Found Wanting

When you are thinking “I don’t deserve to be at this table”, “I don’t know enough to apply for this job”, or “I am really confused and feel incompetent”... you don’t know how the other people are (also) beating themselves up constantly. 

Even if people do open up, we only get the words they choose, and only in the way we interpret them. We are only exposed to projections. We are only exposed to how those projections land on our internal projections. 

Working on these interpretations is not something that is obvious. Good business ideas are things you can count, and deep work is often not countable. You may need to pragmatically focus on good business ideas to build the internal capacity for work that doesn’t have (obvious) payback. 

I avoided reading “How to win friends and influence people” because the title made me cringe. It seems manipulative. The books surprised me with the well-articulated truth that we are interested in people that are interested in us. 

Truth sits in a feedback loop, as an invited and trusted evolving conversation. 

Feedback is best received when we don’t feel like it is a tool of destruction. When it isn’t a disguise for being “weighed, measured, and found wanting.” When there is a long-term commitment to each other’s well-being. Where there is a foundation of respect and kindness. 

Then feeling incompetent and not enough is the only starting point in every new endeavour, rather than a fearful admission of permanent inadequacy.

Damage Shows Strength

Survivorship Bias is our tendency to see the people who made it through some selection process, without seeing those that did not (even if the reason was luck). We study the stories of success like people studying that the roulette ball landed on black rather than red. It is too hard to get a good picture of each important fork in the road, and what could have happened. You can’t study what ifs without a solid imagination. I am a bigger believer in focusing on the foundations. Creativity isn’t a path, it is a process. For that process to work, you need endurance and resilience. Creativity isn’t picturing a world you want and building it. It is building the strength, flexibility and control to make your way through a world that is complex, ambiguous, and random. Those foundations include kindness and respect. Not earned by being a story of success. Earned by a commitment to show up. Today, and every day.

The damaged planes were the ones that returned safely

The others didn't survive.

Private Battles

"Everyone else is fighting a private battle you know nothing about. Be kind." Life doesn't revolve around any of us, except for us. So when we are at our low, others are celebrating. When we are ecstatically happy, someone else may be receiving awful news. In a global world that is connected, we can't get the signals necessary to know if someone has capacity. You can dump your emotional baggage on someone, and two blue ticks later it is in their heart and mind. Whether they are in a space to deal with it or not. At times it can feel too much to bear. Admitting that feels like weakness, because it is. If no one is the rock... where do we turn, but inwards? I don't know the answer. A wise lady once told me just to come back to kindness and respect. Build that first... the rest will follow. 

Starting Point

The starting point for meaningful engagement is kindness and respect. This isn't the same thing as endorsing the views of the other person. Kindness is being friendly, generous and considerate. Giving someone the benefit of the doubt, and interpreting the things they say in the best possible way your worldview reasonably allows. That is hard when people wind you up. Respect doesn't mean endorsement either. Respect is a feeling of admiration for something in them - a quality, an ability, an achievement. Something that you see in them, that you value. That they have that you don't. If you can't see that in someone, then you probably don't know them well enough to have permission to attack.

Naturally none of this matters if you don't actually care about that person, or the community of which you are both a part. If your intent is just grandstanding your opinion and signalling that you belong to a different tribe to that person. If someone has a crazy view, and you care - it is probably because they are part of the community you care about. That means that crazy view belongs to you. You 'have' that crazy view. If your definition of self is in any way connected to that community.

The really substantial conversations happen when people feel safe. Not a safe space for ideas, but a safe space for vulnerability. Bad ideas should never be safe. We should however make space for everyone. Create space for all of us to air our ugly bits so they can die. Without killing everything we care about in the process.

Pyrrhic Victory

Kindness and Respect

Life is full of highs and lows. Sunsets, storms and sunrises. I believe in building buffers. Not just external buffers. Also for relationships. Also for ourselves. If you are building something really worthwhile it takes time. You don't just solve problems by naming them. By recognising them. You have to do the work. That work takes time and patience. Openess, pain, pleasure, warmth and tears. It has to start with commitment. A real desire to be there with each other. A Buffer of Kindness and Respect stops relationships from snapping even when there is way more than enough underlying love. That underlying love and desire to build are also essential, but step one is making it through each day. Today. Tomorrow. One day at a time. Every day.

Kindness & Respect

What unites most of the relationships of friends, family, and random strangers I meet is the little niggles. An 18-year-old chooses a partner based on looks, a 30-year-old based on how they pack the dishwasher (the saying goes). Spending lots of intimate time with people naturally leads to a little dance developing. Steps we learn in response to irritation, moods, or just routine differences of opinion. My view is that you need to tend your buffer. There is no point in dealing with difficulties if you don't start from a foundation of kindness and respect. You need to like each other. In my experience, we take feedback best (particularly of the harsher variety) from people we have confidence are on our side. Feedback we know is intended to help because it is on the margin. It edges us forward rather than breaking us down. Start with kindness and respect.

A Little Kindness

With the world more connected we jump from big thorny issue to big thorny issue. Any single one of these things is very difficult to unravel. Like fighting wars on many fronts. I am not much of a believer in two things. (1) That we can multi-task, and (2) That we care about the opinions of people who don't care about us. I have had a very difficult year. My bandwidth is uber-stretched. I don't think weakness is the opposite of strength. Disconnection is. I don't think I am alone in having had a difficult year. Part of my struggle has been that those I care about are struggling. It seems everyone is struggling. Somehow we need to get a little better at letting people focus on chipping away at one little thing at a time, and caring about them enough to show we are on their side. I need that. I am willing to give that.

Big Issue, Little Issue

Day Changing Kindness

When I was 18, I worked as a waiter in the Pavilion, Westville. I was saving towards a ticket to England where I wanted to work as an assistant teacher for two years while my brothers finished university. One day, a teacher of mine came for a coffee with her friend. When she left, I discovered a large tip. I will never forget the spring in my step for the rest of the day. Ever since then I have really enjoyed doing the same when opportunity knocks. It needn't be life-changing, day-changing kindness also lingers and multiplies.

More Mitzfahs

Who pays? In a world with fewer rules and more freedom to create your own path, there is bound to be more confusion. One of those areas is etiquette. The feminist male who wanders into the world of dating has to decide how to approach this with care. When the bill comes, my approach has always been to put my card down and wait and see. If the waiter comes comes and the bill is settled. I have my answer. If she puts her card next to mine. I have my answer. Some ladies want you to then say, no let me get it. Some ladies will get offended if you say that. I choose not to second guess. A friend of mine cheekily suggests you cover your bases and say, 'No, let me get this. You can get breakfast.'

Then there is the bravado dilemma when a group of people go out, and one person insists on paying. A discussion ensues where a couple of people are saying they would like to be the one to pay. They certainly can't accept the other one paying for their meal. One of the sneakiest players of this game I have seen stirred between two of the arguers. In the mean time, he 'went to the loo'. He returned and stirred some more. Peacock feathers on full display he stirred some more. Then suggested we go somewhere for a drink. Apparently, someone had already settled the bill.

I have never been in a situation where someone has argued that the other person should pay. Sometimes, a person will wonder off to look at something or simply make no movement towards the bill as if it hasn't appeared, but I have never seen an argument. It is much easier to offer than to ask.

Because money simplifies things to an exchange, and most things are offered by the market, asking isn't really a skill we feel all that comfortable with. Beyond asking, accepting an offer is something that seems to be hard to do to. I was chatting to a new Mum recently asking whether she was able to team up with other new parents to grab a few hours here and there. Dropping little man off with another parent for just a little while could allow a regathering of energy. She said that there were often offers but people seldom took each other up. Accepting an offer can feel like an imposition. Even with close friends.

I love the Jewish term of a 'Mitzvah'. The way I understand it, you are giving someone a gift by giving them the opportunity to help you. It is a Mitzvah for them to do an act of human kindness. This makes sense to me. Whether it is paying for a date, paying for a group of friends at dinner, doing some babysitting or helping a friend move house - there is pleasure in feeling like you have helped someone out.

Doctors in South Africa do a couple of years of community service. Lawyers are known for doing Pro Bono work. The Yoga centre I go to is run completely by volunteers. Even the full time staff only receive a nominal allowance rather than compensation. Doing something without it being an exchange feels good.

We spend a lot of time thinking about earning a living. Ideally something we are good at, that people need (so it pays reasonably) and that we love doing. That's awesome. But if we can create muses we can free up time to do and to receive more mitzfahs.