Releasing Constraints

Building an engine (Capital which can work on your behalf) creates the capacity to stop focusing on yourself as an individual. We all have to eat. Many of us have dependents who rely on us financially. Which unfortunately means we can be seen as productive assets. Valued for the money that consumes the majority of our time. A few get the perfect combination of “what you are good at, what people want, and what you love”. Applying all three filters cuts out a lot of activity. Things you are good at and love, that don’t pay? Things people want, and you love, but you aren’t “good” at? People can get stuck doing things that people want and that they are good at, but they don’t love. Many people can’t pick and choose. They take the opportunities presented, and are too busy being a productive asset and meeting obligations to have capacity to breathe and change path. And life passes them by. If you want to stop seeing yourself as a productive asset, you need to build an engine that replaces your need to earn money. If you need to earn money (as most people do), there will be real world constraints of supply and demand that form the boxes in which we are paid. The hold of those constraints gets released if you can gradually create breathing space. 

 

Negative Niggles

Public Speaking is a great opportunity to practice detachment. Where people become confident is when they are no longer thinking of the audience as judging them. When they are passionate about the subject matter and that passion shows. The listener is thinking about the ideas and the person delivering the sparks almost fades away. Their thoughts are being triggered about things they care about. Seth Godin points out that the audience may even be shooting off at tangents where they are being fired up about their own ideas. You don’t live in their heads but what you are sharing helps them connect dots that light up their creativity. Where your words spread in ways beyond your control. It ceases to be about you. They walk away from the talk excited about what they are going to do. A lot of anxiety comes from judging ourselves and others. Weighing and measuring. Separating people into good enough and not good enough. Are they going to choose me? Are they going to kick me out? Am I going to fail? These negative niggles are what prevent us from honest reflection because they lack fundamental commitment. Feedback cycles only work with deep underlying security. Deep knowledge that not only is it okay to make mistakes, but that that is the way we learn. You are okay. You are enough.

Deep Commitment - speaking at my wedding

 

Social Capital

One part of the job search process I do not enjoy is CV writing. As someone who includes “Price is not Value. Salary is not Worth. You are not your Job” as one of his mantras, a CV feels very much like a boastful autobiography. Public Speaking is the best example of where everything works more smoothly when the focus is the content, not the person. When you speak passionately about something you care about, to people who care about it too. Magic. When it is a school oral in front of a class of bored 14-year-old ingrate inmates, no wonder people are scarred for life when they have to present. LinkedIn and Facebook partly solve this, with my tendency to think aloud and befriend strangers. Ideally, as you grow in your career, you are not starting from scratch. You are part of a community. Ex-colleagues, “competitors”, suppliers, clients, classmates and others in my (privileged) network turn it into a team effort. Like the compound interest of investing. Always worth remembering in whatever role you are currently playing.

Tough Crowd

Profitability and Creativity

'The best way to make a small fortune is to start with a small one.' Someone's visible signs of success are not necessarily a good indicator of the underlying changes. The direction. The growth. Creativity is complicated, ambiguous and confusing. It can't always be counted. It needs a deep understanding of needs and wants. What it means to be human. What it means to be alive. 'Forward' steps face random changes and can only be known in advance if the thing has been done before. Known steps aren't creativity. Underneath everything, creativity is our contribution. It is our creation of meaning. Our purpose. It determines whether we are consumers or custodians. Whether our activity actually takes more out than it puts in. Whether our winning requires someone else's losing. Taking versus making. Creativity determines the why.

Feeling First

'We very often reason from, rather than to, our convictions' (Hume). This is why we need to think twice about our intent when arguing. If it is simply to demonstrate what we believe like a Peacock looking for a mate, then crack on. If we want to see and understand, then we need to start with understanding people's feelings. Hume didn't believe that all feelings were equal. He also didn't believe in 'finding yourself' or a personal identity. We are just a bundle of ways of seeing things. A bundle that changes rapidly, and is deeply affected by our passions. We can see, recognise, support, and train those in each other. 'People have to learn to be more benevolent, more patient, more at ease with themselves and less afraid of others.'

Contagious Brazil (with Jodie)

My big cousin Jodie was one of my inspirations growing up. Her daughter pointed out to us this morning that she is older, but I am taller. Yes, it is true, we don't always have visual signs of what makes people up. Jodes showed me you could taste everything. She was a machine on the hockey field, involved in charity work, creative in the Art room and when she left school and headed to Brazil she showed how a passion for people can allow you to lean into their languages. I love a story she told of how she had started thinking and dreaming in Portuguese. On landing back home in South Africa, in a panic, she told a blank faced air hostess she had left her jersey on the plane... in Portuguese. After her young host brother had lovingly labelled every object in the home, and patiently spent time with her, she soaked in the words till she was able to have deep meaningful discussions about geopolitics with her host father. Jodie makes me believe bridges to beautiful worlds are possible.

Jodes and I hitting the road

Contagious Brazil 
by Jodie Sacco

Brazil is the most colourful place I have ever been to. The reason I say colourful is because of the people, not necessarily the landscape. Vibrant. Exuberant. It is part of their culture. They have a love for life. They do things to celebrate life in various ways, and Carnival is the perfect example of that. The best part of Brazil for me was a place in the North East which was the birthplace of Carnival. Carnival for the people in Baia lasts for an entire month, not just for a few days on the strip like the Sambadrome in Rio. 

Fans of colour visiting (during Movember) the hospital where my brothers worked

Baia is just an explosion of these colours I referred to. You have a lot of darker skinned people who have descended from the slave trade during the Portuguese rule, but also by virtue of the fact that it is on a beach. Everyone is in the sun all the time. They are just very chilled, laid-back people. Even their Portuguese accent is a lot more laid back. The spirit filters through every part of their daily lives. Through the people of Baia. You have women who wear big white dresses and walk around with fruit baskets. They are vendors with an explosion of colourful fruit. The craziest, most foreign fruit you have ever seen in your life. Everything is an intense magenta, the brightest of yellow bananas. Papaya, Coconuts, Pineapples. A lot of Rastafarians as well. An incredible rhythm of music. A lot of drumming. It seems like there are street festivals wherever you go. The people are super, super, super, laid back. 

That is an example of a really fun city in Brazil, but it is such a contrast to when you travel to the capital. Everyone automatically assumes it is Sao Paulo, which it used to be, but now it is Brasilia. Brasilia is this perfectly planned city that has won city planning awards. It is so modern, and such a stark contrast to the north east coast where Baia and Fortaleza are. But at the same time, it is so colourful. You have all these beautiful stained glass windows, and massive monumental buildings that house Parliament and things like that. The sky always seems super blue. The sand super white. Then there are these people with incredible personalities. It is a contagious country to travel through because their love for life catches on very quickly.

The National Congress of Brazil - Brasilia (Oscar Niemeyer)

Independence Day

Today is my Independence Day! A year ago today I woke up for the first time post school, post university and post work. Stages of life are often a preparation for something else. My goal was to take each day as it comes. To enjoy it for it's own sake, and add a little flow. Barring a day in the air heading down under, I have written every day. I have also received 48 guest posts from friends, family, colleagues and people that I have met through social media. 

Despite declaring independence, I should say I am not ridiculously wealthy. Talking about money seems dirty, but since the first thing most people ask me about when I say what I am doing is money, it seems I exist in the chink of our financial privacy armoury. So I will be open. I have 'made' £4.11 in the last year. The '' are because Google only pays out when you reach £10. So I have not yet been able to purchase a celebratory Dine In For Two. I also got £50 for covering a Yoga lesson for a friend. 5 people each gave me £10 for corporate organised after work yoga lesson. All my other yoga teaching was on a volunteer basis.

Most writers aren't JK Rowling. Most tennis players aren't Roger Federer. In reality, if you want to pursue your passion there is no reason you should be paid well for it just because you or others think you are good at it. Pay isn't determined by value, effort, knowledge, skill, talent or any of the essential characteristics that we believe form 'who we are'/'what we are worth'. For something to pay, it has to be monetised. For something to be monetised, it has to be quantified. There has to be a limited amount of it. There have to be people who want it. There have to be people who want it but can't get it. That is how it works. A good idea isn't enough.

But that doesn't have to determine how we live. You can separate your passion from livelihood. I live off marshmallows. I work for flow rather than money. I can only do this because I created a muse. I saved aggressively and invested the money in things that were productive. This means my money earns an income and I live off it. The real trick wasn't in fact about how much, it was about how little. There are two important things to living a sustainable lifestyle. The one is how much comes in - how much you are being paid, either by your salary or your capital. The other is how much goes out. My trick is that I think most of us are cultural billionaires. You can cut back dramatically on how much goes out and benefit from our shared wealth. Shared wealth often isn't limited and there is enough to go round. It can't be monetised. It is priceless.

I know I am very privileged. The portion of my wealth that is financial is minuscule compared to the social capital I have got through luck. The language I speak, the colour of my skin, my sexual orientation, my gender and now my red passport, give me a big foot up in the world. What I am doing is not risky. I have a buffer of wonderful friends for anything life can throw at me. Education provides wonderful insurance. If my money disappears, I may not be able to get the job I want, but I am confident I will be able to get a job. That confidence is priceless.

The things I enjoy are pretty cheap. I love spending time with friends. This can be near free if you walk along a river rather than going out for dinner. I enjoy reading. In the UK at least, this is incredibly good value for money. Add the free content, interaction and ideas now available online and again there is plenty to go around. Priceless and free. If your tastes include healthy eating, a healthy lifestyle, time to relax and time to reflect - go live at an Ashram. You really don't need bundles of cash to live an amazing life. You need bundles of cash if you really want stuff there isn't enough of.

My key point is that it is very often a choice. Often we feel trapped by things we are working towards. Most of us are not trapped. I do think poverty is a trap. I do think poor mental health can be a trap. For the rest of us, if we are not comparing ourselves to others - independence is a choice. You can't have everything but there are more amazing things, people and experiences available within your means to fill several lifetimes. Independence is the realisation that you can walk away from any individual thing if you wanted to. It is a mindset. You are not a slave. 

You can be independent and earn a salary. You can be a slave and be a billionaire. You can be comfortably retired but still not independent. Some people can't choose. Most can.

Not Charity

One of the most important things to John McInroy is that it is understood that Unogwaja is not a charity. The 1000 mile trip that Robert Le Brun and him made from Cape Town to the Comrades Marathon was not a test of endurance. John bubbles with energy to get things started. His passion is infectious and he desperately wants the people he loves to be empowered. To feel like their destiny is in their own hands. 'The Light Fund' looks to find projects to help people who help themselves. It is not a hand out.

I have spent a lot of time studying the 'hard part' of wealth creation. This came from a background of 'hating money' and not letting it be in control of me. What makes a business work? What makes good marketing? How do you make money work for you rather than the other way around? What is tough to separate though is the 'soft part' of wealth creation. I am convinced that the best investment and the insurance policy is education, not gold. If you take everything away from someone, you can't strip away their Social Intelligence You can't steal their Emotional Intelligence. Part of this comes simply from being around people who are empowered themselves. Empowerment soaks deep. Disempowerment too.

So part of believing in not 'giving handouts' comes with a fat dose of humble pie realising that most of our handouts were given to us in the social, genetic and geographic lotteries. The cards life deals you are handouts. Perhaps you were lucky enough to meet someone amazing. A partner, a friend, a teacher. Part of that is because you are amazing, no doubt. Part of that is a handout. We may want to believe that our success has come from hard work rather than talent. Talent is luck, but hard work is something you can be proud of. But isn't the ability to work hard a talent?

Unravelling what is privilege and what we can take credit for is an almost impossible philosophical challenge. I think a great approach is similar to how the Yogis think about happiness. If you are not happy, it is your fault. That seems a brutal way to look at it. But... But... But... The harsh truth is that we don't control the 'handouts' we receive. We do control the thing we do next.

And that is where I think John and 'The Light Fund' are spot on. They focus on the thing people do next. This can be done without 'wealth colonialism' where people with privilege go out and show people how to get out of the mud. How can people do this if they themselves have no clue of the social and emotional hurdles that need to be overcome?

But you can walk together. You can let people know that you are available to help. You are available to listen. To learn with each other. To work with each other.

You can be available to build the stuff that can't be taken away.

Wadling into Walking

Most of us are busy. We choose to focus on something and get on with it. We fill in the gaps with a feeling that all the things we aren't looking at are ok. For a lot of people, having to worry about anything more than getting to the end of the week's tasks is simply not on the cards. Job. Family. A bit of exercise. Some food in the gaps. Sleep. And perhaps something to look forward to on the weekend.

What pulls it together is Mojo. A story that makes sense of the world. A story that gives some substance to the parts we don't understand. We don't want this story to be fake and so I think the things that make the news are often the things that cause us to worry that our story is wobbling. That give us doubt. Since we are pretty resilient, I think we are also fond of a good whine. If the gaps between our areas of control feel so huge, we gain comfort in repeatedly saying how huge they are to our buddies. We're all doomed. Another glass. We're all doomed. Another glass.

One of the reasons our wadling [(We're all doomed)ling] works is because we don't take a step back and look at the big picture. In 'The Better Angels of our Nature', Steven Pinker does that. We are conquering our prejudice and becoming better people. The strongest counter-argument to this comes from environmentalists and those who say that things 'seem' better, but the risks are more concentrated. Things could go wrong in a calamitous fashion. Another World War would wipe us all out. Those risks are real and I agree we have to become better custodians of our planet. But us becoming better is the first step towards that. It all starts with little stories.

The trend of the little stories requires Mojo. It requires us to come together and celebrate how awesome it is to be alive. Two guys doing that are John McInroy and Robert Le Brun. They set out yesterday on foot from Cape Town to the start of the Comrades Marathon in Durban. This is not a race. This is not supposed to be some awe inspiring feat. They are going on foot so that they can walk with real people all across the country. So they can hear stuff. Not the stuff that makes the news, but the stuff that makes the people that makes the Mojo that makes us move. Forward.

That is the stuff that matters. The reason people are focusing on their jobs and their families is they want a good life. We all do. A sprinkle of Mojo can turn our Wadling into Walking.

The walk begins

Get Lost

There are some things you can measure and some things you can't. Having a clear, objective, quantifiable goal can be addictive - it can let you feel like you have everything under control. It is much easier to be productive when you can say, 'these are the three things I want to achieve today', and then to tick them off. We apparently get a hit of dopamine when we do manage to hit these targets.

A child with the spending power of an adult would struggle to make it down the tantrum tunnel. You know that tunnel of sweets by the check out counter when the parent is trapped and the kid has to survive to the end without blowing their minds. The risk when you try measure everything is that you become the child rather than the adult. The measures are so sweet, you can't think of anything else.

Source: Hardwareretailing.com

What I am wanting to study and talk about are the obstacles to learning new skills. What I don't want to focus on is the efficiency side of things. Tim Ferris is doing some awesome work in his Four Hour Series showing ways to free up time by doing things better and cutting out waste. Incorporating productivity measures is great, but above that I do think there is stuff we simply can't measure.

Malcolm Gladwell talked about needing 10,000 hours of practice to become world class at something. Matthew Syed continued with the idea and spoke of how practice needs to be purposeful. Ken Robinson wrote about the need to find that place where talents and desire intersect and how those who succeeded found that powerful combination.

So you need to put the time in. There need to be objective criteria. You need to love what you do.

There is also some value in going off the clock. In stopping measuring and getting a little lost. When you use satellite navigation to get somewhere, sometimes you are not able to get there by yourself. Above that, you don't discover the flavour off the route. I spoke the other day of our 'Sense of Authenticity' - I think part of method acting or our ability to tell if someone is talking about something someone else does or something they have done is our ability to tell if it is worth doing in and of itself. I love the Afrikaans word 'Kuier' - it translates as visit, but that doesn't quite capture it. When you 'Kuier', you are in no rush and you have no measurable goal. Yes there is an intersection of 'talent and desire' but it isn't explosive, it is comfortable. Beyond the very valid points Ferris, Gladwell, Syed and Robinson make about finding success - I think perhaps one of the things we haven't explored enough is the value of regularly just getting lost in the things we love.

A little crazy

Apparently it was Bill Gates who said you have to be a little crazy to be successful. You have to do things that it is not logical to do, because the chance of success is not justified by the probability of success.

This doesn't sit well with me in some ways. I don't buy lottery tickets because I am almost certain I won't win. Given that I don't buy lottery tickets, I am now even more certain not to win.

I think logic matters a lot. Thinking things through matters a lot. Thinking about things from other people's perspective too. Once you have thought things through, trying to unthink what you think you thought, and think again. Think bravely, then challenge those thoughts. Then, when you have thought yourself into a knot, clear your mind and start again.

But sometimes, and for some things... a few things you are really passionate about, it may help to throw logic to the wind and go for it. Where every single sign tells you to give up, but something wills you to go on.

There's a thought.

What do you need to do?

While the Fed stormed his way past a ridiculously tall serving machine with a touch of magic, Roddick fought his way back to another Wimbledon semi-final.

I enjoyed the interview with Roddick afterwards and McEnroe's comments about how he got back into shape. A fitness coach worked with him and asked him what must seem obvious.

When recommending that people read Seth Godin's blog, they often come back and say that what he said is obvious. Obvious and yet people don't do it.

The fitness coach asked Roddick what he weighed when he won his last major? And it was a lot less than what he weighed now... so he worked really hard to get back to the level of fitness he was at then.

What is great about sport is that there is tangible feedback. Put the hours in and you see an improvement. Practice hard and your bodies muscles start remembering how to do things without you thinking.

I think having feedback and coaching in other areas of life, like sport can make all the difference. Finding someone who will tell you the hard truths and then support you in either getting back to where you were or taking things to a new level.

Also helps if you love what you do, and are passionate about doing it better.

Do you believe in Destiny?

Arthur asks this in my last post on nature vs. nurture.

I think a large part of life is completely random: Where you were born, who your parents are, some kinds of opportunities you get, who you meet, whether you get hit by a bus.

Having said that, I think we have a remarkable degree of control over what we make of life and what opportunities we create. I think only passive participants have a destiny. If you are born in squalor and show no enthusiasm, you are destined to live in squalor. If you are born in a wealthy family that requires no effort to get that wealth passed on, and you show no enthusiasm, you are destined to live a comfortable if unremarkable life. I believe remarkable people create their own paths with a large helping of support from the circumstances in which they find themselves. The truly remarkable people do it in spite of their circumstances.

While I agree that the people around you, the environment and time you are alive play a large role, I don't think that is an excuse to not take accountability. There are few things in life we can't change with enough desire, passion and determination.

Yes, for the passive... I believe in Destiny. But, I don't plan on being passive.

Finding Your Passion

I have spoken about Ken Robison often. His TED talk remains my favourite.

I have just finished reading 'The Element' in which he furthers his discussion of the need to explore the creative energies that we have and to find that thing that puts us in our element.

He tells the stories of various people who have been 'lucky' enough to find their passion. Whether this becomes your job, or is something that just gets you up in the morning as an aside to your job, I think exploring the things you are passionate about is the best way to find happiness.

There are lots of barriers. Sometimes, people don't get exposed to enough things to find something they are passionate enough. Sometimes social convention, familial links or cultural barriers prevent people for exploring their passions. Sometimes people blame it on age, saying they are too old.

I have had three close female family members go back to university to do their masters in psychology. All of them are around the age of 50. They are all at the start of their new careers with a wealth of experience from their previous careers. They are inspirational ladies who show you that you can get rid of barriers and find your element.

Maybe the barrier is just inertia, maybe you just need to train your inner elephant. I think though, that when it is something you love and you get the ball rolling, that inertia will be short lived.

Read Robinson's book. Its awesome.

What makes genius?

Malcolm Gladwell in this lecture looks at two different kinds of genius.

The two he chooses are the decipherer of an ancient text and the man who sold Fermat's last theorem. The one he sees as a genius, the other he sees as a guy who is really smart, but not a genius, but also really stuborn.

Gladwell believes we need to focus more on creating smart people who are stubborn, and less on individual genius.

The world is becoming more collaborative. We don't need to solve problems by ourselves, we can solve them together. But the skill that is needed is the ability to focus on an idea. He calls it stubborness.

He talks about true mastery requiring `10,000 hours'. To truly understand something and for the lightbulb to go off... it requires brute force of passion and commitment.

This is counter to the way we have been taught what genius is. We are taught that it is a luck of the draw, wow I wish I was that clever kind of thing.

There are very few geniuses who have spent less than 10,000 hours plying and obsessing on their trade. Lance Armstrong, Rodger Federer, Tiger Woods, Albert Eistein etc. weren't just lucky... they worked harder than anyone else. Talent plays a part, but passion, focus and stubborness make the difference.

Interesting ideas. Watch it.

The Art of Possibility

After listening to Benjamin Zander's TED talk, and hearing about his book, I was given Exclusive Books vouchers as a parting gift from my colleagues in Cape Town.

The 4 books I got were The Zander's `The Art of Possibility', `Fooled by Randomness', `The Google Story', and `Gary Kasparov's Why Life is like Chess'. I read the first one today, inspired by the TED talk.

The theme of the talk is much the same as of the book and it is very inspirational. I was always a cynic. Well, that is not completely true, if you read my ridiculously optimistic and bright eyed Std. 6 creative writing. It is more true that I always regarded with suspicion `motivational' speakers. Maybe more so after growing more disillusioned with religion. I am realising that there is actually a lot of value in these `approaches to life', that offer no superstition or ritual, but simple processes with which to deal with whatever life throws at you, and throw back!

One of the things they speak about is having pre-programmed ways of dealing with situations you know you are likely to face. The example they give is of falling out of a boat while white water rafting. Repeating phrases `toes to nose', and `look for the boat, grab an oar'. People think they can swim and ignore these, but when being thrown around in the water not knowing up from down, phrases like these can save your life.

I have heard a similar thing about practicing dialing `911'. Apparently in panic mode, you may forget what to do... practicing dialing emergency numbers may save your life.

I have spoken before about how much I learned about myself by playing poker. Poker is a long term game. If you allow yourself to get upset about individual hands, or even games, you are going to get upset a lot. When you look down at the cards you are dealt and see `AA', you think... I have to win, this is MY hand. I have waited more than 200 hands to see these cards. Then you lose... and often with overplayed `AA' you lose big cause you just can't let go.

Knowing how you react to situations in advance, like getting that `AA', and deciding in advance how to act or rather when to let go can make all the difference.

1. Realising when you are `seeing red' and being illogical because you are angry.
2. Knowing you are about to say something you will regret.
3. Becoming Anxious.
4. losing sight of the bigger picture, taking yourself or something too seriously.

These are all things we do, and know we do. Wouldn't it be great if you were able to catch yourself in the act, and stop yourself before you do it!

Reckon that comes with practice.

Anyway, read the book... only 200 pages and in my view pretty insightful. Like everything there will be bits you use and bits you don't.