🫳 Letting go

Rewind 15 years and you wouldn’t recognize the person writing this today. Life for me; like most teenagers, was filled with angst, narcissism, and blissfully unaware of what lay ahead. My favorite books growing up were Rich Dad Poor Dad, 4-Hour Workweek, and The Abs Diet. I wanted the ability to give myself the life I’ve always dreamed of and I spent my first 5 years realizing that I couldn’t do it on my own.

Today I’m a much happier person, all due to my friends, colleagues, and mentors that have helped me become a better person over the years. You see, I learned that on my own I was fast but I never went far. When I realized that life was less about moving fast on my own and more about going far with others my results went up significantly.

✍️ Quote of the week:

“Nothing in nature blooms all year long.”

🎶 Song of the week:

Looking for Love by Nick Martin

📖 What I’m reading:

The Courage to be Disliked by Fumitake Koga

🧠 Top 3 learnings:

👴 Dr. Phil - I was listening to Dr. Phil talk about his show and all the crazy characters he’s had on it. He went on to explain that a large majority of people on his show don’t go on to better themselves. In fact, they put themselves into worse situations after the fact. But it’s what he said next that made me rethink how great of a person Dr. Phil is. He said it’s not about the people on the show that get the help they need. It’s more about the viewers watching the show and reflecting on their own situation. When you see a drug addict on the show talk about how bad his life got and how it impacts those around him it creates a bond with the viewers. If you’re not a drug addict, you tend to look at it as relief, thinking “man, at least my life isn’t that bad”. If you are a drug addict, then you watch with anxiety, as it hits close to your own life.

Dr. Phil gets lots of calls and emails about how an episode that someone watched changed their life. That they saw someone in a similar situation to them and reversed it to “not be like that guy on TV”. It's really easy to see these types of reality talk shows as trash TV but I found it interesting how some people see them as entertainment and some see them as truth in themselves.

🫳 Let go or be dragged - This saying helped me be a better person. I tend to overthink a lot. Thoughts like “do you think they noticed I made that mistake”, “am I talking too loud”, and “will that person take what I’m saying the wrong way”. My life is filled with these thoughts 24/7. But something I learned is that these thoughts don’t help me or improve my life in any way. I often say to myself “if I’ve planned the best I can, and did my honest best, then what will worrying about it improve?” So said simply, let go of what you can't control or be dragged by the unknown. Just know that there are millions of unknowns out there and it's exhausting thinking of every single one.

Two-tone approach - Two people can hear the exact same song but hear things entirely different from one another. One person might hear the drums and bass lines, and another might focus on the lyrics. The same can be done about problems. Something I learned a long time ago was that everybody solves problems differently. This isn’t to say that one person is doing it the wrong way. The result may be the same but the paths to get there can be vastly different. One may be shorter or both might take the exact amount of time with the same level of effort. The thing I find interesting is understanding how others view the world because it opens you up to understand a different view of problem-solving.

🖍 Designer thoughts:

You need to detach your design from yourself. So if the designer fails the design doesn’t fall with you, and vice versa.

Designers and artists fail all the time but it’s because they can detach those failures from their identity can they really examine how they’ve failed.

You see people who link failure to their identity don’t go far because they’ve made it about who they are. But when you view failure as an external situation rather than internal you can start to dissect how and why you’ve failed. Making it much more informative so that you can influence that skill for next time.

👴 Dad thoughts

My daughter really looks up to me and it’s so odd. When she gets scared she’ll ask me to hold her, when she has trouble building her lego tower she asks me for help. Like I’m the adult now. Up until a few years ago, I use to look for other adults to ask for help. Now I’m the one people turn to when they ask for help. Nothing really profound about it. It’s true what they say. Every year after age 19 doesn’t really feel like I’m older than 19. I now get broader ideas, I have strong growth in my career, and I even own a house, but for some reason, in my head, I’m still that same 19-year-old kid trying to figure everything out. I get my 19-year-old self ready in the morning, I answer a few emails, I look at my 19-year-old self in the mirror and I don’t see a 19-year-old me staring back. Time is a bitch.

Have a great week!

📬 PS: Please do reply to this email if you have anything to add / or any questions. I quite enjoy replying to comments/emails as a source of procrastination from revision.

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