You never win an argument.

Not even if you think you’ve won.

Dale Carnegie used to say the best way to win an argument is to avoid it.

But there’s even better advice.

Understand the other person’s point of view before you ask them to understand yours.

We become focused on what we’re saying and if what we’re saying is rejected, then we feel rejected.

Give up the urge to be right.

Choose your arguments carefully.

Once, while meeting the parents of a girl I was dating, I witnessed an impressive example of this at dinner when her mother picked a fight with her father.  He tried for about a minute to react and then quickly – almost like magic – he said, “You’re right” because it wasn’t worth it to him.

When it is worth the debate understand how to stay cool (courtesy of Amit Sood):

• Stop your negative thoughts.
• Exhale deeply for a few breaths and watch your frustration leave with your breath.
• Redirect your thoughts to something you feel grateful for or someone you feel compassionate about.
• Evaluate what has you stressed using gratitude and compassion as your guide.
• Negotiate what you were doing but with a calmer mind and fresher perspective.

Hint:  assume the other person has positive intent, which will help the disagreement avoid the damaging rage that frequently erupts.

We can be lonely in a group of people.

Some spouses feel alone in their marriages.

All the Facebook friends and Instagram contacts does not guarantee that we are not lonely in our lives.

Loneliness is the feeling of being without friends and the closeness that comes from interaction with others.

Being alone is a regenerative state to help us get in touch with feelings, desires, dreams and allow us time to solve problems and deal with them.  It can also be a time of great focus on that which we have a great personal interest.

The best way to avoid loneliness and get the most out of being alone is to:

1. Work to have a solid support group of friends, family and associates at the ready for when you need them.
2. Never forget that time spent alone can be very valuable when it is a part of the more social aspects of our lives.
3. Use time alone to recharge and invest in yourself.
4. Use alone time to pursue your dreams.  No one ever realized big dreams without devoting one-on-one time with those dreams so that they can pursue those dreams in the future.

I love speaking before audiences but when I am done, I look forward to an equal and opposite amount of time alone with my thoughts to regenerate my feelings and balance my life.

Being alone, then, is a tool to help us avoid loneliness that brings sadness.

The Eagles had it right in “Take It Easy”:

“We may lose and we may win though we will never be here again”

In the radio industry right now some formerly ethical and moral people have sold their souls to make more money and acquire power.

It’s logical to want to earn a living and have an influence in this world especially in what we do, but far too often we lose sight of the end game.

Losing is transformational.

“Losers” almost always have another day as tomorrow’s success.

And winning is overrated when you have to sell your soul to chase money and might.

To avoid this sorry fate, the new mantra should be win or lose, we will never be here again so take it easy and be the person you want to be – not the unhappy one it is so easy to become.

My best friend, Jimmy, used to say that all the time as a reminder that often we know what is best for us and we just stop doing it.

Meanwhile we expend lots of energy and anxiety trying to find new ways to do what we already know works.

I said “It worked so well I stopped doing it” just today to remind myself that I am still guilty of walking away from doing what I know works.

In this case, I like to stay physically fit.  I have gyms and treadmills in both my Arizona and New Jersey homes.  But when I was away from the equipment on vacation at a rented beach house I had none of that.

I had to rely on what used to work better than all this equipment that I own.  It’s called The Royal Canadian Air Force Fitness Plan – you know, just for the week, right?

I had it right way back then when I couldn’t even afford a treadmill so what I’m saying is – I’ll add the extra goodies in but I’m going back to what worked well for so long that I stopped doing it.

It could be anything.

Or everything.

Do I have any company out there?

There are lots of ways to bully people but one of the most popular ones is to make fun of them because they are fat.

For decades thin-is-better has gotten out of hand.

Healthy is best and people of all sizes and shapes can be healthy.

Fat shaming is particularly odious on social media where it seems the worst elements of bullying have found a new and powerful way to hurt people.

Fat shaming or any other kind is a direct reflection on the person doing the bullying and it hurts the victim.

The beauty Marilyn Monroe would be considered too fat to be a model by today’s standards.

Here is how to support friends or children who are losing confidence because they are being held to social media ridicule for being too fat:

1. Fat shaming doesn’t lead to weight loss but it does lead to a serious loss of confidence.
2. Your body was given to you to love and protect.
3. Even skinny people can be “big hearted” – the size of your heart matters more than the size or shape of your body.
4. Even a doctor does not get to fat shame a patient for health reasons — allow no one to be the weight police.

Be proud of yourself and your body.

The only thing that matters is to be the fine person that you are.

Now we know.

A study done by Advisor Perspectives has nailed it down to the penny.

So how much household income is necessary to achieve happiness?

$75,000 a year.

More in some states.  Less in others.

New Jersey it takes $95,700 but in Missouri $70,271.

It takes only $65,800 to achieve happiness in Mississippi and $122,175 in Hawaii.

Making more will not increase your happiness significantly and yet almost all of us devote our lives to making more money even though we have no idea when enough is enough or not enough is preventing us from being happy.

What if we had a metric for happiness not related to income.

Happy moments together.

Friends in our lives.

Loved ones with whom to share our experiences and dream our dreams.

Wouldn’t that be a way to get the most for the money you earn and then some?

Place a real value on things that money can’t buy and you’ll discover the road to fulfillment.

I thought you might like to see what you need to earn in all 50 states so here it is.

My friend John Dowd, Jr (also known to SiriusXM “70’s on 7” listeners at Jaybeau Jones) writes:

“Many confuse self confidence with conceit and arrogance.  Self-confidence is something others can feel, while arrogance is an external reaction to a situation that others can see.

We can’t control how others react to our self-confidence.

Some will champion it; others may be threatened by it.

In those situations we must keep moving and send those who are threatened a silent blessing in hopes that they discover inner confidence on their journey.

Self-confidence originates in the heart from a place of love and a need to do well to help others. Arrogance and conceit are powered from fear.

Start today and every day centered in your heart with 100% self-confidence”.

I subscribe to his daily motivators and thought you might like to see John’s work here.

On my media website I wrote about a radio executive who was fired by his best friend since first grade – the godfather to his son and executor of his will.

And the firing was done in an unnecessarily cruel way.

In our quest to be successful and self-fulfilled, we are often making compromises that hurt the ones we love.

It has happened to me, perhaps to you as well.

The feeling of being betrayed by someone so close to you is more than an empty feeling, it is a raw rejection that seemingly never goes away.

I once heard a psychiatrist say that people who have had their heart broken should stop glorifying the person who broke their heart.  It just makes things worse and keeps the pain front and center.

She suggested instead of saying “no one will ever love me like that again” to substitute “he wasn’t that good looking anyway”.

Which prompts the thought that when we are betrayed by a friend, instead of obsessing over the ingratitude of it all, think constantly of someone else in your life who could be called a friend and for whom you are truly grateful.

If you liked this piece, subscribe and share it with your friends.  If you want more resources, go to Jerry Del Colliano.com.

Taylor Swift is one of the most important icons in the Millennial generation.

She is a role model for a lot of young and teenage girls and is a savvy businessperson in her own right.

She recently wrote in the stogy old Wall Street Journal to put selfies in their proper place.

Selfies are today’s autographs.

No one would dare ask someone for their signature when they could have a picture taken with them to distribute via social media.

My daughter, Daria, and her girlfriends at ASU Cronkite School were surprised to be approached by President Clinton and his Secret Service agents as he asked them if THEY would like to have a picture taken with HIM at a school event.

Taylor Swift says Instagram followers are currency because Instagram is the most important social networking tool for their age group.

She has 9.7 million Instagram followers, 41.7 million Twitter followers and 66.6 Facebook likes.

I can think of an almost endless number of people I wish I could have included in a selfie looking back on the past had only technology to do so been present.

The real revolution was not the computer, not even the Internet.

It is social media.

And anyone who says I don’t do social media is leaving one of life’s great new communication tools behind.

It’s called vamping and teens do it when they are supposed to be in bed and their parents think they are sleeping.

Snuggling under the covers, dimming the screen uploading music, watching videos, discovering whatever they seek online.

A recent New York Times article cited a recent National Sleep Foundation Poll that revealed more than half of 15 to 17 year olds sleep about 7 hours a night – 90 minutes less that the minimum recommendation.

As a professor at USC, my antidotal evidence was more like they’d be lucky to get four hours of sleep and they sleep with their phones in bed or nearby.

One explanation is that young people have so much structure in their lives installed by their parents that they cannot be free until their parents go to bed.

Texting is an amazing tool to help us communicate more seamlessly.

But it is not a lifestyle — jut a tool.

Without pointing fingers and including myself, parents are often poor role models when it comes to technology.

As our lives become more stressful, our goal should be to become more helpful.

And one last thought.

When a person is important enough to you, they deserve your focused attention in person with the exact same way we focus on our digital devices.