Your story, the inner voice, character, and the quest to unlock career potential
Graymatter - May 12, 2024
Welcome to Graymatter, a weekly newsletter that shares ideas and strategies for unlocking career potential and business value through data and AI.
Graymatter
“You are the author of your life story. Everybody loves a great story. What is yours?”
“The world’s knowledge is available within seconds. But this by itself is not adequate to help people accelerate growth. Great coaches and teachers curate the information into a curriculum that guides people through a learning process that gives them joy and growth in a safe and trusting environment.”
“Developing a deep sense of purpose that emanates from your values, beliefs, identity, and experiences is the guiding light that shapes your direction.”
“It’s a fact that your life will end someday – that is out of your control. You don’t know when or how it will happen. It’s frightening to think about and easier to avoid by allocating your attention to the demands of a busy work week that pulls you in multiple directions. Turn this around by embracing mortality as the catalyst to engage in the present and prioritize the hundreds of decisions you make each day that make your life intentional.”
- Connect with Your Mortality to Create a Sense of Urgency
Podcasts
Most everyone has heard the inner voice that lives within us. It always has something to say - sometimes motivating- and sometimes the voice of your inner critic puts you down or holds you back.
In the book The Untethered Soul by Michael A. Singer, he calls it your inner roommate. This is one of my favorite nuggets:
“There is nothing more important to true growth than realizing that you are not the voice of the mind - you are the one who hears it.”
This week, I listened to The Knowledge Project podcast interview with Dr. Jim Loehr (No. 1 Performance Psychologist) after seeing this quote that caught my attention:
“Your inner voice creates your destiny.” - Dr. Jim Loehr
I mined numerous nuggets from this podcast, and I encourage you to do the same.
People who had the greatest success had a deep, compelling reason for expending energy and completing the mission they set for themselves.
Allocating time is not enough to reach your potential. You must also invest your energy in it.
“Who you become is the consequence of the chase.”
Rituals vs. habits - a ritual is an intentionally acquired habit that serves the mission.
Creating a story that works for you—reading it, creating a voice memo, talking to yourself, playing it back, listening to yourself coaching you—neural pathways transfer information. The story begins to change. A running narrative builds belief. Craft the perfect story with your handwriting.
People who had the greatest success had a deep compelling reason for expending energy and completing the mission they set for themselves
The Graymatter challenge to you: When was the last time you wrote or edited your life story? While you can’t edit previous chapters, you can write a new chapter to capture your most vivid dreams that shape your destiny.
Books
I have been reading Hidden Potential: The Science of Achieving Greater Things by Adam Grant. While the core theme of the book is unlocking potential, it’s predicated by this central idea:
“Character skills do more than help you perform at your peak - they propel you to higher peaks.”
Grant reinforces that character is a skill that can be learned. Here is one of my yellow highlighted nuggets:
“Character is often confused with personality, but they’re not the same. Personality is your predisposition - your basic instincts for how to think, feel, and act. Character is your capacity to prioritize your values over your instincts.”
“Knowing your principles doesn’t necessarily mean you know how to practice them, particularly under stress and pressure. It’s easy when things are going well. The true test of character is whether you manage to stand by those values when the deck is stacked against you.”
Personality is not your destiny - it’s your tendency. Character skills enable you to transcend that tendency to be true to your principles. It’s not about the traits you have - it’s what you decide to do them with. Wherever you are today, there’s no reason why you can’t grow your character skill starting now.”
The Graymatter challenge to you: What character trait are you most proud of? How would you change your character to unlock your potential?
Inner Quest: Unlocking Career Potential
On June 3rd, I am taking a small cohort of people on a four-week metaphorical trip to a destination many avoid. Most people don’t know how to get there, and you need an experienced guide to go deep into the wilderness. It may get uncomfortable sometimes, another reason most people choose not to go inside and discover who they are and who they must become to unlock their career potential. It also takes work; if it were easy, everyone would be living their best self and knocking it out of the park.
If you seek to strengthen your career direction and capture the ingredients to unlock your potential, I invite you to join the Inner Quest—Unlocking Career Potential cohort course.
Thanks for reading Graymatter and sharing it with your network.
Happy Mother’s Day to all of the wonderful moms out there!
- James