SomethingVentured

I was asked to write a guest piece for Spark this week and reposted here. As we all work to manage through the changing cycle, I keep hearing from friends, entrepreneurs, and clients that they are struggling with their identities, their purpose/focus, and feeling like they are enough and doing enough. The answer is learning to get Small to do Big Things.

We are in a world that celebrates BIG…big wins, big personalities, big challenges, big backgrounds & personal stories, big bank accounts. It caters to the needs of ego, which is constantly hungry for recognition and to silence that voice inside that we all have: “You are not enough; you do not have enough.” This is called the Hedonic treadmill…” I will happen when…”. I’ll be happy when I get the promotion, the new car, the new relationship, the new dress, the new body, and so on. However, as we all know, we enjoy the “new” briefly and then back to dissatisfaction. I’m not going to write about the evils of big or wealth or ambition (I’m a fan of all) but rather about the importance and role of SMALL.

“Because he is content with himself,
he doesn’t need others’ approval.
Because he accepts himself,
the whole world accepts him.”
– Lao-tzu, Tao te Ching

Paradoxically, the more we focus on the BIG, the more likely we will fail to achieve or even start the Big Things. We make them so complex and even so daunting that it becomes difficult to find the motivation or drive to start (overwhelm, imposter, etc). Conversely, sometimes we have success and let it go to our heads. Our ego gets BIG, thereby reducing our future success (arrogance, overconfidence, etc). Or, we find ourselves in a situation where we want to make ourselves appear BIG. This could be in a social setting, with friends, a work environment, or a date. We want others to know that we are enough (success, status, education, wealth, etc), and we peacock about these…sometimes moderately, sometimes excessively so. If only they knew how amazing & accomplished I am, they would approve, accept, love, or befriend me.

At our core, we all seek approval from and connection to others. This goes back to our early days seeking approval to fit into our family of origin. Do Not Get Kicked Out of the Tribe. One of the key drivers of discontent and depression is a feeling that we are not enough or don’t have enough. “Enough” is a subjective concept where we often move the goalposts further and further out…“I’ll be happy when”. Add the “Imposter syndrome” and FOMO and this losing game of comparative living leads to despondence. We find ourselves stuck, unable to fully enjoy our good fortunes, connect with others, or make forward progress.

At the heart of all of this is EGO. Ego is never satisfied and always vigilant. Ego plays an important role in our drive, perseverance, etc. However, you need to master it. Unchecked, like Icarus flying too close to the sun, we fall. Also, to not fail or look bad, ego triggers fears and warnings that keep us from moving forward. Again, we find ourselves “stuck”, held prisoner by our own nervous system.

My coach, Phil Stutz, says that we need to Get Small to do Big Things. Using HIPA (see below) combined with making continual Forward Progress through Micro-transactions leads to both happiness and success.

Having read hundreds of books on wisdom, philosophy and self-help, my living life hypothesis is that the magical way to be both successful and content is to architect our lives and personal philosophies to move towards Flow state (the “Zone of Optimal Functioning”). Most of you have likely heard of Csikszentmihályi, who became intrigued by elite artists who would get so lost in their work that they even disregarded their need for food, water, and sleep. You lose sense of time and, more importantly, the hard edges between you, others & your task all begin to dissolve. Your focus is so intense that self-doubt and inhibitions fade away. You’re not worried about failing or what others might think. You’re just completely absorbed in the task. Martin Seligman, who co-founded the Positive Psychology movement with him, calls it Flourishing.

Ego likes certainty and drives anxiety when we don’t have it. However, one of the universal life truths is that the future will always be opaque. As Steve Jobs said:

“You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backward. So, you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something – your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.” – Steve Jobs

Instead of demanding clarity around the path to the Big Thing, you have to focus on micro-transactions. One way to get “unstuck” is to take small, continual actions toward your goal. Instead of pondering how all the pieces of a new firm will come together, just get up in the morning and get the URL on GoDaddy. Then hire a web developer and then… Each of these micro-transactions moves you forward and gives you clarity and feedback to guide your next step or move. You move your forward motion a touch to the left or to the right. You feed your intuition while also letting everyone around you know your intentions and direction so they can help. Also, these steps are so modest that they bypass triggering fear and the inevitable Self-sabotaging that follows. Yes, you need to do intentional work like doing a strategic assessment of the market space (but even this, break into pieces). You have to have an informed opinion and core hypothesis on why this direction and why it will work.

Speed is a Force. If you want or need to do something, take action quickly. One way to make steady progress is to do one micro-transaction after another. The longer from idea to execution, the greater the chance you will lose momentum or get distracted. Consistent Forward progress. Try small experiments throughout the day. If you realize you need to do something, especially something that you likely will put off, see how quickly you can start it (like minutes). Note in a journal every time you do this. Soon, your identity begins to form in your mind that you are an action-biased (vs analysis paralysis) kind of person.

How do you keep your ego in check while you progress forward (or have setbacks)? Peacocking or talking up your accomplishments, not acknowledging others’ contributions, or any of the other dysfunctional manifestations of ego will achieve the opposite of your desired goal. Instead of connecting with others or gaining approval, you will push people away. Instead of learning from others and helping them feel seen, heard & valued, pontificating or talking at people kills curiosity, connection, and learning. You can never fill the hole of “being enough” this way.

Phil encourages us to focus on HIPA:

Humility: You need to disassociate from all of your successes and identities and refocus on your goals, on connecting to others, and on leaning into your growth edges. Focus on the end game and how you can be of service to others. When you Peacock, you push others away while defocusing on your task at hand. Can you sit with others as equals from a place of humility?
Ignorance: having a “beginner’s mind”, coming from a place of curiosity and humility, is essential for success and future progress and growth. It is hard for anyone to learn if they feel they already know everything. You have two ears and one mouth. You will learn nothing new if you pontificate…ask questions. Can you engage with others through questions from a place of ignorance (“I don’t know, what do you think?”), in which you are curious to learn the wisdom, experiences and perspectives of others?
Poverty: no matter how successful your past days have been, when you get up in the morning, o’clock goes back to zero. Success and growth are driven by constant effort that results in small improvement compounding over time. There is no better way to lose the gains and momentum from previous days than to get up in the morning and not apply yourself because of how impressive your past achievements or days have been. Can you reset your focus, motivation and drive each morning?
Anonymity: If you want connection and acceptance with another person, let them feel heard and seen. It is the most basic of human desires. Can you become so curious about others that you can hold an entire conversation in which they learn nearly nothing about you? Can you create a container with the other person that is focused solely on their feeling seen and heard?

So, these are just a couple of simple tools to use in your daily efforts to realize our dreams while also tightening our relationships with others. Remember, ego is a very useful partner in life. However, poorly managed, it handicaps us, fills us with fear and envy (not enough), and traps us inte. Use our current sta these tools as simple ways to get unstuck and start making specific Forward Progress.

I hear this a lot from entrepreneurs and students. “If I lose my fear, do I lose my drive?”. Two things are implicit in this question…1) fear/anxiety is an essential motivator for success and 2) being driven by anxiety & fear (often a default) has an unsustainable & unacceptable cost. This is a false trade-off…success through fear or contentment. They are not mutually exclusive. My core belief, backed by science, is simple: There Are Much More Powerful, Sustainable & Effective Motivators than Fear and Anxiety. There is a growing base of research around Flow and Flourishing (“Yes And” solutions). I’ve often said that the anxious tennis player is no match for Roger Federer when he is in Flow. He doesn’t even know his opponent exists.

This is not a roses and puppy dog kind of existence either. Only through grit and hard work can we succeed. The question is whether we are motivated by running away from something (not enough, seeking approval, reputation loss, etc) versus moving towards something that matters, has purpose and/or is in service to others. I think Viktor Frankl said it best:

“What man actually needs is not a tensionless state but rather the striving and struggling for some goal worthy of him. What he needs is not the discharge of tension at any cost, but the call of a potential meaning waiting to be fulfilled by him.” — Viktor Frankl

This calling doesn’t need to be solving world hunger but could be something as simple as building the best culture and company focused on a given SaaS platform or AI or e-commerce. There is what you do but equally important is how you do it (think Tony Hsieh at Zappos) and what values you instill in your firm or life. Anyone can do this…I remember talking with the janitor of 30 years at my son’s school. He said he got up every morning with a smile because he knew his cleaning would help teachers & students take pride in their school. Furthermore, he went out of his way to connect with young kids, especially those who seemed to be having a tough day, to bring some kindness into their world.

Our default setting is to “grind it out” so we’ll finally attain contentment with our next achievement. We are told that only the paranoid survive (Andy Grove, Intel) and the anxiously obsessed will eat our counter-parts for lunch. We have day to day responsibilities like winning accounts, getting product out or managing teams and “grinding it out” works perfectly fine. We ignore the brain science, organizational research or piles of burnout students/execs that contradict this. We fear that we will become roadkill and our resulting behavior drains us.

Jim Dethmer, co-founder and one of the top CEO coaches at CLG, borrowing on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, says that we have five layers of motivators. At the base is ego-centric, fear & scarcity driven motivators and at the top are selfless, trust & “enough” motivators. Don’t be naïve…there is a place in life/company for all five. Great leaders know when to use them.

Level 1: Fear, guilt and shame
Level 2: Extrinsic Reward (kill it for recognition/freedom, beast has to be fed)
Level 3: Intrinsic Reward (purpose, meaning, value, matters)
Level 4: Play, Curiosity & Learning (when work becomes play & you are curious…you can’t get enough of it…the drive for Mastery)
Level 5: Love (selfless, done purely for love…helping those in need, raising your kids, not asking “what’s in it for me”)

So, what is anxiety (and fear)? Simply defined, we succumb to anxiety when we cling to the outcome of something that we don’t have control over. I wrote about this in my blog post on Choice Is All You Can Control In Life. Ego is the architect and creates stories around facts…we aren’t enough, that horrible things will happen if we don’t achieve XYZ , that people will we will be judged, etc.

We jump from fire drill to fire drill and fail to enjoy the present moment. Late last year, I had a week where I got up each day anxious, raced from meeting to meeting, focused on my personal agenda, obsessed on couple of perceived insults, slept poorly, ate crappy food and failed to spend time with family or friends. I was drained and miserable. I thought to myself how easy it is to get into this rhythm and soon realize that months, even years, had gone by. This life is a gift. How do we want to spend it? Memento Mori…only today is guaranteed. So, I’ve become very conscious about this, asking myself each night the following question below.

“If I approached all of my remaining days like I approached today, what would my 80-year-old self say to me?”
(Were we present today, connected with those around us, mastered something new and lived a good life or did we go from dumpster fire to fire on autopilot?)

So, what exactly is going on here? We rarely have true, life threatening situations where adrenaline laced fear is critical for our survival. Scientifically, this is a battle between our three “brains”. There is an ancient coping relic, buried in our reptilian brain which triggers our Limbic system and shuts down our Rational Brain/Cortex. So, our ego creates anxiety (not us) which comes from our Reptilian, autonomic core and reduces our ability to think rationally or have higher-level thoughts.

Does this make us perform better? No. In the short run, it may focus our attention but it actually shuts down our pre-frontal cortex. In this state, we literally can’t do higher level thinking, creative/orthogonal thinking or be emotionally intelligent/connected. Ask any entrepreneur (or student) and they will tell you that they are stressed “out of their minds” because we keep hitting the Nitrous injector like a Fast & Furious movie. The father of Positive Psychology, Martin Seligman, wrote about the permanent building blocks for a life of profound fulfillment (Positive Emotion, Engagement, Relationships, Meaning, and Accomplishment—PERMA) in his book Flourish:

“I now think that the topic of positive psychology is well-being [PERMA], that the gold standard for measuring well-being is flourishing…Even scarier, measures of ill-being have not declined as gross domestic product has increased [twelve-fold]; they have gotten much worse. Depression rates have increased tenfold over the last fifty years in the United States. This is true of every wealthy nation, and, importantly, it is not of poor nations.”

I can keep running up the score here but I think you get the point. I don’t need to go into additional gory details about how dysfunctional & ineffective the Fear driven model is (scientific research, interviews with older, successful entrepreneurs, top life coaches, Buddhist philosophers, stoic philosophers, health experts, etc). You will more likely find someone supporting the benefits of smoking than to find a knowledgeable person advocating “the Grind” approach. And yet, our autonomic Fight or Flight system triggers again & again.

By the way, when you go down the rabbit hole, you bring your colleagues down it with you. Not only are you consciously or unconsciously instilling a misguided behavioral norm, but you are also literally impacting their neurology. Fear and Optimism are equally contagious (think market crashes and irrational exuberance). We have “Mirror Neurons” in our brains that track the emotional flow, movement and even intentions of the person we are with. This is a key part of developing empathy to learning skills from each other to forming relationships. Our neurons (brain cells) synchronize. Like the Coronavirus, you are contagious.

The focus of this post is not to layout a playbook for Flourishing but rather to dispel the value of the alternative approach to life. I’ll continue to write about the various elements of the playbook (mindfulness, curiosity, internal not external measurements, empathy, service, clarity on values, discipline/mastery, motivation strategies, power of relationships, etc). I wish I could provide the answer but each of us carries our own unique answer within ourselves. We won’t ever eliminate fear or anxiety. It is part of our DNA. However, we can approach life courageously. Courage is not having a lack of fear but rather stepping into or through fear in pursuit of a greater cause. Make today a Courageous one!

The Importance of Getting Small

If I Lose My Fear, Do I Lose My Drive?

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