my decisions of where I choose to prioritize my energy.
Thanks to years-long encouragement from my wife, Terri, I made a [wise] decision to read more actively to help my learning and growth. Since 2012, reading for personal development has become a non-negotiable priority. The mission is to allocate my efforts to make a more meaningful contribution to the world daily. This starts with owning my decisions of where I focus my mental bandwidth.
Where I focus, these three words are front and center for me. Since I started reading the philosophy of Stoicism in 2019, and have read daily since January 1, 2020. As I noted in a March 2023 blog post, “In Pursuit of Inner Peace: My Stoic Transformation:”
“The Stoicism philosophy profoundly influences my perspective and “how” I handle myself and my emotions daily. Striving every day to develop my mind and embrace the only aspect of life we all control – our reasoned choice. Thoughts such as “it is not necessary to have an opinion, we should be strict with ourselves and forgiving of others (no judgment), and we control our response to any external event – we are harmed only if we believe we are harmed,” are thoughts I hold close to my heart and work to live in practice.”
Embracing my reasoned choice. My remaining life’s work will be to strive to use my mind for good – developing myself and helping others by utilizing my skills and talents. I can and must do better. The work must not stop.
A blog post by Morgan Housel, “Lazy Work, Good Work,” inspired my post here. When we can keep our mind disciplined to focus on learning and good, we can prioritize time for reflection and creativity. Here is a sample of topics on my “do not do” list – activities I strive to eliminate or actively reduce by being aware of my behavior:
Gossip.
Expressing an unsolicited opinion.
Judgment.
Watching or engaging in conversation about mainstream news.
Involving myself in other people’s business.
The work regarding my do-not-do list is a never-ending process. I credit my reading of the Stoicism philosophy for helping me.
By reducing the above activities, I will replace my time (and mind) with:
Quality time with my family, friends, and communities of practice who inspire and lift me up.
Kindness to others and my world.
Encouraging others.
Helping others through micro-moves taking almost no effort. Social media engagement is an easy micro-move example.
Investing in improving myself (as the Optimist Creed states: “To give so much time to the improvement of yourself that you have no time to criticize others.”).
Be more patient and calm. We all are doing our best to get through each day.
A key component of “investing in improving myself” is prioritizing building buffer/slack into my days and intentionally moving more slowly and thoughtfully through each day. Make space for time for reading and contemplation. Morgan Housel notes in his article [Bold emphasis is mine]:
“Here’s a problem we don’t think about enough: Even as more professions look like Rockefeller’s – thought jobs that require quiet time to think a problem through – we’re stuck in the old world where a good employee is expected to labor, visibly and without interruption.
The point is that productive work today does not look like productive work did for most of history. If your job was to pull a lever, you were only productive if you were pulling the lever. But if your job is to create a marketing campaign, you might be productive sitting quietly with your eyes closed, thinking about design. The problem is that too many workplaces expect their knowledge workers to pull the proverbial lever – today in Microsoft Office form – 40+ hours a week when they’d be better off doing things that look lazy but are actually productive. The result is that most people have thought jobs without being given much time to think, which is the equivalent of making a ditch-digger work without a shovel. Maybe this is why productivity growth is half of what it used to be.
If you anchor to the old world where good work meant physical action, it’s hard to wrap your head around the idea that the most productive use of a knowledge-worker’s time could be sitting on a couch thinking. But it’s so clear that it is. Good ideas rarely come in meetings, or even at your desk. They come to you in the shower. On a walk. On your commute, or hanging out on the weekend. I’m always amazed at the number of famous ideas that came to people in the bathtub. But tell your boss you require a mid-day soak, and the response is entirely predictable.”
Starting with yourself, embrace a gentler and kinder presence with the world. Slowing down and being more mindful as you move through your day will be rewarding and gratifying. While you may appear “lazy” and unproductive, the reality will be enhanced productivity through leveraging greater creativity and adaptability.
2019 – Bill T and Bill G encouraging “Good!”France! Learning in Community with Karena de Souza
What is truly important to me is putting in the daily effort to refine my talents and develop my skills. The key to superior performance is quiet, steady dedication practiced for the long term when no one is watching.
I’ve learned many valuable life lessons through competitive sports participation. I credit competitive distance running with developing my willingness and ability to take the long view. My twin brother Don and I are obsessed with personal development and continual learning. We’ve pushed each other to invest time and money into our growth.
When my son Ryan was diagnosed with childhood cancer in 1996, my ability to tenaciously focus on core priorities was tested beyond imagination. My wife Terri’s memoir tells our family’s story of this challenging journey.
Over the years, I’ve pursued initiatives that exemplify my commitment to consistent effort and self-improvement. These include a daily planking streak with Don that has lasted 2,277 days so far, cofounding our #TwinzTalk initiative to share personal development tips, and dedicating myself to writing during the pandemic, completing four unpublished memoirs since June 2020.
I believe that to make a difference in the world, you must be different from the world. Dedicate yourself to improving and helping others through small, consistent efforts practiced long-term. Find a tribe to encourage and inspire you on the journey. With commitment and belief, the compounding impact of your focused dedication will amaze you.
What matters most to you? Whatever it is, pursue it relentlessly, for that is the path to growth and fulfillment.
Full Original Writing
What is important to you? Is it important enough that you are willing to work on refining your talents and developing your skills every day? Every day, in incremental effort, where progress is not felt or noticed? Yet, the key to superior performance is the daily dedication performed quietly for the long term, done in the quiet of your life when no one is watching.
The best hack is to realize that there are no shortcuts to success and commit yourself to the steady drip, drip, drip effort to enable you to reach your best level of preparation. The process is a life-long adventure.
“You must build up your life action by action and be content if each one achieves its goal as far as possible—and no one can keep you from this.”
–Marcus Aurelius
“If you follow The Process in your life—assembling the right actions in the right order, one right after another—you too will do well. Not only that, you will be better equipped to make quick work of the obstacles along that path.”
Seth Godin’s June 16, 2018, blog post, “The danger of not good enough,” reminds us that it is a trap to dismiss others or ourselves as “not good enough.” The more accurate sentiment should be “not good enough yet.” Seth’s closing sentence is a thought we should hold onto:
“It’s true that you’re not good enough yet. None of us are. But if you commit to trying hard enough and long enough, you’ll get better.”
If you commit to trying hard enough and long enough, you’ll get better. If you are committed to the deliberate and steady process of investing in yourself, you will progress.
“Today, I will do what others won’t, so tomorrow, I can do what others can’t.”
–Jerry Rice
“Hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard.”
–Tim Notke
With a willingness to work hard (and smarter), you WILL exceed many more talented peers. You control your willingness to prepare. In matters of importance to you, be relentless in your dedication and daily focus.
The greatest attribute I have been blessed with and embraced throughout my adult life is a willingness to put forth consistent effort that is matched by few. My twin Don and I share this attribute and have pushed each other throughout our lives. Above, I mentioned competitive distance running as a prime contributor to developing my willingness and ability to take the long view throughout my life. Examples of deliberate focus and effort, as a lifestyle of investing in myself, include:
After graduating from college in 1981, I inherently knew that continual learning and development were imperative to my career and life success. Don and I have shared an obsession with personal development. We believe in investing personal time and money into learning. When portable computers were first available, I remember spending weekend nights in the office (Coopers & Lybrand public accounting in the early 1980s) tinkering around with VisiCalc spreadsheet software. This moment started a love of technology that Don and I have shared and leveraged throughout our lives. In our early to mid-twenties, we were alone in the office on a Saturday night while many of our peers indulged in more ordinary entertainment choices. With our dedication to competitive distance running (a serious endeavor until age 25) and professional personal development, we were comfortable on the less traveled road!
My dedication and preparation to find a better way to work became a career and life survival imperative when my son Ryan was diagnosed with childhood cancer on October 17, 1996, at the age of two years and two months. My ability to tenaciously focus on my core priorities was tested beyond anything I could have imagined. Terri Tomoff’s memoirThe Focused Fight: A Childhood Cancer Journey: From Mayhem to Miracles, published in March 2021, tells Ryan and our family’s story.
July 2021 – The Focused Fight – Cleveland Reception
On March 25, 2018, Don and I started a 30-day planking challenge. What started as a unique challenge to help our physical conditioning has become a part of our lifestyle. As of June 18, 2024, we have done a daily plank for 2,277 days. On March 26, 2023, I wrote a blog post celebrating five years of continuous planking!
April 2018 – NYC Central Park Planking
On April 16, 2018, Don and I cofounded our #TwinzTalk initiative, where we share personal development encouragement and tips to help others in our network. Tip One was dedicated to highlighting our amazing friend, Rich Flanagan. Since then, we have shared almost 1,300 tips on LinkedIn, and we receive great joy and fulfillment from sharing our knowledge and expertise to help others.
On June 8, 2020, a few months after the COVID-19 Pandemic started spreading across the United States, Terri and I joined an online writing initiative called Writing in Community. While Terri dedicated her time to completing her memoir, The Focused Fight, I pursued writing my unpublished personal memoir, “Living Life…Off The Track.”I have now written four unpublished memoirs. Four years later, we consider ourselves writers and have met many inspiring, kind, and generous people who share the love of writing and being in a community of practice. On the other side of the pandemic, we believe our lives have been profoundly enhanced through our writing efforts and community relationships!
2024-03-13 – Bill Tomoff with Four Memoirs Written
“If you desire to make a difference in the world, you must be different from the world.”
–Elaine S. Dalton
What is important to you? Dedicate daily effort to improving yourself and then helping others. You will be amazed at the compounding impact of small efforts consistently performed over the long term. Find your tribe that will inspire and encourage you. You got this. Believe.
In this blog post, I reflect on the importance of being the bigger person when faced with perceived insults or mistreatment from others. Inspired by Ryan Holiday’s The Daily Dad meditation “Teach Them To Be Bigger,” I share the story of Jim Lawson, a young African American boy who, after being called a racial slur, was reminded by his mother that he was loved, intelligent, and destined for a good life. This lesson helped him realize that he was above the horrible things others said and did and that responding with kindness and love was what mattered most.
We all must embrace this lesson, and awareness of our emotions and pausing before responding can be tremendously advantageous. My personal journey, aided by my daily reading of Stoicism since January 1, 2020, has helped me in my quest for inner peace and to avoid allowing everyday inconveniences to stir me negatively.
I also reflect on the idea that we will encounter difficult people throughout life, but our control lies in our attitude and response. We should gladly accept the “taxes” of life, be grateful for what we have, and not retaliate when faced with challenges. Instead, be kind, keep moving forward, and set an example for others to be bigger, creating a gentler and kinder world.
Full Original Writing
When faced with an insult or mistreatment from another person, do you instinctively react in a similar manner, potentially escalating the situation? Or do you take a moment to reflect and choose a more measured response?
This blog post was inspired by my morning reading of the May 19 meditation ofThe Daily Dad: 366 Meditations on Parenting, Love, and Raising Great Kids. The meditation is titled “Teach Them To Be Bigger.“ I could locate Ryan Holiday’s blog post on this meditation he published before the book was released. Please read the full post, but here are a few parts that resonated [Bold emphasis is mine]:
“A ten-year-old Jim Lawson was walking down the street when, as he passed a car, a small child looked at him and called him the n-word. Stunned by the hate and the meanness of it, Lawson reached into the car and slapped the boy in the face.
When his mother found out about this, she was understandably worried. In the then-segregated and racist South, the actions of a young black boy could so easily lead to something terrible and tragic at the hands of awful and unaccountable adults. But more than that, she wanted her son not to be defined or changed by the hate of the world around him.
“What good did that do, Jimmy?” his mother asked him. “We all love you, Jimmy and God loves you,” his mother explained, “and we all believe in you and how good and intelligent you are. We have a good life and you are going to have a good life. With all that love, what harm does that stupid insult do? It’s nothing, Jimmy, it’s empty. Just ignorant words from an ignorant child who is gone from your life the moment it was said.””
“It helped him realize that he was above the horrible things that other people said and did, what mattered, as the Stoics would also say, was what he said and did. What mattered was responding with kindness and love. What mattered was knowing that he was good and that he was loved and nothing anyone else thought could change that.
Lawson’s parents gave him the gift of teaching him–after that understandable lapse–that he was bigger than the small people who lived around him. That he could be the bigger person and do bigger things.“
The encouragement is “Be the bigger person.” Do not allow an external situation to provoke you into regrettable behavior harmful to improving a situation. Though Ryan Holiday writes in The Daily Dad about teaching this to our children, the lesson is one we all must embrace intentionally and heed to the best of our abilities. Awareness of our emotions and pausing before responding will provide a tremendous advantage.
My personal journey is a lifetime work in progress, yet my reading of Stoicism (daily since January 1, 2020) has changed me profoundly, and for that, I am grateful. I find that my inner peace has improved, and I am fairly consistent at not allowing the inevitable inconveniences of everyday life to stir me negatively.
Along with the theme of responding to difficult situations, below are additional thoughts that I reflect upon often and inspire me to strive to bring my best calmness and patience to those difficult situations.
Throughout life, we will encounter people who are different from us and will not or may not behave as we would hope. Our control is in our attitude and response. Viktor Frankl, inMan’s Search for Meaning, expressed:
“Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms – to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.”
“Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lie our growth and our freedom.”
In the Daily Stoic blog, Ryan Holiday encourages us inThe Taxes of Life that everything we do has a toll attached to it:
“Taxes are an inevitable part of life. There is a cost to everything we do. As Seneca wrote to Lucilius, “All the things which cause complaint or dread are like the taxes of life—things from which, my dear Lucilius, you should never hope for exemption or seek escape.” Income taxes are not the only taxes you pay in life. They are just the financial form. Everything we do has a toll attached to it. Waiting around is a tax on traveling. Rumors and gossip are the taxes that come from acquiring a public persona. Disagreements and occasional frustration are taxes placed on even the happiest of relationships. Theft is a tax on abundance and having things that other people want. Stress and problems are tariffs that come attached to success. And on and on and on.
There’s no reason or time to be angry about any of this. Instead, we should be grateful. Because taxes—literal or figurative—are impossible without wealth. So, what are you going to focus on? That you owe something or that you are lucky enough to own something that can be taxed.”
Accept and gladly pay your taxes for the life you are blessed with.
When we encounter the inevitable “taxes” of difficult people, let’s not hurt ourselves by responding in kind or retaliating. Rather, we should be kind and move forward in our own way—no need to get even no need to have an escalation. Keep moving forward and bring goodness into the world. This helps us the best, and it may help the other person.
I don’t need to “prove my point” or be right. When at all possible (and it is possible a high percentage of the time), my handling of difficult people will be gentle and kind as I quickly move to separate from the situation.
We are not required to pass judgment and have an opinion.You don’t have to get upset. How about giving the benefit of the doubt and calmly thinking internally, “This moment is not about me. This person is doing the best that they can.” Even if I might be incorrect, the perspective serves me well and increases the likelihood of no further negative emotions and diffusion of an unfavorable situation.
Be bigger, and by example, lead others to be bigger. Wouldn’t that make our world a gentler and kinder place?
In this blog post, I share how the writings of Wendy Coad, Seth Godin, and Rajesh Setty have inspired me to reflect on the importance of dedicating ourselves to what matters most, being intentional about how we spend our time, and slowing down the pace of life to make room for contemplation and creativity.
I discuss how my son Ryan’s cancer diagnosis in 1996 forced me to ruthlessly prioritize my time and energy. My top priorities became self-care, family, career, and managing healthcare coverage. By staying laser-focused, I and my family persevered through the immense challenges we faced. Over the past 27 years, we have emerged stronger, dedicated to personal growth and helping others.
The wisdom shared by Coad, Godin, and Setty resonated deeply with the lessons I learned through that difficult chapter. Coad’s example of honestly assessing her priorities and eliminating overcommitments, Godin’s warning about smartphones making us hurried and distracted, and Setty’s beautiful reframing of how Parkinson’s disease forced him to slow down and notice the richness of life – all of these perspectives reinforce my conviction about living more deliberately and savoring the wonder around me.
I encourage my readers to join me on this journey. Prioritize time for self-reflection, set boundaries to protect what matters most, and consciously choose to slow down. In doing so, we open ourselves to the “ordinary” beauty of life and opportunities for growth that are always available when we create the space to see them.
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This post is inspired by Wendy Coad, Seth Godin, and Rajesh Setty. Thanks to their writing, I am inspired to write about the important work we should all dedicate ourselves to, prioritizing where we allocate our time, and the value of intentional effort to slow down the pace of our lives to allow time for contemplation and creativity. Slack/buffer built into our daily lives enhances the “ordinary” beauty in our lives and allows for a calmer internal state. Our days are not packed with back-to-back urgencies that allow no room for delays or unexpected occurrences.
Life will throw adversity into our path. Adversity is part of the human condition.
On October 17, 1996, my and my family’s life was turned upside down and changed forever when my son Ryan was diagnosed with childhood cancer at two years and two months old. I realized quickly that my priorities had to be narrowed, and the final list of my few critical priorities needed to be ruthlessly adhered to. My energies had to be laser-focused, and my willingness to say “NO” would become essential. I would not apologize for protecting my priorities and did not need to explain myself to anyone. I would do my best every day… with genuine intent and based on the knowledge I possessed. My, and my family’s, survival was at stake.
Writing this in May 2024, over 27 years later, I am eternally grateful that Ryan is a survivor and my family is intact and doing well. Fate has challenged us immensely, and we are standing tall today, forever changed in unimaginable ways. My wife Terri has beautified the world with her love of quilting and designing treasured t-shirt quilt keepsakes. She has written a memoir of Ryan’s experience (The Focused Fight: A Childhood Cancer Journey From Mayhem to Miracles, published in March 2021). Our daughter Olivia persevered and changed our lives through her love and commitment to soccer. She is now married to her husband Bo, and they are new parents to a beautiful baby boy, Bodie, born March 25, 2024! We believe in post-traumatic growth and are dedicated to helping others and making the world kinder and gentler.
At the time of Ryan’s diagnosis in 1996, I was scared and mentally wondered, “How do families survive this?” We were all in the biggest war of our lives. There was no instruction manual, and Ryan’s life was at stake. Terri and I dedicated ourselves to doing everything humanly possible for Ryan and Olivia, and we would attack this one day at a time. I had no thought of how I would be profoundly changed over the years. I am beyond grateful and feel I am a greater contributor to the world due to my experience. I am consumed with how to grow personally and leverage my growth to be more valuable for helping others.
My highest priorities identified in 1996 were sharpened by the urgency of moving forward through Ryan’s medical treatments and the stress our family endured as a result. The nonnegotiable priorities that I determined required my complete attention were:
Self-care: Focus on health and personal development. I needed to do my best to be my best for my family and my career and to be of value to others.
Family: My role as spouse, father, and caregiver. My family is the world to me.
Career: Bringing the best I could to my professional responsibilities. Continual development and finding ways to work more effectively were imperative. My twin brother Don was my “right hand” in helping me think differently and holding me accountable to make progress. I endured high stress about my ability to support the family financially and provide healthcare coverage to cover the financial exposure of Ryan’s medical care requirements.
Monitoring Healthcare Coverage: This aspect felt like a full-time job besides my other priorities. Likely, my love of personal finance was cemented through the stress of continual concern about healthcare coverage and the risk of bankruptcy.
Living my life with the clarity of my priorities allowed me to be relentless in setting boundaries of where I would permit my time to be allocated. As Mr. Pollin once encouraged me, “Bill, you need to keep your eye on the ball, and that ball will change…” My emphasis on the differing priorities has fluxed; thankfully, the core structure has provided a framework that enhanced my quality of life. I determined what was important in my life, and while bending (dancing) within the framework, I have stayed true to my core matters of importance.
During the years since Ryan’s diagnosis, I have embraced the times when greater freedom existed in my schedule. My priorities have often maxed out my capacity, and when an opportunity for a break would occur, I was diligent about taking time to relax. I refused to move on frantically to another activity. Protecting my time and sanity was a component of self-care that was extremely important to me.
Slowing down became a mission for me. I strive for my daily pace to be more deliberate and relaxed with reduced commitments to build a buffer in my day. When I can live this way, my ability to be my best self and help others is optimized.
Recent readings that inspired me were:
Wendy Coad, in a post from my community of practice (Purple.Space), shared about her evolving priorities and the activities she has chosen to eliminate from her schedule. It was refreshing to see Wendy’s honesty with herself, recognizing she cannot do everything. Too often, we think, “I can handle this,” and add a new obligation to our list of priorities. We make the mistake of over-committing and become overwhelmed with our to-dos. The willingness to pick the highest priorities and eliminate everything else is a massive strength for anyone to possess. The impact of Ryan’s diagnosis forced me to be brutally honest with myself, and I pared down my priorities practically overnight. The core list has been my guide since that day. Giving my best for my family was my guiding north star.
Seth Godin‘s blogOn One Foot, discusses how “Smart phones can hobble us.” We hurry through our lives handling things on a small phone screen in short bursts. He says, “There could be a direct correlation between smartphone usage and underinformed mass behavior.” Seth even suggests that “opening up a laptop might count as slowing down a bit.” Slow down.
Rajesh Setty‘s LinkedIn post, encourages “Slowing down to witness wonder.” Rajesh is an inspiring, caring, and generous person I have met through social media. I look forward to the wisdom he consistently shares and encourage everyone to follow him on social media! In his post, he shares that his diagnosis of Parkinson’s forced him to slow down and ultimately develop his reframe: “Slowing down allowed me to observe more than most people who are too busy to notice.” I am sharing Rajesh’s full post below and encourage pausing and asking yourself, “How can I be more intentional about slowing down?”
“Slowing down to witness wonder
We live in a fast-paced world where everyone seems too busy to notice the richness around them. By “world around us/them,” I mean nature, people, and conversations happening right in front of us, not just online.
When you pay close attention, you’ll witness wonder. The world around you speaks and whispers in vivid colors, both through nature and people.
I noticed this because of a health situation, Parkinson’s, which forced me to slow down.
Over time, instead of complaining about slowing down, I began to appreciate the world’s richness. Everything seemed to be in slow motion, not by choice but by design. Slowing down allowed me to observe more than most people who are too busy to notice.
This higher fidelity observation was a gift that came with Parkinson’s. It sparked more ideas for me than ever before. That’s why I reframed Parkinson’s to (S)Parkinson’s.
Although I discovered this because of (S)Parkinson’s, you can choose to slow down and witness the wonder in the world around you without going through something like that. In fact, I wouldn’t wish my experience on anyone. But by choosing to slow down, you can truly appreciate the beauty around you.
PS: If you are curious to know more about my ongoing adventure with (S)Parkinson’s, here is more in my bookUNSHAKEN (published by INKtalks).”
Rajesh notes that we all can choose to slow down and witness wonder in our world without going through a life-threatening experience. Please take his encouragement to heart, prioritize time to be with yourself, and contemplate actionable steps to move you towards a slower lifestyle. Join me on this life-enhancing journey!
December 2019 – Tomoff Family Vacation in Maui, HawaiiJuly 2021 – The Focused Fight – Cleveland Reception
When reading About The Author at the end of Emma Seppala’s book Sovereign, I noted:
“A psychologist and research scientist by training, Seppälä’s expertise is the science of happiness, emotional intelligence, and social connection. Her research has been published in top academic journals and featured in news outlets including The New York Times, NPR, and CBS News and featured in documentaries like Free the Mind, The Altruism Revolution, What You Do Matters [Bill T emphasis], and Bullied. www.emmaseppala.com and www.iamsov.com”
The documentary title, What You Do Matters, caught my attention. What we think and what we do are important. Think and do good. Be kind. Our actions and the presence we bring to the world matter.
In my approach to my career and my family, I have long embraced the core belief that what I do matters. Every action matters. Two quotes that guide me:
The personal development and professional work I do with my twin Don (follow hashtag #TwinzTalk on LinkedIn!) is stated:
“Changing the world, one interaction, one person, at a time.”
I am not looking to impact the masses. Still, I am dedicated to making the most of individual IRL, virtual, and social media interactions, and bringing a presence to the world that may influence and reach folks I likely will never know about. The truth is we often don’t know the reach and impact that kindness and generosity toward helping others will have. I genuinely intend to help my world through micro-moments of living my life through caring and doing the “right thing.“
That “I told you so.” That “Thank You.” That recognition for being first, or being better, or being different. You want credit. You want gratitude. You want the acknowledgment for the good you’ve done, for the weight that you carry.
What you want is what Marcus Aurelius has called “the third thing,” because you’re not content enough with the doing. “When you’ve done well and another has benefited by it,” he writes, “why like a fool do you look for a third thing on top—credit for the good deed or a favor in return?””
“You don’t need a favor back. You don’t need to be repaid. You don’t need to be acknowledged. You don’t need the third thing. That’s not why you do what you do. You’re good because it’s good to be good, and that’s all you need.”
Too often, it is natural to wonder, “Am I making a difference?” I have let go of the need to have affirmation of my actions. I choose instead to KNOW that What I Do Matters. Thus, the video referenced in the book resonated with me. I have provided the link below and encourage everyone to prioritize the hour of time to watch the documentary. Inspiration guaranteed! I hope you will feel compelled to embrace approaching the world and others with a kinder and gentler presence. You will influence others, and over time, you will be profoundly changed for the better!
Emma Seppala emphasizes throughout her book the importance of awareness of our thoughts and the impact that can have in keeping us from reaching sovereignty. The good news is that we can take control of our minds, prioritize our self-care, and bring our best selves to others and the world daily. Our thoughts build our actions and what we do. Consider, and hold close, this quote from Lao Tzu:
“Watch your thoughts; they become your words; watch your words, they become your actions; watch your actions, they become your habits; watch your habits, they become your character; watch your character, it becomes your destiny.”
The Chicago Community Trust Documentary | What You Do MattersCredit: The Chicago Community Trust Documentary | What You Do Matters
Ben Franklin’s 13 virtues are timeless and worth reflecting upon often. Walter Isaacson discussed the virtues (pages 89 to 92) in his biography,Benjamin Franklin: An American Life, which I have read twice in the past ten years. I highly recommend the book! A 23-minute summary is available on YouTube.
The 13 virtues discussed in the blog are worth keeping and referring to for an expanded discussion of each virtue. Nils and Jonas describe the virtues as key to Franklin’s success: “The key to his success was his continuous pursuit of self-improvement.” The 13 virtues are:
Temperance: Eat not to dullness; drink not to elevation.
Silence: Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself; avoid trifling conversation.
Order: Let all your things have their places; let each part of your business have its time.
Resolution: Resolve to perform what you ought; perform without fail what you resolve.
Frugality: Make no expense but to do good to others or yourself; i.e., waste nothing.
Industry: Lose no time; be always employed in something useful; cut off all unnecessary actions.
Sincerity: Use no hurtful deceit; think innocently and justly, and, if you speak, speak accordingly.
Justice: Wrong none by doing injuries, or omitting the benefits that are your duty.
Moderation: Avoid extremes; forbear resenting injuries so much as you think they deserve.
Cleanliness: Tolerate no uncleanliness in body, clothes, or habitation.
Tranquility: Be not disturbed at trifles, or at accidents common or unavoidable.
Chastity: Rarely use venery but for health or offspring, never to dullness, weakness, or the injury of your own or another’s peace or reputation.
Humility: Imitate Jesus and Socrates.
About Franklin’s efforts at living the thirteen virtues, Isaacson notes in his book:
“Mastering all of these thirteen virtues at once was “a task of more difficulty than I had imagined,” Franklin recalled. The problem was that “while my care was employed in guarding against one fault, I was often surprised by another.” So he decided to tackle them like a person who, “having a garden to weed, does not attempt to eradicate all the bad herbs at once, which would exceed his reach and his strength, but works on one of the beds at a time.””
Hopefully, the three books discussed in this three-part blog post will inspire you to pursue your quest for personal development. Show up every day and dedicate time to yourself and your own growth. The Twinz are cheering you on!
