Defining, meaningful moments in our lives

While human lives are endlessly variable, our most memorable positive moments are dominated by four elements: elevation, insight, pride, and connection. If we embrace these elements, we can create more moments that matter:

What if a teacher could design a lesson that he knew his students would remember twenty years later?

What if a manager knew how to create an experience that would delight customers?

What if you had a better sense of how to create memories that matter for your children?

Why do we tend to remember the best or worst moment of an experience, as well as the last moment, and forget the rest? Why do we feel most comfortable when things are certain, but we feel most alive when they’re not? And why are our most cherished memories clustered into a brief period during our youth?

Do you have any idea how brief experiences can change lives, such as the experiment in which two strangers meet in a room, and forty-five minutes later, they leave as best friends? (What happened in that time?)

Or the tale of the world’s youngest female billionaire, who credits her resilience to something her father asked the family at the dinner table. I want to know – and surely other readers as well: What was that simple question?

Many of the defining moments in our lives are the result of accident or luck—but why would we leave our most meaningful, memorable moments to chance when we can create them? 

No one teaches you that and, frankly, no one can teach you that: You have to discover it yourself.

Learn how to be comfortable being alone. Unplug from distractions and business and come back home to your thoughts.

For this, meditation is an incredible practice, but you have to practice—as you do it more and more, you’ll get better at connecting to yourself.

And you have to connect to people:

In life, it’s not your IQ; it’s your EQ (emotional quotient) that determines your success. (Soft skills are far more valuable than hard skills.) Learn how to connect, relate, and empathize with people. Learn how to build rapport and comfort.

Stimulate investment in basic research. New business models are needed because the share of government research funding has been shrinking for decades:

* Breaking down research silos, for example tying together biology, software and engineering in innovations.

* Change structures, for example with incubators in which scientists and companies network.

In conclusion:

Why can certain brief experiences jolt us and elevate us and change us?

And how can we learn to create such extraordinary moments in our life and work.

And what did the father of the world’s youngest female billionaire ask her family at the dinner table?

I am still hunting for answers. If you have ideas, let me and others know. Contact me at [email protected]