Some­times I long for the days when an Etch-a-Sketch was the most tech­no­log­i­cally advanced gad­get I owned.

Yes, I love my shiny iPhone and all the won­der­ful things it lets me do.

But I hate when a fam­ily is out to eat and I see them all face down in their smart­phones. I hate it because it reminds me of how the pull to check email or send a tweet or scan sta­tus updates on Face­book pulls ME away from actu­ally being present in my real life. It often dis­tracts me on my dates with my daugh­ter. And it sucks up the men­tal space that could have been used to pray or think or — gasp! — just BE.

Oh, the inter­net and smart­phones and wi-fi has got­ten us more con­nected than ever. But are we mak­ing any connections?

Every­thing seems so sur­face level these days; our con­ver­sa­tions have dete­ri­o­rated into small talk boiled down to 140 char­ac­ters or less. It’s bor­ing, mean­ing­less, and a tragic waste of our pre­cious time.  Per­haps the rea­son we are the loneli­est, most depressed, most drug addicted soci­ety that has ever lived is because we are lack­ing real connections.

We deserve bet­ter. Our fam­ily and our friends deserve bet­ter from us.

If you agree, here’s a crazy idea: Next time you’re with some­one, put down the phone. Slow down. Shut your pie hole.

Instead, look. Hear. Be. Prac­tice being present once in awhile.

Open your heart, offer your atten­tion, and make a real human connection.

A small thing, perhaps.

But it’s a Small Rebel­lion of epic proportions.

by Jason Kotecki

Kim and I love watch­ing Mas­terChef on Fox, star­ring one of our favorite TV per­son­al­i­ties, fiery chef Gor­don Ram­say.  Mas­terChef con­ducts a nation­wide search for the best home cooks in Amer­ica, and through a series of excit­ing elim­i­na­tion rounds, turns one of them into a culi­nary master.

In the ini­tial audi­tion episodes of the first sea­son, the con­tes­tants have to pre­pare their sig­na­ture dish for the panel of judges in an effort to win one of 30 aprons in order to advance to the next round. As she pre­pared her dish, a young His­panic woman named Adeliz spoke pas­sion­ately about her family’s food his­tory. In a mis­guided attempt to impress the judges, she used squeeze bot­tles to begin draw­ing squig­gly lines of reduc­tion sauce on the plate.

It didn’t take long for them to sense a disconnect.

“I can hear the pas­sion but I can’t taste it. You’re miss­ing the most impor­tant part, the heart and soul of what you stand for.” ~ Gor­don Ramsay

In an unprece­dented move, Ram­sey gave her a sec­ond chance. With a time limit of two hours, he implored her to drive home, raid her cup­board, and come back with the ingre­di­ents to cook to her strength, some­thing truly authentic.

She returned, free of pre­ten­sion, and made New Mex­i­can chile rel­lenos star­ring green chiles straight from her freezer. A dish she’d made hun­dreds of times for her family.

The judges loved it. They unan­i­mously rewarded her with a cov­eted apron. Ram­say encour­aged her to con­tinue to play to her strengths and stay authentic.

While this proved to be excel­lent advice for Adeliz, I think it’s a great life les­son for all of us.

You were cre­ated to be some­thing spe­cial. Every time you pre­tend to be some­thing you’re not, or hide your unique­ness from the world, you lose a lit­tle bit of that spe­cial­ness. You look more and more like every­body else.

School and soci­ety teaches us to con­form, to fol­low the leader, and to work on our weak­nesses in order to become “well-rounded.” We’re so used to it, we think of it as solid com­mon sense.

But it’s not.

You’re cre­at­ing unnec­es­sary com­pe­ti­tion for your­self. You’re blend­ing in to the crowd. You’re becom­ing both mediocre and invisible.

A school in our area recently hired a new sec­ond grade teacher. They had over one hun­dred appli­cants to choose from for one posi­tion. I’ll guar­an­tee you that the per­son they picked didn’t look like every­body else.

Here’s a fact: No mat­ter how much work you do, you’ll never lift your below-average skills to any­thing that rivals the efforts of some­one who’s nat­u­rally good at them. How­ever, when focused towards the things you ARE good at, that same amount of effort can eas­ily take you to a world-class level.

When I started out as a speaker (and an artist and writer, for that mat­ter), I nat­u­rally imi­tated the peo­ple I admired. It’s a great way to learn. But I have found that the more I unleash my own unique­ness into what I offer, the more uncopy­able — and suc­cess­ful — I become.

Whether you’re look­ing for a job, look­ing for a date, or look­ing for a way to be happy in life, the first step is to just be yourself.

“Be your­self; every­one else is already taken.” ~ Oscar Wilde

It really is a lot eas­ier to be your­self than try­ing to pre­tend to be some­thing you’re not. The hard­est part is get­ting to the point where you feel like YOU is good enough. Espe­cially if you have yet to enjoy the suc­cess of some of your role models.

Let me tell you some­thing. You are MORE than good enough. You have tal­ents that no one else has. (At the very least, you are in a spe­cific posi­tion to use them in a way no one else can.) The world doesn’t need another (fill in the blank with your biggest hero), it needs you.

It needs your strengths, your pas­sion, your authenticity.

Be you. The world is waiting.

by Jason Kotecki

Are you Hall of Fame material?

Go ahead, think about it. Are you?

While you’re mulling that over, let me ask you another ques­tion: Did you know that there is a National Toy Hall of Fame? It’s true. As you might imag­ine, it fea­tures things like Lin­coln Logs, the Hula Hoop, the Slinky, and even the multi-talented card­board box.

What makes a toy Hall of Fame wor­thy? Well, it turns out there are four cri­te­ria:

• Icon-status: The toy is widely rec­og­nized, respected, and remembered
• Longevity: The toy is more than a pass­ing fad and has enjoyed pop­u­lar­ity over mul­ti­ple generations
• Dis­cov­ery: The toy fos­ters learn­ing, cre­ativ­ity, or dis­cov­ery through play
• Inno­va­tion: The toy pro­foundly changed play or toy design. A toy may be inducted on the basis of this cri­te­rion with­out nec­es­sar­ily hav­ing met all of the first three.

Undoubt­edly, Lin­coln Logs clear all four hur­dles. But what about us? We’re not toys. What, if any­thing, can peo­ple learn about great­ness from Hall of Fame cal­iber toys? Quite a bit, it turns out. The four cri­te­ria can be help­ful in mea­sur­ing our great­ness as well.

Let’s start with “Icon Sta­tus.” When your time on Earth is over, will you be widely rec­og­nized, respected, and remem­bered? Keep in mind we’re not talk­ing about fame here. I know teach­ers that are beloved icons in the mid­dle school at which they teach, even though they may be com­pletely unknown a few school dis­tricts over.

What about “Longevity?” Any­body can have a good day, a good week, or even a good year. The greats show up year after year. They are per­sis­tent, con­sis­tent, and stand the test of time. Are you in it for the long haul?

“Dis­cov­ery,” as it is used here, can be summed up in one word: empow­er­ment. You can build a mil­lion things with Lin­coln Logs. That’s what makes them great: they jump­start the imag­i­na­tion of the play­ers them­selves. Like­wise, we are great when we empower oth­ers to be great.

What’s inter­est­ing about “Inno­va­tion” is that it’s such a big deal that a toy can get in on the basis of inno­va­tion alone, even if it doesn’t meet the other three cri­te­ria. This is because it’s so hard to do. Inno­va­tion is rare, but not because it’s unreach­able. You have the poten­tial to pro­foundly change the world YOU live in. But in order to do so requires immense courage and brav­ery. You have to be will­ing to chal­lenge con­ven­tional wis­dom, buck the sta­tus quo, and take a stand with­out any guar­an­tee that any­one will fol­low you. (Most likely, they won’t, at least at first.)

Back to the ques­tion about you being Hall of Fame mate­r­ial. The answer, of course, is yes. A mil­lion times YES. You are.

Don’t be fooled by the fact that there prob­a­bly isn’t an actual Hall of Fame in your area of gift­ed­ness. That doesn’t dis­qual­ify you from being one of the all-time greats. What would it take to be a Hall of Fame teacher? Nurse? Team Leader? Cub Scout Leader? Jan­i­tor? Mom? Grand­par­ent? Snow Plow Driver?

Refuse to set­tle for aver­age. Regard­less of what you believe or may have been taught, the seeds of great­ness are within you. Your fam­ily, your col­leagues, and your com­mu­nity need you to share that greatness.

How?

Let the Lin­coln Log be your guide.

by Jason Kotecki