A wonderful, profound distraction: Meet Adelaide

By now, you know my belief in leaders blending their personal and professional lives. And, I know first-hand how living and working with a focus on the Seven Fs: faith, family, finances, fitness, friends, fun, and future – helps leaders improve empathy and sincerity in their endeavors.

This week Melinda and I are celebrating our Seven Fs, because we became first-time grandparents last week. Our daughter Katie and her husband Max successfully brought Adelaide Ann Bowell into the world at 8 pounds 1 ounce, with a heavy head of hair and marshmallow cheeks. It’s impossible not to process this wonderful occasion through our satisfaction on faith, family, finances, fitness, friends, fun, and future. It’s a Seven Fs booster for sure.

A broader perspective always helps

Someday, I will have a mature conversation with Adelaide about the circumstances in which she was born. How fear of a deadly virus, masks, and social distancing kept many of her loved ones to wait many moons to welcome her into the world. And how the pressure of the pandemic brought out the best in most people – despite what we see in the media.

This morning I came across a familiar quote that summarizes how I’m feeling:

“Don’t judge each day by the harvest you reap but by the seeds that you plant.” – Robert Louis Stevenson

My mood hasn’t been the best lately, working from home in quarantine while awaiting to meet Adelaide. The looming cold and darkness of a Minnesota winter has it’s grips on my morale in my weaker moments. But that’s me getting stuck in the moment. Stepping back and looking further out, it feels wonderful that my daughter and son in law have planted another seed in the garden of great possibilities for a wonderful world. My belief in Adelaide’s powers to make things better is profound.

For those of us who don’t have a bright and glorious granddaughter to celebrate, I’ll close with advice I got from my own grandfather – Willis Kenneth Hunter – more than 40 years ago: Keep your chin up, and eyes forward. Adelaide is proof of how goodness pays because goodness grows. It’s contagious. Isn’t that wonderful?