ARTICLE

Slam Dunk Your Life

Envisioning a University Team Building Experience

90% of employers say, “A sense of community is essential for success.”¹ Isn’t this also true for schools and universities? This article uses “The Pursuit of Happiness” to increase core motivation. ² It builds community, within an educational institution, by giving students a fundamental understanding of how to best manage and create happiness.

The 3 Types of Happiness

1. Mood Empowerment:  Voltaire said it best, “The Best Decision You Can Make Each Day, Is the Decision to Be in a Good Mood.” Every morning chose to smile at the world.
2. Passionate Career Vision: Knowing what’s worth wanting creates a beautiful forward-thinking, disciplined, life full of hope.
3. Successful Expectations: Realistic expectations create a life where you’re constantly winning and being affirmed as successful.

1. Mood Empowerment

What Are You Thinking?

Be aware of your thoughts. If you aspire to be in good shape, are you critical of those who are overweight? If you’re into fashion, do you find those who aren’t disgusting? We are all biased by nature. Labeling someone “not one of us” or “he’s one of those” destroys positive energy. After all, whenever you see one of them, you get beaten down with a negative thought.

Being different is not wrong. Make it just not “your way,” and that’s OK. Hear what you and everyone you meet have in common, not what’s different. You’ll see their point of view. Say hello to everyone. Ask, “How’s it going?” Learn. Every person has a gift to give you.

Happiness is Contagious. When YouSmile
and Others Smile Back, It Makes You Happy³.

– Harvard University and the University of California, San Diego Study

Create Affirming Body Language

Body Language talks before you do. The body language others hear from you can be as high as 93% (55% non-verbal, 38% verbal reflecting negative energy.)⁴ Critical thoughts, situational frustrations, and suppressed anger can make others not hear you, even dislike you. The reverse of this fundamental truth is “Think something great about someone, and they’ll think great things about you.” Great energy is contagious.

Cash in and reap the rewards of good energy. When you meet someone, ask yourself. “What do I like about them?” Perhaps, they have beautiful hair, fun shoes, a sweet smile, a lovely voice, or whatever. Listen. Hear their joy. Empathize with their concerns. They’ll give back energizing, positive energy.

2. Passionate Career Vision

What Is Worth Wanting?

Pull your life together. What looks fun to do? Don’t be naïve. Situations, careers, and even people are seldom what they appear to be. Get the facts. Research every option and investigate every possible choice. Then, imagine yourself experiencing your favorite ones. How does it feel? Eliminate the “ugh ones” and explore the “beautiful things.”

This is your life. Don’t be like 45% of American workers who “Wouldn’t wish their career on their worst enemy.”⁵ Decide on an enjoyable career path. Then, celebrate your life-changing decision. Knowing “What you want” creates a focused, disciplined, successful future. Oprah says it’s the key to success.⁶

Being Immersed in a Beautiful Future Vision, Not Your Limitations, Makes You Happy.

Be Powerful

Daydream a vision of your future. Imagine yourself doing a career path. Envision it as being a huge success. Then, ask yourself, “What great things about me made it happen?” Follow up with a critique. “What are the challenges?” “How can I solve them?” Finally, make your vision come true by obsessing every day about how to make it successful. Keep your power. Don’t let comments get you off course. Advice from friends and family can be more about their personality or issues, not yours. Follow your passions by taking your career path goals to the next level. Think big. What do you want to be doing in 20 years? Be a person with a sense of purpose- a life mission.

3. Successful Expectations

What’s Your Bottom Line?

Know exactly what you want to do. Isn’t “Getting it done your bottom line?” Tell others what you want. They’ll give support. Is it a new job, a promotion, a college degree, a trade school certificate, a relationship, or whatever? See each task ahead, even those you don’t enjoy, as one step closer to success. Don’t sweat the small things. Complete them and move on.

Get tough. Rise above rudeness, prejudice, and terrible situations. Don’t let anger, emotions, or a sense of injustice set you off. Others will only hear you as verbally attacking them. Find a way to let it go. Look forward, not backward. Run the race. Stay the course. Win.

When You Create Realistic Goals and Fulfill Your Expectations, it Makes You Happy.

Examine Your Expectations

Are you grounded? Establish a step-by-step process. Critique each step. What could go wrong? Yes, mistakes happen. Learn. Talking down to yourself will only make things worse. No one gets it totally right the first time, and neither will you. So, chill out. Constantly inspect your progress. Ask yourself, “What’s working? Not working?” Make improvements. Applaud your successes.

Examine your self-expectations. Are you winning? If not, adjust your timeline. Create a world where you win, win, win. Enjoy this journey called life by fulfilling your expectations every day.

Each Section Has a Goal

Consider using “Happiness” as a motivating factor in a group or classroom discussion. In so doing, students will become empowered to quantify the rewards of hard work. This article is also a team-building speech that uses an interactive quiz.

Visit https://deweycolorsystem.com/meet-dewey/ to learn more.

1. 1. Mood Empowerment: Isn’t it time we discussed managing our mood? This discussion will create an inclusive, positive team-building experience.
   2. Passionate Career Vision: Are they planning a future? What have they done so far? Get tough. Motivate them with “those without a planned, positive future suffer from low self-esteem⁷ and high anxiety.⁸”
   3. Successful Expectations: Why not choose to set realistic goals? The consequence of an impractical, starry-eyed goal is a failure which “makes a goal seem further out of reach. It also distorts your perceptions of your actual abilities.”⁷ Get grounded. Choose to be a continual winner.

The More They Want to Do a Career,
The More Successful They Will Be.

Dewey Sadka

For more than 25 years, Dewey Sadka owned and ran Temp Force, one of the nation’s largest and most successful staffing companies. He then sold his company to Randstad Staffing, where he served as the USA’s COO.

Running staffing companies for over 25 years, he came face-to-face with thousands of individuals working to survive, stumbling to find an enjoyable career. Regrettably, there wasn’t a career program that worked. After leaving, he invested millions and 20 years in building a career program that empowers others to control their destiny.

The Top 50 Most Enjoyable Occupations assessment list was validated directly against the US Dept. of Labor’s O*Net Code. Therefore, no assumptions exist that “an occupation should be a certain personality type.” Then, an O*Net Code’s occupational link connects students to all they need to know about a career. The other assessment, Success Driven Coaching, identifies their core motivation. Then coaches them every 2½ days with a Customized Coaching Program to keep them on track. A 2-minute Color Test produces both programs. Try it out on us.

Dewey Sadkaʼs company was featured on CareerBuilder, receiving over 100 million visitors with over 8 MSN and 12 AOL “Article of the Week” awards. He has received excellent features and reviews from CNN, The Wall Street Journal, The Chicago Tribune, The Washington Post, USA Today, and over 1000 national magazines.

He’s also the author of a series of books and products through Random House with over eight international editions and a best seller in Japan.

1. https://www.surfoffice.com/blog/teambuilding-statistics
2. LifeHacker 2014 https://lifehacker.com/the-complex-relationship-between-happiness-and-motivati-1623287744
3.  NPR 2008 https://www.npr.org/2008/12/05/97848789/a-study-to-smile-about-happiness-is-contagious
4. University of Texas https://online.utpb.edu/about-us/articles/communication/how-much-of-communication-is-nonverbal/
5. Fortune 2023 Jan  https://fortune.com/2022/11/15/american-workers-hate-their-jobs/
6. https://www.facebook.com/reel/231880452550509?fs=e&s=aEkTS0&mibextid=pIVN6E
7. Frontiers in Psychology 2018 Apr  https://doi.org/10.3389%2Ffpsyg.2018.00514
8. Healthy Place 2018 Mar https://www.healthyplace.com/blogs/buildingselfesteem/2018/03/how-low-self-esteem-can-negatively-impact-your-career-path