I’m not a fan of IKEA; I only go when it’s absolutely necessary.
Typically a trip to the blue and yellow monster is the cost for my carelessness with our glasses, plates, and mugs. So the more careful I am, the longer the gap between trips.
The occurred lesson occurred to me today whilst trudging through a jam-packed IKEA: There is a cost to carelessness, and an often unforeseen value to prevention.
If proficiency is a function of talent, principles, and practise, to develop an attention to detail, I invested heavily in the latter two—being detail oriented doesn’t come as second nature to me.
Early in my career, after a few careless mistakes, I learnt to always double check my writing, and triple check my calculations.
It slowed me down at first, but what I gained was a confidence that I could be detail oriented.
More recently I realised a positive side effect of writing this blog is the daily practise of sense checking my thinking and communication. There are benefits to asking myself every day, “Does this make sense? Do I really believe what I’m saying? Is this simple and easy to digest?”
We end up becoming what we practise each day.
The first voice likely says, “Don’t do it. Take the safe road. Do the easy thing.”
The second voice, which closely follows the first, says, “Do it. It’ll be good for you. You’ll grow. You be better for it.”
The voice order rarely changes. Don’t give one voice more of a say just because it spoke first.
No matter how much money you spend on product development, on branding, on consumer taste tests, and on marketing, it all falls a bit flat if you forget to spellcheck.
I saw this Pringles advertisement at my subway stop.
Apparently Pringles got roasted for their mistake on Twitter, and to their credit responded excellently. I saw this poster at the next subway stop.
Maru and I have a rule: that she’ll always correct me when I make a mistake in Spanish. I’ve asked her to point out the mistake, tell me why it was wrong, and help me understand what I should’ve said instead.
It’s a powerful agreement. It’s an expectation that we have of each other: for me to try and improve, and for her to diligently provide thoughtful feedback.
Having an agreement also avoids any tension that comes with unsolicited feedback. Because I’ve asked for it, I have no justification for brushing her feedback aside.
Think of a random date in recent memory, say, the 18th of July 2018.
Can you remember the stresses of that day? The deadlines? The anxiety?
Although we all likely had very real worries at that time, does the fact that we can’t recall them today change things?
Perhaps we should hold today’s concerns with less of a vice grip because time will force our minds to let go and forget them eventually.
What’s the first thing you think about when you wake up in the morning?
What does it tell you about your priorities? Does it reaffirm them? Or does it inspire you to reconsider them?
There’s much we can unpack by questioning ‘the first thing’.
Since getting back into Touch Rugby—a sport that requires sprinting, rapid changes in direction, and a small degree of physical contact—I’ve been adhering to the principle: not above 70%.
Yes, I could run, attack, defend, and play at 100%, but I don’t. I throttle my effort to 70%.
The risk of injury is non-linear. My estimate is a large proportion of injuries happen in the 90-100% zone. So operating at a lower range of intensity significantly reduces this risk.
It’s not about being timid, or playing in a half-hearted way, it’s about staying in the game.
Avoiding injury means I can continue playing for a long time: week after week, year after year. That’s far more important than winning any in-the-moment point.
Principles are few, but methods are many.
Many will try and give us advice based on their methods—the thing that worked for them.
The challenge is picking out the principles amidst the methods, and choosing the ones to bet on, adopt, and adhere to.
I was originally baffled by Amazon Video, Disney+, Hulu, Apple+, and a myriad of other streaming services entering the market.
I thought Netflix had gobbled up most of the pie, and that others would struggle to win customers.
What I didn’t expect was to discover many of my friends have multiple subscriptions—myself included.
Of course, I only have access to a biased and skewed sample, but a quick Google shows that between 50-60% of US households have more than one subscription.
It made me realise that what I once thought was a zero sum game in the streaming industry, is actually a much larger opportunity.
It reminded me of a piece of advice I heard: avoid playing zero sum games—it’s more fun to grow the pie than split it.
A friend recently shared an excellent excerpt from an interview with Eliud Kipchoge—the first person to run a marathon in under 2 hours.
The interviewer asked, “How do you develop self-discipline?”
Kipchoge’s answered, “Rule number one is to get Vitamin N.”
Kipchope paused.
The interview asked, “N is for?”
The straight-faced Kipchoged replied, “It’s to learn to say ‘No’.”
I agree with the principle, but I also love Kipchoge’s delivery. He deliberately caused confusion and built suspense to ensure the resolution was more impactful.
It’s not my style, but I love it when other’s use the tactic well.
I tell myself I’d like an endless summer, but I do like how each of the four seasons mark the passage of time.
In particular, shoulder seasons give us a signal as to how the world is changing around us. They give us clues as to how we need to adapt. And they teach us a lesson if we don’t heed their advice.
Our careers, friendships, relationships, and personal projects also have shoulder seasons—when a warm summer feels like it’s approaching, or that we may soon be trudging through a winter.
Why not take a moment and think about what season may be approaching?
Every so often I like to take a look at my baselines and consider whether or not they need a reset.
When I say baselines, I mean quantifiable expectations we set for our growth and self improvement.
A good example are the targets many of us set on fitness trackers. When I first bought an Apple Watch, I started with the default move target of 500 calories. I have periodically reviewed my daily goal, and increased it slowly over time.
Another is the number of focused minutes of Cantonese and Spanish practise that I complete between my weekly lessons. I often find myself the day before a lesson trying to cram in some reading or vocabulary to make the lesson worthwhile. I realised I was setting my expectations too high, and that some consistent daily practise was better than none.
The goal of resetting baselines isn’t to create a laundry list of tasks we need to complete. That’s exhausting, and the opposite of what I’m getting at.
Resetting baselines is about choosing the few things that matter, setting new and high standards for what we expect of ourselves in those few things, and deliberately dropping the rest.
…when you’re in a foreign city, walking at 50% pace, listening to an album for the first time, and have a willingness to pause at the slightest curiosity.
This post was written whilst walking the streets of Zurich with a couple hours to spare before my flight home.
Give it a try some time!
All you need is one person in the group who can ask great questions to completely change the course of a conversation.
It’s true for work, play, and for meeting new people.
The good part, it’s a skill that can be learned.