This is the Too Many Trees newsletter, where I share what I’ve been writing and reading in the realm of leadership and personal development. My coaching practice is centered around the idea that we are more effective in moving towards our goals when we become more conscious and intentional in focusing our time and attention, and learn how our unconscious patterns are holding us back. If you know somebody that could benefit from my perspective, please forward this to them or let them know they can set up a free intro chat with me.
After I shared some things I was thankful for in my last newsletter, a friend told me that my newsletter made him feel ineffective as I was doing so much despite having two little kids, and he felt he “should” be doing more since he is single. But that’s partially because I fell prey to the Instagram phenomenon of painting my life in the best possible light.
For one thing, I didn’t share that my wife and toddler were traveling in the two weeks covered by my last newsletter. That meant that after I put the baby to sleep at 7:30 each night, I had three hours to myself, which enabled the brief burst of productivity of writing two blog posts, as well as reading for my leadership class.
I am also self-employed so I have the flexibility to use my working hours to exercise, to take classes, and to spend time with friends, under the theory that taking care of myself is investing in my capabilities as a coach. I also write during work hours as posting on LinkedIn and my blog is my primary form of marketing. My friend is working long hours every day for a demanding startup, so of course he doesn’t have time to do all of those things!
If I were still working at Google, I wouldn’t be able to do any of these things either. This is another way in which a practice of gratitude focuses on what one has, rather than on what one doesn’t. The less positive version of my life would note that Google’s stock price has more than doubled since I left so I gave up a ton of stock upside by leaving, especially since I was on track to be promoted to director. Plus my former VP is now running all of Google Ads, so I would have been helping to run a 20,000 person org. By leaving Google, I chose to optimize for autonomy over compensation or scope or prestige, so my gratitude practice focused on what that autonomy enables.
When you see somebody online that makes you feel jealous or wish your life were different, look at what they’re not doing or what they don’t have. They are naturally drawing attention to the highlights of their life, so it’s up to you to critically assess what they are giving up to enable those highlights. For instance, somebody who has an amazing skill has often sacrificed the rest of their life to spend hours each day practicing that skill - would you make that trade? If so, you can start to change where you spend your time to practice more. If not, take a moment to appreciate what you have that they don’t: perhaps your friends, hobbies, or just a sense of contentment.
This tendency to focus on what we don’t have makes evolutionary sense: humans that grew too satisfied or content were outcompeted by the perpetual strivers. That’s why I try to retrain my brain to focus on what I have and to consciously make choices to reflect my values and priorities. These are unnatural for humans and require deliberate practice, but they help me live my life in the way in which I now intend.
Full disclosure: I still regularly struggle against the urge to beat myself up for not doing everything I “should” be doing, like:
Writing more: I’m making no progress on that book.
Exercising more: I built a habit in January of doing strength exercises like kettlebell swings or pushups for 10 minutes a day, and that evaporated.
Reading more: Despite considering it part of my job to learn, I struggle to read more than a few pages a day of non-fiction books.
Meditating more: I am still not meditating most days, despite all the benefits it brings both to me and to those around me in helping me be less reactive.
Socializing more with my friends
Doing more to fight for social justice and take on the struggle as my own
Playing more with my kids each day in the hours before and after day care
Writing out that list makes it clear how my inner critic has ludicrous expectations of me, especially because those “shoulds” are all framed in terms of “more”: there is no “enough”. For each of those list items, I am doing something most days, and I try to remind myself something is better than nothing because I don’t think I can take on any more given my current capacity. But my inner critic only looks at what I’m not doing, and beats me up for not doing more, and I would be perpetually unhappy if I didn’t consciously change that focus.
That was my intention in sharing the gratitude practice last time, but I hope that this provides a more complete picture of my thinking. Was this helpful?
And now for the normal personal development content:
LinkedIn: These are ideas that have helped my clients (or myself), and that I share via LinkedIn to help a wider audience.
After my last newsletter on practicing gratitude, I received an email question from a reader I don't know that read: "How does one practice gratitude when there is so little to nothing to be grateful for?" I shared my response that I think of practicing gratitude as appreciating what we have instead of focusing on what we don't have.
How do you describe what you do for work? In helping a client prepare for an interview, I encouraged them to treat it like an investor pitch, and answer three questions: Who can I most help? What problem will I solve that is so valuable they will pay me to solve it? How will I address that problem in a unique and differentiated way?
Find the common ground. When dealing with a teammate who disagrees with us, it’s easy to believe that we are right and they are wrong. But such disagreements often come from differing assumptions or interpretations, so I like trying to search for common ground, particularly around goals, to start the conversation. Then you can step forward, and see where your stories diverge.
Say what you want to happen. Once you declare a desired future, you can start to identify the ways in which your own actions are blocking you from that future, and start changing those behaviors. Also, articulating what you want allows you to share that vision with others who can help you move towards that future.
Articles and resources I’ve found interesting on the theme of burnout and rest:
The Necessity and Challenge of Being ‘Onto Ourselves’ by Joy Reichart of New Ventures West, where I trained. She describes the value of “becoming aware of ways of being that don’t serve us: all the ways we defend ourselves, protect our feelings, avoid being affected.” In a complex and fast-changing world, it’s tempting to turn towards “the habits that we built over a lifetime in order to protect ourselves, to survive”. But those habits often lead us to burnout, because they were helpful in a different world and are no longer adaptive.
I Overstressed My Body Until It Shut Me Down, by Brianna Sacks. “In life, I subscribe to a “do at all costs'' mentality. I seem to have been born with one speed: go. And I live for the hustle because, while a lot of it is my personality, society often defines success as how much you can do and how well you can do it. “ After her burnout and shutdown, “I am learning that it takes strength to be still, to admit you cannot do everything all at once, and love yourself enough to heal from what your body has been through.”
The 7 types of rest that every person needs, by Saundra Dalton-Smith. I loved this article describing how humans need more than the physical rest of sleep. She adds on mental rest, sensory rest, creative rest, emotional rest, social rest, and spiritual rest. This resonated with me as there are times I’ve stayed up late and gotten less sleep, but felt better because I recharged mentally and creatively.
Thanks for reading! See you in a couple weeks.