ABOUT RICK

It has been said of me that I don’t know what I want to be when I grow up.

I’ve made a living in a variety of ways in my life from working cattle on a ranch to making lumber in a sawmill. I’ve been an oilfield worker, professional photographer, carpenter, minister (20 years), realtor, developer, writer, speaker, founded an organization that empowered 120,000 volunteers to provide 20 million meals for disaster relief in Haiti and spend a great deal of my effort empowering people to feed the hungry.

I’m exactly what I want to be: curious and flexible. I leave very few stones unturned.

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Grief

How To Help Someone In a Time of Grief

05/21/2013

Author’s note:  This is from a previous post that was well received by readers and, in light of the recent national tragedies in the Boston Marathon and Oklahoma City tornado, I thought it was timely to repost.  It is very helpless to watch the collapsing of human lives and often the question of “what can I do to help?” utters from the heart of the compassionate.  However, the people you see on television live hundreds of miles from you and are complete strangers.  Now is a good time to turn your compassionate feelings to those whom you know personally that are struggling with the death of a loved on.  Here’s how to help someone who is grieving:

The little 4-year-old boy sat on his recently widowed grandma’s lap as they both cried over the loss of the man they loved. The little fellow’s parents, thinking the young boy was upsetting his grandma, gently called him back to them and told him not to bother his grandma, to which he replied, “But I was just helping her cry.”

As a former minister, I have had the sacred privilege of being invited into the inner circle of grief for over 500 families in my life as they asked me to help them lay their loved ones to rest. 500+ eulogies later, here are a few things I’ve observed that can help grieving people cry:

Just be there

      • Your physical presence means more than anything else

Find a practical way to help them

      • Food is always a great thing
      • Mow the lawn, fix the car, drive the kids to school, etc.
      • Pick up their slack at work – it’s very hard for people to concentrate on work when they are grieving

Just listen

      • I spent two hours with a grieving family and said almost nothing as I just let them talk. When I left, the man said, “Young man, what you said this evening helped us tremendously.”

Resist the desire to answer “why”

      •  “Why?” is the cry of every broken heart.  Answering that question often leads a futile blame game in which society, God, the government, the family, television, video games, and a host of other things get fingers of accusation pointed at them.

Avoid these statements, which often hurt more than they help:

      • “God needed another _______”(fill in the blank; angel, gardener, fisherman) heard a well-intentioned person tell a grieving parent, “God need another little angel.” Such a ridiculous statement paints God as a capricious, selfish monster who causes people immense pain just for his own gain.  That is not the God I know.
      • “There’s a reason.”  When people suffer horrific losses, this is simply nothing that makes sense about the loss.
      • “I know how you feel.” Even if you’ve had a similar loss, you never really know how another person feels.
      • “All things work together for good.” This is a statement from the Bible and people who use this mean well, but in times of intense grief, this phrase frequently causes more pain.

Say these statements:

    • I’m very sorry for your loss.
    • I’m here, 24/7- here’s my phone number in case you need to talk.
    • I’ll stop by (or call, write, text, email) next week and meet you for a cup of coffee

Keep communicating with them

    • Being there for them in the initial stage is wonderful, but more importantly is for you to be there for them well after the funeral is over.
    • Email them every few weeks
    • Send a card
    • Take them out to dinner, coffee, or stop by for a visit
    • Holidays are usually the worst- a card or phone call during that time offers great comfort
    • Check in on them in times of national tragedy. People who are grieving often struggle more when a national tragedy strikes because of all the images and stories in media.

Share your memories of the deceased person with the family

    • An old friend of my Dad recently shared one of his favorite memories of him. It was priceless!

Give them hope of a reunion

    • The only  “holy ground” I ever stood on was a rocky beach on the northern shore of the Sea of Galilee where Jesus fixed breakfast for his boys after his resurrection. The hope of resurrection and reunion is often the only light that flickers in the darkest of nights.

Death robs us of that which we value most: life.  When it visits our friends, or us, we struggle knowing how to help. Have you found other ways that you have been helped, or you have helped others?

 

sad_dog

How Do You Know When You’re All Grown Up and Stuff

05/17/2013

I only know this story because my parents variously repeated it with the same effect: I was responsible for shortening their life span.

We lived in the wide-open prairies of Kansas that had been sawn in two by Highway 54.  Our house had been a considerable distance from the road until the state decided to divert the traffic through our front bedroom.

However, surrounding us was a prairie and farmland symmetrically outlined with hedgerows. The hedge trees were planted by a Johnny-Appleseed character year earlier. Actually, he was more of a Johnny-Osage-Orange character because that’s what the trees are called. They are incredibly hard wood with limbs that are viciously thorny.  Hedgerows are the gossipy little old church ladies of the nature world; get tangled in them and you’ll come out bloody and bruised.

I had just turned 3 when I disappeared one morning. Mom got on the party line and soon all the neighbors and my parents were looking for me. Child abduction was not as prevalent during the early ‘60’s, but I was missing and imaginations stir ferocious fear.

Snaking through the prairies are numerous ravines that are raging torrents in the spring but make great bunkers for war games in the summer.  In one of those ravines far from the house, my Dad finally spotted my little head bobbing up and down.

It was the first time in my recorded history I threw someone else under the bus; namely, my dog.  Because when Dad came rushing upon me, my 3-year-old intellect deduced his fear and anger and immediately blurted out, “Boo-Boo made me do it!” This was Boo-Boo the dog; not Honey Boo-Boo the non-reality television personality.

The blame game is not new: Adam blamed Eve who blamed the snake and, well, it’s never recorded who the snake blamed. Regardless of what you call it, it boils down to a tendency to blame someone else for a mistake you had a significant part in creating, participating, and executing. Studies have shown that the health of an organization is measured by blame. In the healthiest organizations, the blame goes up the chain; a culture is created where the superiors accept responsibility. In the unhealthiest organizations, blame travels down the chain in a kick-the-dog fashion.

When one of my sons was a child, he asked me this question:  When will I know I’m all grown up and stuff?

I thought about it for a bit, then replied, “When you learn to accept responsibilities for your own actions and don’t blame others.”

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briefcase

5 Things I Can’t-Live-Without for my Mobile Office

05/14/2013

I have no main office for myself; however, I have a hundred offices. I prefer desks, but my lap works fine.  I prefer office chairs, but picnic tables and recliners work, too. Here are a few locations from which I work:

          • Man cave – Potwin, KS
          • Hotel Room – Anywhere in the world
          • Picnic Table – Any sunny day
          • Schiphol Airport – Amsterdam, Holland
          • American Airlines – 32,000 feet
          • Alliance to End Hunger office- Washington, DC
          • Catholic Social Center- Singida, Tanzania
          • Debaab Refugee Camp – Kenya
          • Outreach, Inc., – Union and Des Moines, Iowa
          • Paneras – Any city, USA
          • Log Cabin in the Rockies- Colorado
          • Carnival Cruise Lines- Caribbean

I have not punched a clock for thirty years. The great thing about my life; I can work from anywhere on earth. The bad thing about my life: I can work from anywhere on earth. It’s hard to stop working, sometimes.

I’m fortunate to be able to make a living at something I’m incredibly passionate about: feeding hungry people. However, my work involves a lot of travel to multiple locations so I’ve learned to take my office with me.

Here are the five things I can’t-live-without to have an office anywhere.

Cell phone – I have an iPhone with the capabilities of having a “hot spot.” As long as I have cell strength, I can activate my “hot spot” and connect my computer to the internet.  My phone also has these can’t-live-without tools

      •             Camera
      •             Video Camera
      •             Voice Recorder
      •             Map (GPS) (I use this most of all)

 

Laptop Computer- We have a desktop at home and I’m so unaccustomed to it that I try to pick up the monitor and carry it with me when I leave.

      •             MS Word, Powerpoint, and Excel
      •             Evernote- This is a premiere task management system. You can get a version for free, but if you use it a lot, you’ll want to get the $50 a year upgrade. I have Evernote on my phone, iPad, and laptop so if I create work on any of those devices, I can access it anywhere at anytime.  Evernote automatically syncs between all three devices.

 

Ipad- It’s a library, concert hall, movie theatre, game room, scribe, and camera.

      •  Penultimate- it is a program that lets me write in freehand with a stylus so I can take notes.

 

Portable Battery Charger

      • Sometimes I don’t have time to charge my phone so the charger slips into my pocket and I’m assured my cell phone doesn’t die.  There are various levels of power that can even power a laptop.

 

Earphones with a built-in mic

      • Listening to music to eliminate noise- I prefer to work in silence, but noisy airports, hotels, and coffee shops, make it difficult to concentrate so I listen to classical music. I can’t listen to music with words or else I start singing along which generally annoys people around me. My son also taught me that if I have earphones in, it keeps the person beside me on an airplane from wanting to talk from Chicago to Amsterdam.

 

      • Mic for quiet phone conversations- I am baffled about how loudly some people speak while on a cell phone, especially people doing business. I often want to say, “Do you realize you’re giving away confidential information or trade secrets?” My earbuds have a mic built in so I can have quiet conversations.

 

My office fits into my bag.

What tools do you recommend for a mobile office? I’m always looking for new gadgets or programs that I can’t-live-without.

truck

Leadership Lessons I Learned from a Growly Trucker

05/09/2013

I was dressed in a suit when I got the call to offload a semi truck in our new distribution center. The trucker arrived 3 days earlier than expected and our warehouse man was in the hospital.

I went back to the hotel and changed into old tennis shoes, a ratty pair of jeans, and a hoodie then made my way to our building. I jumped out of my vehicle and ran over to the trucker and promptly lost the only key I had to the facility.  An atypical May snowstorm deposited two inches of snowy mush so I slogged around looking for the missing key, but to no avail.

After a few phone calls and longer delays than it takes congress to make a decision, I finally managed to get into the building and crawl up on the same forklift Noah used to load the ark.

Because of my construction background, I’ve spent a fair amount of time on backhoes, bobcats, high-loaders, bulldozers and the occasional forklift. There is no standardized, “gas-pedal-is-on-the-right-and-the-clutch-is-on-the-left-and-the-brake-is-in-the-middle” format for this kind of machinery.  Nope, it’s more of a mix-and-match collection so each machine requires learning new locations of levels, pedals, and eject-buttons.

To add further excitement, the forklift had no brakes.  A forklift without brakes is like riding a bicycle without handlebars; or baking a cake without a temperature indicator; or a nurse giving a shot without a syringe.  You can do it, but you have to be pretty darn inventive to get it done.

Combine a rookie forklift driver with a forklift more dysfunctional than the Kardashians and you have either a recipe for disaster or slapstick comedy. I chose comedy.

I’d already used up any charm I had to keep the trucker amused after my ridiculous delays. I apologized profusely, offered him my firstborn and/or donuts and coffee but nothing wiped the growl off his countenance.

After two hours of pre-stress activity, the real stress began when I began unloading the truck.  I admitted I was a novice and gingerly approached the truck to unload it. Since it was his truck, he had an opinion about how to unload it that resulted in minimal damage to the truck, dismemberment of bystanders, or loss of life.

After I got over my initial intimidation at the coarseness of which he gave direction, criticism, and questions about my heritage, I began to notice the lessons I was learning about leadership.

 Here’s are the leadership lessons I learned from a growly trucker:

      •  After initial instruction, walk away and let them do their job – the first few pallets were nerve racking because he was barking at me, but when he disappeared (he finally caved in for the coffee and donuts) I settled down and started doing much better
      • Compliment before you criticize – it took me forever to unload the truck and he would check on me. Sometimes he’d compliment me and then give me some criticism, then other times he led with the criticism. His effect was far more positive on me if he complimented first, then offered critique
      • Be patient- he was growly about technique, not about time. He wanted it done right (and me not drive the forklift through the side of his truck)
      • Laugh- Near the end, he laughed at a self-deprecating remark I made comparing me to a little old lady peering between the steering wheel and the dashboard.  His response was affirmation.

I finally got his truck unloaded.

I have some new leadership techniques in my pocket.

We have a better forklift now- I’m sure the trucker called our founder and said, “Look, you have to get a new forklift or that idiot is going to kill himself.”

When he left, he asked what I usually do and I told him I was a Vice President in the company.

Chuckling, he said, “You better keep your day job.”

I couldn’t agree more.

______________________________________________________

*If you are interested in my writings about hunger, please check out this week’s blog on Universities Fighting World Hunger’s website: Senator Bob Dole – A Hunger Fighter You Should Know.

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The image above is from www.wallpaper.org

 

tundra

The Power of a Story to Change a Heart: Why We Now Have a Kitten in the House

05/07/2013

Turning the corner on the highway, I noticed the little blob of fur about 3 feet off the road and wondered if it was dead. I couldn’t tell kind of animal it was, but I noticed a slight movement as I drove by.

I hate to see animals suffer so I pulled over and backed up to see if I could help. I watched it in my rearview mirror and, as I got close, I opened the door to see what it was. It was a calico kitten who shot under my Toyota Tundra pickup. I knelt down to look under the truck but couldn’t find it. I walked around the truck and looked in the tall grass in the ditch and still couldn’t find it. I knelt down again to look under the truck before I took off. I assumed it was okay and was hiding in the grasses.

Several miles later pulled into my son’s home to pick up the grandkids for the day. I turned the truck off; the engine stopped but the meowing started.

I opened the hood of my truck and there it was! Stowaway kitty I started to reach in, but I’ve had enough skirmishes with wild kittens to know that in a nanosecond they can be a cupful of hatefulness wreaking the destructive equivalent of an entire school of piranhas or a gaggle of middle school cheerleaders. I did not want to turn up on Funniest Home Videos for the fool that got decimated by a kitty. Slowly, the kitten crawled in my hands that, apparently, were connected straight to my heart.

Walking to the door with a new kitten made me a hero in the eyes of my 4-year-old granddaughter, KK, and 2-year-old grandson, Evan.  They immediately began lobbying the Grand Poobah of the house- my son Caleb- who gave me a look that said, “Really, Dad? What were you thinking showing up here with an abandoned kitten?”  We had a discussion over mergers and acquisitions and it was decided his firm was not interested in assuming my liabilities and assets. There was further, and considerable, disagreement over what one person defines as an asset and another deems a liability.

So what do I do with my new friend?  My wife and I had numerous discussions over having a house cat and, while she is a passionate lover of animals, she has not been interested in another animal. Therefore, I knew that taking the new kitty home to be a house cat was not an option. However, we do have a barn on our place and- being from the country- I know that a good mouser is an asset to ecosystem.

I called my wife- who was shopping- and told her the story. That’s all it took.

She came home with a kitty litter, kitty toys, kitty food, kitty bowls, and a kitty bed. I’m surprised she didn’t have a set of jammies for me with kitties all over them.  This kitty will never get within a hundred yards of the barn.

She didn’t even have to see the kitty; all I had to do was tell her the story.

We have a new kitty in our house.

It’s not just any other kitty; it’s a kitty with a story.

Her name is Tundra.

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© 2013 Rick McNary | Writer and Speaker