Reflection Title: 10 Truths Toward Finding Meaningful Work and Meaningful Relationships!
Book – Nine Lies About Work: A Freethinking Leader’s Guide to the Real World by Marcus Buckingham and Ashley Goodall (Part 2 of 2)
Book Description:
Forget what you know about the world of work - You crave feedback. Your organization's culture is the key to its success. Strategic planning is essential. Your competencies should be measured and your weaknesses shored up. Leadership is a thing.
These may sound like basic truths of our work lives today. But actually, they're lies. As strengths guru and bestselling author Marcus Buckingham and Cisco Leadership and Team Intelligence head Ashley Goodall show in this provocative, inspiring book, there are some big lies--distortions, faulty assumptions, wrong thinking--that we encounter every time we show up for work. Nine lies, to be exact. They cause dysfunction and frustration, ultimately resulting in workplaces that are a pale shadow of what they could be.
But there are those who can get past the lies and discover what's real. These freethinking leaders recognize the power and beauty of our individual uniqueness. They know that emergent patterns are more valuable than received wisdom and that evidence is more powerful than dogma.
Reflection:
There are so many thoughts that this book either helped spark anew or relight the flame from learnings past. I could write a 10-part reflection if I wanted, but I won’t bore you all.
Instead, I will try and summarize what I’ll affectionately call Chris’ 10 Truths on a Path to Meaningful Work and Meaningful Relationships, some inspired by this book and others by this journey overall!
1. Learn and Share – Make learning a daily habit. Explore all that this world has to offer, and then don’t forget to share it with others along the way when you find something interesting.
2. The Team is Everything – You can’t do it alone; you need a tribe. The meaningful relationships, or lack thereof, forged in the small team you produce your meaningful work together will determine whether or not you stay in that tribe…period. Find Your Tribe!
3. Quantity always tops quality – I’m not saying quality doesn’t matter, it does. I am saying that quality only comes by doing more and more and more of the things you love. Volume is the key, and the quality is a natural by-product of doing something over and over and over again. As Seth Godin would say, “Ship It”.
4. Goals are stupid – Goals are just random numbers and images in your mind. They bring you no joy or happiness in the moment and most likely will only bring you maybe a day’s worth of happiness if ever achieved. Goals are so overrated. Instead of cascading goals to yourself or your tribe, cascade meaning and purpose. Meaning and Purpose are self-generating and provide happiness in the here and now as well as the future. Find what matters to yourself and your tribe and make that the focus of your future and present.
5. A Beaver Must Dam – As the book would say, people are Spikey. I like to say, A Beaver Must Dam! You have things you love to do for reasons only you can understand. Do them! We can’t do everything great. The only chance of you doing something sustainable is if it feeds your soul and is what you were born and groomed to do your whole life. Find your activities that you love and dam away. If something is preventing you from doing what you love to do, work on it so you can get back to doing what you naturally love doing.
6. Follow people that understand their Spikeyness – Being a beaver is the easiest thing in the world once you figure it out. Figuring if you are a beaver, or whatever else you are, is the challenge. Sadly, so few of us really figure out what we are spikey at and are uniquely positioned to bring to the world. For those lucky few, they will accrue followers because people love to follow certainty. If you find a beaver in the wild, spend some time and learn from them. Hopefully, you will figure out your own spikes in the process. Once you do, others will start following you. Teach them and pay it forward.
7. We Can Only Reliably Measure Ourselves – Only you know if you are living your values each day. No one will ever be able to measure that from the outside, other than by following your actions. It is through your actions that we can get a glimpse of what values you are projecting into the world, but only you know if that aligns to your inner self or not. Don’t lie to yourself.
8. If it doesn’t bring you energy…stop – Eating the frog isn’t sustainable long term. You can’t leverage will power forever. If the stuff you do each day isn’t a sustainable source of energy that is self-generating, then you need to take a good hard look at why. My advice is to stop immediately.
9. You Don’t Know Anything – Everything I just typed could be spot on, or it could be total crap. Stay curious, keep learning, and remember that you don’t know anything/
10. Endure – If you haven’t found your path, your people, or your purpose…don’t ever stop searching. If you’ve found your path, your people, and your purpose…don’t ever quit until this world decides you have reached your finish line and take
There you have it…10 random rules from someone you don’t know to help you find meaningful work and meaningful relationships in your life.
If you check back with me in 10 years, I’m sure it will be completely different, or maybe not. The only thing I can guarantee is that I won’t stop trying to figure it out.
Question: What are your truths to finding meaningful work and relationships?
Links:
What is The Year of Magical Learning? - An Introduction
YOML Podcast Discussion - Coming Soon
YOML Bookstore - Nine Lies About Work by Marcus Buckingham and Ashley Goodall
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