In this month’s issue of Wired Magazine, Brian Lam has written a step-by-step series of instructions, complete with illustrations about “How to Capture the Armrest”, on an airplane so that you can “claim the elbow room and comfort you deserve” and “dominate the disputed territory” of the armrest between you and your “fellow” passenger. What happened to “There is one armrest for us to share – I’ll be happy to share it with you – would you like it for the first half of the flight?”, kind of grace and elegance between human beings? If this is what we write in magazines aimed at our corporate elite, can we be surprised that we breed warriors and fear-based leadership styles in our boardrooms and executive suites? Is this the priority for our media and our educators of corporate leaders? I hope readers reject this greedy and self-centered attitude in favor of the kind of serving behavior we should model for others first if we aspire to teach them how to be inspiring leaders.
If there was truly only one arm rest, then I would gladly give it up because you don’t need it when your seat is in your heart.
The article was in jest. Many things are published all over the place and this is the least of things to get concerned over. We do breed warriors, because only the strong prevail. Sometimes, fear is the only instrument that some people understand in our chaotic world…Not to say that chivalry should be ignored – it is a must for all gentlemen. It’s ok to be a warrior and a gentleman, is it not?
I did not see anywhere that this was a tongue-in-cheek article, but rather a serious message about how to aggressively and selfishly put a fellow passenger at a disadvantage. Little discourtesies and minor ineligances pave the way for bigger ones. When Rudi Giuliani was mayor of New York he imposed a ban and penalties on graffiti – because he understood that big crimes start with little ones. He significantly reduced crime in New York. If we can imporve our day-to-day graces with people, we will inevitably reduce violence on the planet. Lance.
I am at a workshop this weekend and the facilitator said that a few years back he read the following poem, which you might know from Jack Canfield. Afterwards, a woman stood up and said that she was the actual woman in the poem, and that it was all true except for two things. I will write them at the end so as not to give it away.
The Cookie Thief
by Valerie Cox
A woman was waiting at an airport one night,
With several long hours before her flight.
She hunted for a book in the airport shops.
Bought a bag of cookies and found a place to drop.
She was engrossed in her book but happened to see,
That the man sitting beside her, as bold as could be.
Grabbed a cookie or two from the bag in between,
Which she tried to ignore to avoid a scene.
So she munched the cookies and watched the clock,
As the gutsy cookie thief diminished her stock.
She was getting more irritated as the minutes ticked by,
Thinking, “If I wasn’t so nice, I would blacken his eye.”
With each cookie she took, he took one too,
When only one was left, she wondered what he would do.
With a smile on his face, and a nervous laugh,
He took the last cookie and broke it in half.
He offered her half, as he ate the other,
She snatched it from him and thought… oooh, brother.
This guy has some nerve and he’s also rude,
Why he didn’t even show any gratitude!
She had never known when she had been so galled,
And sighed with relief when her flight was called.
She gathered her belongings and headed to the gate,
Refusing to look back at the thieving ingrate.
She boarded the plane, and sank in her seat,
Then she sought her book, which was almost complete.
As she reached in her baggage, she gasped with surprise,
There was her bag of cookies, in front of her eyes.
If mine are here, she moaned in despair,
The others were his, and he tried to share.
Too late to apologize, she realized with grief,
That she was the rude one, the ingrate, the thief.
How many times in our lives,
have we absolutely known
that something was a certain way,
only to discover later that
what we believed to be true … was not?
The truth: the cookies were not in her bag: they were in the overhead bin. And she discovered this when they fell on her head!
David this is marvellous new information. I use this poem quite a lot too, and the additional information is very illuminating. Thanks for posting this. There is a short movie of The Cookie Thief here: https://www.atomfilms.com/film/cookie_thief.jsp?channelKeyword=channel_slapstick