View From The Office

My friend and business partner Mike sent me a picture this week.  At first glance, it was a nice pic.  It took some time for me to grasp the full impact of what he had provided.

Mike is a chopper pilot.  He flies to and from offshore oil rigs in Asia.  And this particular picture was taken from his seat in the cockpit one warm, sunny but slightly cloudy morning.  He labelled it “today’s view from my office”.

I found myself looking at it again and again trying to unravel the mysterious hold on my attention it had taken.  And I started thinking about everyone that looks out their office windows every day.  What do they see.  Other offices or office buildings or some non-inspirational vista?  Or, as I did for most of my career, sitting in a small radio studio with no visibility to the outside world, surrounded by soundproof baffles.

So I closed my eyes and imagined myself in the studio with a window that provided the view that Mike had the foresight to capture from the helicopter pilot’s seat.

The feeling was bliss.  Calm, focused, productive and happy.  That’s a great way to spend your day at work.

And no, I’m not naive enough to think that a simple picture will cure all the challenges you face at work.  But if one picture can make even a slight, positive change, isn’t it worth a try?

I’m going to suggest that you do something about the view from your office window, even (and perhaps most especially) if you work from home.  Find that picture of a person, place, situation or thing that makes you feel great and stick it to your window.  Someplace where it takes just a glance to catch your eye just for a second now and then throughout the day.  And if you want to share the view from your office window, please feel free to tell us about it (condensed form) in the comments section of the blog.  I’d love to hear what inspires you.

Mike inspired me.  I owe you one, buddy!

And as always, something to think about:  “All men dream, but not equally. “Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds, wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act on their dreams with open eyes, to make them possible.”  (T.E.Lawrence)