"When we open our mouths to describe what we see, we in effect describe ourselves, our perceptions, our paradigms[...] Where we stand depends on where we sit."
- Stephen R. Covey
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Recently I've been asked if I could write an advice column for those of my demographic in similar contexts. I'm not sure I've really figured it out myself.
In line with my personal guiding 2022 Theme "Year of Novelty" and Mission "Return Better Than You Left", I have been exploring and expanding my domains of social interaction, community volunteering, life fulfillment, and continuous journaling.
However, I suddenly realise that I'm not sure if these developments are better— or merely just different, especially since these are externally-centred and hence may be unsustainable sources of meaning.
Even in psychologically safe environments, there may be psychologically unsafe moments. It would benefit us to shift our mental model from the dependence on external validation as "Am I doing okay?" to the quiet confidence that 'I Am doing okay", in the knowledge that we are working in the right direction. But of course, there are also just psychologically unsafe workplaces in general as well.
Of emotional well-being, "numbness is not feeling nothing— it's feeling everything, and never really having learnt to manage it all". I begin to realise that I might not actually have learnt how to cope with overwhelming situations, as much as I have removed myself from them, or tided over the phase as a function of passing time. Changing your environment is an important strategy— but it is a privilege that not everyone may have, a situation which I had also surprisingly often found myself to be in.
How does one go from leaving to living (again?)?
I conclude that it is imperative to develop a personal model of decision-making and energy management that is independent of the external environment, to shift the balance of power from emotional reaction to unsavoury characters and unbearable situations, to that of proactive action driven by an unshakeable personal consistency.
Thus, I begin to explore the concept of principles-based living.
The following is a collection of my first five (modified) journal entries on the matter, for your perusal and personal consideration.
Always open to hearing your thoughts.
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I
Source: https://www.instagram.com/p/Cln-GwMNwEW
Preamble
The adamkhoos and success planner gurus of today, wax lyrical about starting with the end in mind. This concept may now have been so popularised as to lose its initial nuance.
In reading source material The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, when Covey invites you to start with the end in mind, he means to picture your funeral.
Who will you want to be in attendance? What will you want them to have said of you? How do you want your life to be remembered? Write your eulogy, then you can start to identify what really matters to you, who or what distractions you can disregard, and what principles can guide you in becoming who you want to be.
Principle I
I've been learning and practicing active gratitude and active listening without judgement, but really— and I recognise that it's a privilege to be in such a position to listen, I don't know the first thing to say in response to something vulnerable that someone may share with me.
Recently on independent occasions, I've had colleagues and acquaintances who may hint at their troubles, and I am shook to realise that I remain professionally helpless to respond.
Now I know that holding space by being physically, emotionally, and mentally present with someone in that silence, is also as important too, but that doesn't remove from the fact that I currently remain highly unequipped to manage it.
For someone who claims to value and write about psychological safety, I really don't know the first thing about building psychological safety and psychologically safe spaces. For now I can only hope that if anything, my work speaks for itself on the brand of my character and thought, that if anyone may seek to speak in confidence, they may do so with confidence.
Previously, I wrote about the imperative of principles-based living. In this new written series Principles, I aim to attempt to identify, develop, contest, consider, and codify my priorities, practices, and principles that comprise consistent decision-making, congruent with what's important to me.
Create a culture of psychological safety.
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II
Preamble
DON'T think about a baby penguin.
🐧
Now, all you want to think about is baby penguins. You need to focus on picturing something else— like an Arctic fox, in order to overpower the strength of the curious aquatic bird.
To me, this exercise demonstrates the ineffectiveness of negative exhortations that are so common in self-improvement parlance. It is important to know what NOT to do, but it may be more important to identify what to do instead in its place, and if that is a realistic substitute.
Oftentimes, the temperamental tyrants who speak of the fallibility of human emotion, forget that their anger is an emotion too.
Principle II
I grew up observing anger as an effective tool in getting what you want. This is often coupled with negative reinforcement, punishment, or manipulative displays of disappointment. Especially due to its prevalence, this was one of the "fundamental truths" that I did not think to question.
In many workplaces, anger continues to be used in power play, and we tiptoe around temperamental tyrants.
Recently, I have found myself developing a hyperawareness of when people are angry. Figurative alarm bells go off in my mind as I rush to mentally neutralise the psychological threat.
I'm now convinced that anger is the most unprofessional display, second to unprofessional behaviours. There is no place for anger in the workplace, and similarly in interpersonal relationships.
The failure of realising this before has led to the numerous undoing of personal ties. Therefore, this is important to me.
Currently, I understand that I am not intelligent enough, nor strong enough, to even try to fight my emotions. As an aesthete, I suspect that I may even require them to write well and think better. I am just intelligent enough to understand and to accept the fact that I am rather emotional. The difference between me and those that I ridicule is that I try to be aware of it.
In Principles III, we will discuss what to replace the unproductive and sudden manifestations of anger with.
I may be incapable of being "slow to anger", and I cannot control the anger of others. I can only listen— while shaken by emotion, but not with the coward’s imploration and complaints.
Act not out of anger.
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III
Preamble
Anything is possible. But not everything is possible at this point in time. The things that are immediately possible now, are your Adjacent Possibilities. Acting on them expands your Circle of Influence.
Gratitude is recognising that a worse Alternative Possibility could have been realised, and being grateful that it didn't; And conversely, being grateful for the serendipity that the desirable event of small probability had even occurred.
Excerpt from Primer
Principle III
What we do not know, and what is random, are functionally equivalent.
Therefore, we do not know if things will necessarily be better if things were different, because it takes everything happening for things to have happened this way.
Complaining is common. I have a colleague whose whole identity is complaining. If you don't know anyone like that, then you may be that person yourself. It is a behaviour that arises from a sense of entitlement to better situations. And who are we, to not deserve better situations??
Gratitude and entitlement are two sides of the same coin, in that the latter is also of the same mechanism, but from the converse perspective, that there are always alternative possibilities that are better than the current event. To be entitled is to be fooled by randomness.
Gratitude is thus the recognition of the small probability of large desirable events occurring, that is a privilege and not entitlement, and can be taken away at any time.
However, I suspect that there is a role in society for complaining. It is an effective and necessary means for catching complacency in demanding higher standards, so that things can continually get better. Without the mechanism of complaining, we forgo the advantage of cross-domain feedback that catalyses progress. Thus, we need people to still complain.
This may be a problem because it leads to a paradox wherein we must look to give emotive feedback that requests for improvement, but be mindful not to complain, which may even develop into a free-rider problem if people stop complaining and we rest on our laurels.
I believe that this problem will only be realised in the infinitesimally small fringe possibility wherein everyone in the world stopped complaining, which is highly unlikely since this is not an effortful, and moreover, natural tendency, but rather one that I am advocating to suppress for personal wellbeing. Therefore and thus fortunately, this will not be a functionally practical point of concern. Complain less.
Celebrate serendipity with gratitude.
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IV
Preamble
Clearly risk taking is necessary for large success— but it is also necessary for failure.
Reality is far more vicious than Russian roulette. First, it delivers the fatal bullet rather infrequently, like a revolver that would have hundreds, even thousands, of chambers instead of six. After a few dozen tries, one forgets about the existence of a bullet, under a numbing false sense of security.
Second, unlike a well-defined, precise game like Russian roulette, where the risks are visible to anyone capable of multiplying and dividing by six, one does not observe the barrel of reality.
Excerpts from Fooled By Randomness, by Nassim Nicholas Taleb
Principle IV
This one might be a bit divisive.
A common platitude to the anxious, is that there's nothing really to worry about because "what's the worst that could happen?". I remain unconvinced at this reasoning, because things always can be— or could've been, much worse.
"That wasn't so bad, was it?" also fails to recognise that perhaps the very preventative actions that were taken out of precaution, have precluded instead of produced the projected undesirable outcomes. Who will pay for what does not happen?
The idea of taking into account both the observed and unobserved possible outcomes, is the core of probabilistic thinking.
There are 3 doors. 2 promise material wealth. 1 will put you in crippling debt for the rest of your life. You don't know which is which. Do you play the game?
There are 1,000 doors. 999 promise material wealth. 1 will put you in crippling debt for the rest of your life. Do you play the game now?
I spend a lot of time thinking about this, but don't have a concrete criteria yet for how much risk is too much risk. What about other situations where the risks are less defined, like bungee jumping?
I settle that in principle, it does not matter how frequently something succeeds, if failure is too costly to bear. In both and similar scenarios, the best decision should be to not play the game— unless the maximum possible loss from playing is less than not playing.
It's not about being risk averse, but about being risk aware.
Minimise exposure to the maximum plausible risk.
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V
Preamble
Consider, as well, that you may be blocked in your progress not because you lack opportunity, but because you have been too arrogant to make full use of what already lies in front of you.
Excerpt from An Antidote to Chaos, by Jordan Peterson
Principle V
For any given Advanced Possibility (read: Primer), there are many different pathways that can lead to it. All we have to do, is identify the key prerequisites, what we need to do to attain them, and be open to exploring different paths of possibility that can functionally achieve that.
This is the antithesis of fixation— something which I have been working on overcoming. Therefore, this is important to me.
In celebrating progress over perfection, I seek to remind myself about the seemingly paradoxical pursuit of self-development, where you're already best at being you, but you can always be better.
Very often, this pursuit of the best leads me straight into a paywall. Recently, solely from its promotion on LinkedIn— and in line with my exploration on building psychological safety, I was interested in attending the Singapore National Counselling & Psychotherapy Conference 2022. However, it was only clicking through to registration did I realise that this was a $700 event.
If it were sponsored or unticketed, I would attend. Otherwise, I realise that this was an unnecessary want. There are many other resources that I haven't yet maximised.
This is not to say that all ticketed events are unworthy of their asking price. I'm sure for working professionals, NCPC22 is an important event. Price is what you pay, value is what you get. Sometimes, it's worth investing in or spending on quality resources. CalmCon, which I attended, was a ticketed event. And you don't have to pay for Coursera if you don't need the accreditation.
Instead, consider where at no and no one else's expense, what is already within your circle of influence and bounds of access, to make full use of the currently available resources in new, creative ways, that are targeted to the advanced possibilities that you seek to realise.
Leverage first the currently available avenues.
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