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A conversation with a stranger caused me to notice some things I’ve lost of late. A notebook habit, persistent risk-taking¹, spotting wildflowers in the street. These losses aren’t catastrophic. But they do make me feel somehow less… me.
It’s alarmingly easy to find that bits of yourself have gone astray. Not just good habits², but who you are (or thought you were) solo or together. Does that matter? And if you want it back, where on earth should you look?
What have you shoved out of sight?
Embarrassing admission: when I started Chirp I invisibilised the artist bit of my career.³ I didn’t think anyone would get it, much less value it.⁴ So my artist self stayed out of sight. (I even ditched the edgy fringe.⁵) It took me ages to notice that my niche blend of career was actually the point. And even longer to own it.⁶
It happens in teams, too. In an identity workshop I ran a while ago, a sidebar chat unearthed a stash of hidden gifts – from deep visual literacy to an intricate knowledge of gaming.⁷ Was this stuff core? No. Had dismissing it hampered their success? No. But it had prevented the rest of the team from leveraging a pile of (bonus!) skills, knowledge and experience.
We all shove aspects of ourselves out of sight, for all sorts of reasons.⁸ But what are you truly willing to lose? What might be valuable now even if it wasn’t then? What do you want to find again? This is a timely moment to look: wittingly or not, we are building the future. So get curious:
What have you downplayed?
Which aspects of yourself do you rebuff?
What are you unwilling to lose?
Which unheralded gifts might your team reveal?
Who couldn’t you be before but might be now?⁹
What have you inadvertently mislaid?
Stuff gets lost by accident, too. Another team I worked with had embraced asynchronicity so heartily they’d lost the knack of picking up the phone.¹⁰ They still had team meetings, but their ad hoc “10 minutes to figure out” or “quick take on” had disappeared. And losing those quick, on the fly connections had also slowed them down. But it didn’t require wholesale change. Just noticing what was mislaid, and choosing, judiciously, to put it back.
Sometimes it’s personal. A rueful I used to be… is something I quite often hear from leaders. And on the surface it’s fine – they’re over it. But it niggles because what’s missing feels somehow fundamental to they are.¹¹ Happily, a lot of being is actually doing: I do therefore I am. It needn’t be big, or constant, or superb. Doing is still becoming. So again, get curious:
Who do you miss being?
What did you do that made you be?
What might be its easiest, most appealing iteration?
What are you willing to trade in exchange for doing it?
Who are you without it? And why does that matter?
Audit your lost and found
Many of us have lost things beyond the plain heartbreaking over the last few years. Some we’re deeply aware of; others rest below the surface. But we can choose to audit that lost and found – for ourselves, our teams, even our organisations. So have a good rummage. Notice what’s missing. Where might you find it? Do you still want it? (You might not.¹²) Notice what’s turned up. Is it useful? Is it in the way? Perhaps you’ll find what you were looking for elsewhere. Perhaps it’ll look a bit different. And hey, maybe it was never quite lost in the first place.
See you next time! 👋
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FOOTNOTES
1 More on this next time.
2 BJ Fogg’s behavioural model is interesting on this, and why tiny shuffles might be the path to big strides. Thanks to Do Manifesto for the reminder, and the conversations that inspired this blog. (And that nice Nick Parker for giving me his ticket!)
3 To invisibilise: in common usage but as yet invisibilised in the dictionary, AFAIK (which isn’t).
4 Or… FIND IT ONLINE. 🤦
5 I still didn’t look corporate. Just unfringed.
6 Different times, innit? 🤷♀️ Plus it can take metaphorical balls of steel* to own who you are. In some contexts, just showing up is a radical act.
*I’m not fond of that phrase, but my feminist rendering is NSFW. 🙄 Which is particularly sad because it is also HILARIOUS.
7 Apparently it’s not just Pac-Man. 🤷♀️
8 FWIW, my thoughts on navigating the messiness of bringing your whole self to work.
9 Inspired by Ethan Mollick’s excellent question ‘what impossible thing can you do now’. Looking forward to reading his book – anyone else ordered and keen to discuss?
10 I think it’s an art: knowing when it’s the smart choice, having the confidence to ask, knowing how to use it efficiently.
11 My hunch is that these conversations are happening a bit more now because many of us have just enough distance from the pandemic to reflect on where we’ve landed. Who we were, and are. What we’ve gained, and lost. What we’re trying to find.
12 Like losing a fear of being found out, or sloughing off what isn’t yours – other people’s assumptions, say. Noticing this stuff can help you savour your success, own who you’ve become and choose where you go next: deliberately, and unencumbered.