Earlier this week, one of my colleagues was going into a big presentation.  Armed with the confidence of many successful previous events under his belt, he assumed he had it under control.  At the last moment, jitters and panic set in and the first call he made was to me.  

Despite the early hour and the tone of his voice, I knew the important thing to do here was to calm him down and solve the problem.   One of the greatest things I have learned on my journey in life is to remove myself, my ego, from the situation, especially when it comes to stressful situations where my feelings ultimately don’t matter.   

This is a great skill to have if you are hanging with your kids, in a work situation, or anytime emotions run high. With these six steps in mind, you will be able to handle anything that comes your way.

1)    Assess the situation. Will tossing your emotions into the situation add fuel to the fire or calm the flames?  It’s serious high road time.  Take it.

2)    If you don’t know it already, determine the DO. Remember, eyes on the prize: moments of panic are never learning opportunities.  Put out the fire first.

3)    Find clarity and then send up flares.  In this scenario, I knew I was going to have to ask for outside help.  But without clarity, reaching out would only create more trouble.  Find what is fixable (most things are) and then call experts into action.

4)    Remain calm.  Your energy will determine the outcome.

5)    Redirect their attention.  Once the fire is out, check in on something else (this works especially well with my boys, a quick talk about their latest video game obsession or Lego creation saves buckets of tears).

6)    Return to the DO.  Double check next steps.  Reassure, compliment, rebuild.

We can hone those instincts, hunters, and use them in our lives every day.  When you can get above and clear and remove your ego from any situation, you are on your way to hitting your targets, as well as helping the ones closest to you on their hunt for success.

For my kids, this week is the start of summer, defined by the last day of school. Weeks of endless sunshine and possibilities lay out before them like an ocean of opportunity. I remember that feeling like it was yesterday.   Waking up super early, out the door like a shot, filled with an excitement that was often lacking the rest of the school year. I sat in the classroom, desk cleared and clean, my teachers just a little friendlier, my friends revved up and raring to go. Then the bell rings, another school year was done, and summer was waiting for me. I was on the hunt for fun.

When I look back on those days, I miss the butterflies; the anticipation of a stretch of time where schedules fade away and life takes on an air of adventure. So today I’m asking you: what if we lived our lives like the last day of school? What if we viewed our lives, as adults, as the wide-open adventure of summer vacation?

Every once in a while, on a Saturday or Sunday, my sons and I will climb in the car and head out looking for an early morning adventure. On those days, I feel a small piece of what I remember from that last day of school. But then my cell phone rings or an urgent email shows up, and I lose my tentative grasp and find myself thrust back into the business of life.

It’s amazing to realize that once upon a time, we didn’t have cell phones or email. We lived our lives off the grid, within the confines of our neighborhood blocks, freedom defined by the distance between home and 7-11 and how much fun we could find between the two. Drinking Slurpees, going from house to house with my friends, raiding pantries and eating whatever we could. I always had a job to pay for my 7-11 runs, but mostly it was wide-open fun.

We should not let technology or business or the craziness of modern life take that summer fun away. Have that bonfire, take the long way around. Ride bikes and eat ice cream and get messy. Remember the promises you made to yourself as a kid. They started with “When I’m an adult, I’m not going to…” and ended with whatever the antithesis of freedom was to you at the time. Be free! And have the summer of your dreams, wide open, my hunters!

People come in and out of our lives every day. Sometimes, we are lucky enough to share just minutes with special people; significant minutes that carry over into other aspects of our lives, making their impact more powerful by the simple fact of their existence. Several weeks ago, Detroit lost one of those special people, a man more authentic and powerful than I ever realized when he was just a phone call away.

I met Mike Fezzey when he was at WJR, and I was often at the station. Our relationship carried over to Huntington Bank and through various non-profit boards. We fished and hung out, and I cherish those moments we spent together.

The last time I saw him, we sat in the Huntington Bank headquarters. He was telling a typical Fezzey story, full of laughter and lessons and we both welled up by the time he finished. As always, we hugged good-bye, not the typical bro hug, but a real embrace (without patting and thumping each other like men do). I had no idea this would be the last time I would hang alone with Mike. But I have no regret in realizing it was our last minute together. That’s the thing about Mike Fezzey, every minute counted.

Mike was a man with a formula for life, one from which we can all learn and grow. The Fezzey Formula (“FF”) was developed over a lifetime, and it goes like this:

FF1 – Recognize that a matter of minutes can change everything in your life.

Through our brief, yet meaningful interactions, Mike showed me how to be utterly present in a moment. We all know about “busy” people, the ones too busy to make eye contact as they shake your hand in passing. That is the exact opposite of Mike. He knew that if one minute was all he had, he was going to give it his all.

FF2 – There is strength in humility and admitting when you’re wrong.

Mike once told me a story from his grade school experience. He considered it one of those minutes that taught him who he wanted to be. Mike had a teacher he idolized. Mr. R upheld the characteristics of what Mike thought a man should be: honest, motivational, humble, confident and strong. One day, through a series of unfortunate events, Mike found himself at the receiving end of a paddling in Mr. R’s class. Humiliated and heartbroken, Mike confronted Mr. R in the hall, explaining that he was wrongly accused and how disappointed he was that Mr. R had struck first and asked questions later. And then an amazing thing happened: Mr. R took Mike by the hand and led him back into the classroom where he apologized to Mike for his error and offered him the paddle. Mr. R, in that minute, showed Mike another facet of what it takes to be a man: humility and the power in admitting you made a mistake.

FF3 – Be kind to people; notice and acknowledge what makes them special.

When I decided to try my hand at public speaking, Mike could not have been more supportive. He told me how he admired my spirit, loved my message and could feel how my energy would motivate people and help them hit their targets. He was so specific and sincere; his words were more than kindness, they felt like love.

FF4 – Be authentic and remember not to leave things unsaid.

No one would ever doubt that Mike loved his family. His wife Suzy (his beshert as we say in Hebrew), his children: Peter, Jesse, and Sam, meant the world to him. Years ago, in the wake of a heart attack, Mike thought of nothing but the things he could do to make sure he had more time with them. Mike viewed that incident as a wake-up call: he changed his diet, exercised and lost weight because, in that minute, he knew his family was truly the one thing that mattered most.

What can we learn from the Fezzey Formula? I don’t know about you, but I learn more from it every minute that passes in my life. Mike made a mark on my life that will not be erased. While I miss his physical presence, I feel his spirit often. Sometimes as I cast a line, sometimes when I tune into WJR, sometimes when I think of Northern Michigan, and sometimes when it feels hard to hold it together in a meeting or a moment of frustration at home.

Mike was taken from us without notice and my heart goes out to his family, who I’m sure have tallied the minutes and determined they were not enough.   But I know for certain that the minutes that Mike gave eclipsed the hours of others. While I know there won’t be any hugs or fishing soon, it is nearly certain at some point I will wet a line and crack a beer with Mike in that great fishing boat in the sky. Best of all, the Fezzey Formula lives on and offers us the possibility to make meaningful progress in each minute of our lives.

I had trekked for miles, up and down ravines, in and out of the woods and through fields all over the farm in northern Michigan. After nearly 10 miles of hiking and looking high and low, finally, there they were! A bumper crop of 25+ big fat yellow Morel mushrooms. They were nestled behind two dead ash trees, next to some old apple trees. Until that moment, all I had found was a lone Morel mushroom here or there until I cracked the code and found my pattern.

Until finding that grouping of Morels, I was hunting somewhat blind. As soon as I found the right conditions with ash and apples, I changed my strategy and began hunting trees and those precise conditions. I went from searching randomly to targeting a specific pattern. And it worked. 

In every area of life, finding the pattern is essential. When you detect a true pattern, you are on to something big, something repeatable, something scalable. By identifying personal patterns, good or bad, we will constantly improve internally and externally as patterns don’t lie. People, animals, nature…we are what we do. When we can identify the patterns, we begin to change, learn and get on a path to success.

Look for the patterns in your life. Look for the patterns in your career. By identifying those patterns, you will be on your way to more of the trophies you are after in life, whether they are Morels, winning deals, big relationships or self-improvement. After all, the secret to life is all in the patterns.

If you know me, you know I find something to hunt every season; my current passion is Morel mushrooms. One of the great things about hunting Morels is that anyone can do it. It has become a family adventure, and one that my boys and I like to share with friends. This past weekend Morel conditions were supreme, so a friend and I took our kids up north to see if we could find some treasure.

We spent an afternoon and evening mushroom hunting. The kids were thrilled to be out, and the hunt was on! We found a good number of them and feasted on fresh Morels, salmon, and steak. The kids had a blast and overloaded on nature, and they loved it, right down to the crackling of the fire and the making of s’more’s. Filled with country love, they fell asleep like rocks at about 9:30pm. (A miracle unto itself…as parents, we should bottle fresh air and save it for bedtime!)

After the kiddies had fallen asleep, my buddy and I shared our stories of the day. Out of nowhere, my buddy hit me with a reality check: “Man, you should take a break from your phone more often. You did a good job, but each time you checked it, your son noticed it and acted out for your attention.” Although I know I’m as dependent on my phone as the next person, I didn’t see how it was an issue with my kid. It is, indeed, a total blind spot. That’s how blind spots are in life: you can’t see them! I was grateful for my friend’s insight and honesty: he gave me the opportunity to become conscious of this issue and do something about it.

It’s a great practice to look for the blind spots in others and be constructive about them, as they can devour relationships, culture, and the moment if we don’t deal with them. There’s a quote I love by Carl Jung: “What you resist will persist.” (Ain’t that the truth?)

Being open to feedback on the things you do not see about yourself and encouraging others to do the same is a powerful practice. You can leverage that feedback into success. I’m glad to say I left the phone alone as much as possible for the rest of the trip and kept it up when I got home. Starting now, I am going to be more conscious of the phone. I want to be “in life,” awake, aware, and present. After all, life is about being there in the hunt.

Many thanks to my man for pointing out the blind spot. I’m on it…