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.
Thank you to those of you who voted. We have a clear election result with one candidate winning the popular vote by over 5 million votes.
Now the next phase of work begins of trying to convince half of America of that result. 70% of Republicans think the election was not fair or legitimate, in part because the President refuses to acknowledge he lost. Republican leaders are refusing to acknowledge the loss because they need Trump to campaign in Georgia, so they can keep the Senate and continue to obstruct any meaningful government action. This view is being reinforced by a “Stop the Steal” campaign organized by Roger Stone, notorious political operative and self-described “dirty trickster”, who not-so-coincidentally had his criminal sentence commuted by Trump in July.
A Facebook friend shared the perspective of Frank Wilhoit, who says: “Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition. There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect.” I find this a concise and useful framing for understanding the current Republican actions - the law is meant to protect their interests, but not bind their actions, and that is what we see in their refusal to accept the results of the election. Law is used as a tool to reinforce their interests, and when the law goes against their interests, they break the law without thinking anything of it, knowing that they will likely not be punished. And yet, when a black man is killed by the police, if they can find one instance of previous wrong-doing, the same people say the killing is justified, because for the “out-group”, the law is used as a tool of control.
Wilhoit goes on to propose an alternative construction: “The law cannot protect anyone unless it binds everyone; and it cannot bind anyone unless it protects everyone.” This feels like the essence of Black Lives Matter - the law is not meaningfully protecting people’s lives unless it protects everybody’s lives, especially those who are most at risk. The law must apply to everyone, especially those who enforce it, or it becomes a tool to increase the power of the privileged, rather than a way to level the playing field.
But enough of politics for now. Here’s my ongoing content on personal development.
Blog: People occasionally ask me what I’ve learned in my first couple years as a leadership coach. The unspoken question is “What is the secret to being a better leader?” And while there is no secret per se, there is a formula I see consistently among people who have more impact: Clarity plus Focus. Clarity to understand what is important to you and what future you want to build, and Focus to say no to the competing commitments and asks others make of you, so you can put your time towards that desired future.
Workshop: Another way I’m sharing what I’ve learned as a coach is by creating an hour-long workshop on the coaching mindset, sharing ideas from Nancy Kline's book Time to Think, and Michael Bungay Stanier's book The Coaching Habit. The workshop also includes time for participants to practice coaching each other in breakout rooms to apply these ideas. This is a shorter alternative version of the training workshop for the Career Guru peer coaching program at Google. If you'd be interested in taking that workshop (or in me running that workshop for you or your org), please contact me for more info.
LinkedIn: These are ideas or questions that are helping my clients, and that I share via LinkedIn to help a wider audience.
You can make a difference - rather than passively feeling helpless when overwhelmed, take action to break the cycle of overwhelm, which could be self-care, helping others, or creating something.
Habits, not goals - changing a task from delivering a result to taking an action can change one’s mindset. My example was changing from “publish a blog post” to “spend 30 minutes writing”, which feels easier and more attainable.
Actively create, rather than passively consume - the temptation to stay inactive is reinforced by an infinite on-demand content world, yet we feel better if we take action and create instead.
Relax into your authentic self - when you try to show up as an image of how you “should” be, you tense up trying to prevent people from seeing as you are. Yet that tension may be viewed by others as a threat or danger, and cause them to tense up, which then creates more tension for you. If you instead relax into yourself, it allows others to relax.
Why life can’t be simpler from Farnam Street: "Complexity is like energy. It cannot be created or destroyed, only moved somewhere else. …If we accept that complexity is a constant, we need to always be mindful of who is bearing the burden of that complexity."
I appreciate Shane Parrish’s perspective, and recommend his weekly “Brain Food” newsletter for more articles like this.
Lots of Overnight Tragedies, No Overnight Miracles by Morgan Housel: “[a major] setback will always get more attention because of how fast it occurs. So slow progress amid a drumbeat of bad news is the normal state of affairs.” Housel’s recent book The Psychology of Money has several observations like this that help to place events into context to help us consciously focus on long-term growth. Housel publishes a biweekly newsletter that I always enjoy reading.
Roxane Gay reflects on the election: “The United States is not at all united. We live in two countries. In one, people are willing to grapple with racism and bigotry [and] understand this is a country of abundance. … The other United States is committed to defending white supremacy and patriarchy at all costs."
This newsletter continues to be an experiment, and I would love to hear how I could make this more useful for you. Let me know what is working for you, what you want more of or less of, or anything else on your mind at eric at toomanytrees. And 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.
Thanks for reading. See you in a couple weeks.