Welcome to “The Looking Glass”, a weekly newsletter journey of personal growth into mindset, meaning and mastery in work.
#34 – 16 Dec 2022
Hello friend,
Thanks again for being here!
Here’s an insight, a question, and a quote I reflected on over the last week.
💡 You don’t need to explain yourself
I reflected this week on how we need to explain ourselves.
I do this a lot. It’s almost like I am commentating on my actions.
You may not even realise you do it:
- Justifying your decisions.
- Clarifying points before anyone asks.
- Unnecessarily illustrating what’s going on.
But does anyone actually care?
Don’t waste your time with explanations: people only hear what they want to hear.
Paulo Coelho
After all, we are the ones jumping in with the suggestions when no one has actually asked.
“Less is more,” they say.
You might be more effective as a leader by not defaulting to those explanations.
All that explaining may just make you look like you are uncertain about your ideas.
It’s better to keep some allure and mystery to you.
Allow space for intrigue.
People will ask if they want more.
❔ You’re trapped after all those sensible decisions
Have you ever wondered if the reason why you feel stuck and unfulfilled could be because you are always playing it safe?
I was flicking through a book this week, and this quote stopped me in my tracks:
It’s not because you are making the wrong decisions, it’s because you are making the right ones.
We try to make sensible decisions based on the facts in front of us.
The problem with making sensible decisions is that so is everyone else.
Paul Arden, Whatever You Think, Think The Opposite
Thought-provoking, right?
It doesn’t make sense on first instinct.
How could we be trapped after making sensible decisions?
We are taught in school to be sensible. Play it safe. Do the right thing. Work hard, keep your head down and don’t break any rules.
The problem is that in the world we live in now, this mindset no longer stands. The rules are changing, and the foundations are shaking. What used to work doesn’t serve us so well anymore.
These old rules were built for an industrial system where the rule of law was command and control. Everyone kept in line on the factory floor and did their bit.
Clock on, clock off.
Times have changed.
Today, we need creative, free thinkers. Problem solvers and innovators. World changers. We need people who matter.
Industries are collapsing, and new ones are being created as I type.
I went to do some Christmas shopping today in the city. It had been a while as shopping isn’t my thing. I was shocked to see how many stores had stripped the human element. It was all pushed to self-service and electronic checkouts.
Soul-less.
We live in a world where influencers on YouTube and podcasts have more power than mainstream media.
Some kids earn over a million dollars a year playing video games professionally.
Who would have predicted that only 5-10 years ago?
How much more is the world going to change in the coming decade?
Keeping your head down and playing it safe no longer seems like the safest option.
I was certainly one of those people. I did what I was told – went to university, and studied Commerce as “a business degree gave me options”.
I majored in accounting as “it’s a good career. That pays well”.
The only trouble was that it felt like someone else’s path, which made me more and more miserable over time.
I felt like I had all this untapped creative potential going to waste.
Can you relate to this?
Have you woken up one day and wondered, “How the hell did I get here? I didn’t sign up for this.”
It’s not what you envisioned when you finished high school, all bright-eyed and optimistic about the working life ahead of you.
Before too long, it was like you were drowning in a pond of mediocrity.
Surely there was more to life than this?
Then came the real kicker for me – the pandemic – when I found out how “safe” I was on my corporate path.
Management and the board have to be seen as “doing the right things”, a.k.a. cutting costs.
Suddenly everyone is let go.
The minute we are no longer required, we are hung out to dry.
I always found this short-sighted as I believe people are the greatest asset in any organisation.
For example, look at the airline industry, where they jumped at the opportunity to sack a bunch of full-time employees and then hired contractors when business resumed. The only issue was the contractors were sloppy. Suddenly they couldn’t fill the staff they needed. Flights were cancelled on a whim, and baggage was lost and damaged. TikTok videos emerged of the chaos erupting behind the scenes. Everyone lost confidence in the travel industry.
The short-sighted actions shot themselves in the foot.
Sensible?
So you can see here how making the same sensible decisions as everyone else can come back to bite you.
I had been plotting my escape from corporate life to online business for a long time, but I was procrastinating.
I was kicking myself when the pandemic hit and work dried up.
“If only I had started my dream on the side two years earlier. I could now double down with all my extra time.”
But I couldn’t then, as I had never started that side project.
We can’t get hung up on what we have and have not done.
That’s useless overthinking.
The best thing we can do is start now.
I regretted not taking matters more into my own hands.
I felt powerless.
I don’t want to make that mistake again.
It’s interesting that when I started my idea of writing online and building a coaching business, people thought I was crazy. Some family members thought I had lost the plot.
“Why walk away from a steady career to something new and unknown? That is a bad decision.”
Don’t take advice from people who don’t understand what you are doing or why you are doing something.
The important thing is that you can see a path forward.
And so today, I leave you with some questions to ponder:
How are those “sensible decisions” no longer serving you?
And how could you lean into what some may consider a “wrong decision”?
But deep in your heart, you know it is your right decision.
💬 A quote to ponder
– On clarity
“It is a fault to wish to be understood before we have made ourselves clear to ourselves.”
Simone Weil
📣 What happened this week
Action is the way
I’ve come around to the idea that action is what matters.
I used to waste hours in “tutorial hell”, as they say – only watching lectures, reading books, and listening to podcasts. But not actually creating anything meaningful.
They feel good in the moment. Like you are learning, developing and growing. But in the end, you don’t have much to show for it. And most of that “learning” is lost within a few weeks if it isn’t applied.
You want a better path?
The way to go is to build a project around what you are learning. Implement what you learn immediately.
TAKE ACTION.
Move from consumer to creator.
Then you will have something to show after all that learning.
You will have delivered a project. Or even if it failed, you will have learned much more.
Look at all the people you admire. I’m sure they were some form of action-takers. They did stuff, and they made things. They achieved something. They got out of tutorial hell and made an impact.
So should you.
I’ll leave you with this from one of the greats:
Reading after a certain age diverts the mind too much from its creative pursuits. Any man who reads too much and uses his own brain too little falls into lazy habits of thinking, just as the man who spends too much time in the theatre is tempted to be content with living vicariously instead of living his own life.
Albert Einstein
💭
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Cheers!
