We consume a vast amount of information through multiple channels on a daily basis that give us ideas, motivation and support in problem solving.
Access to information is an amazing ability but have you thought about giving back and helping others like yourself too? The humans mind is built to solve problems and face challenges.
Make sure you’re creating too, feed that thirst to build and create something, anything to put out into the world.
Before you go… 👋
If you like my writing and think “Hey, I’d like to hear more of what this guy has to say” then you’re in luck.
You can join me every Tuesday morning for more tools, templates and insights for the modern L&D pro in my weekly newsletter.
Being a storyteller is an important component to expressing your ideas and gaining support.
Develop the skill of building an engaging narrative to bring your audience on a journey and most importantly, identify how to communicate with different audiences.
In developing your communications and engagement plans, you must know the audience you’re speaking with. How do they digest information? Do they respond better to simple language or a bit more detail? Are they visual or prefer a more intimate style?
Success in getting audiences to buy into your ideas is by knowing them, knowing how to engage and tell your story in a way they understand.
I’ve always been really into making sure my body is getting the right food to fuel me for physical and mental performance. I am that guy who will refuse a cookie and take a handful of cashews instead, much to the disappointment of those around me who would like me to partake in the cookie feast and look at me like I’ve just murdered their cat.
You see, providing my body with the right nutritious food, allows me to be at my best — the right input ensures I get optimal output. Plus on top of this, I feel good and look good and when you feel like this, life’s challenges seem a little easier to navigate.
Now most of us spend time making sure our body has the right fuel to perform, but what about the mind? what about the most powerful operating system known in existence, that’s sitting in your head? what are you letting this consume? hopefully it’s not just a 24/7 news station.
Our minds are super powerful and amazing, it’s so advanced even Apple products bow down to it. Just like our body, our mind needs the right input to get us in the right mood to achieve what we want. You wouldn’t put diesel into a Ferrari and expect it to run at 100% so why would our minds do the same on poor content consumption. As much as we all love reality TV, general mindless programmes and scouring through mainstream news sites, they aren’t doing any favors for your mental wellbeing and a number of studies are starting to show how this can impact us in a negative way.
Think about it, if you watch a 24/7 news channel all day filled with drama, celebrity gossip, death, murder and generally the worst of the worst from humanity then of course your going to feel like crap and think the world is terrible. But this is merely a snapshot of reality, a tailored snapshot bought to you directly and designed in a fashion to prey on your emotions and get you hooked. Same goes for 90% of the programmes on TV nowadays, I struggle to find something that has an uplifting tone out of what seems like the thousands focused on serial drama and murder mysteries.
Lots of people report feeling like crap from consuming mainstream media and I was like this myself for many years. I would read the latest news everyday, whether this was on my TV or apps on my phone, I was connected to everything that these channels wanted to tell me — but was it really vital for me to be exposed to all of this content, well no, not really.
We have a choice on what we choose to consume and allow into our head space, it’s very important that we understand this and that one version of the truth is hard to find. You need to see there is balance to everything and with all these negative stories of course there are positive ones too, sadly though, positivity doesn’t sell or keep eyeballs glued to a website. This is a real shame and says a lot about society in 2018, however, like I said, you have a choice on what and how you consume from the world.
We need to take the love and care that we give to our physical body through the form of healthy nourishing foods and physical activity and apply this to the mind. You must be ruthless in what you allow yourself to consume, whether that’s watching, reading or talking. The advanced software in your head is constantly evolving and it will develop dependent on what you feed it, providing it with good upgrades is key and this is done by controlling your information flows.
Figure out what’s important to you, what content makes you feel good and helps drive your performance too, what inputs provide the best outputs — find those and consume more of them, you’ll have yourself a healthy, happy and open mind for it.
Before you go…
If you like my writing and think “Hey, I’d like to hear more of what this guy has to say” then you’re in luck.
After I left college, I had a bunch of options in front of me to pick for my next move — join the corporate world, continue my education or (like many of my friends and classmates) go travelling to “find myself”.
Now I’ve never been comfortable with the term ‘find myself’.
What the hell does that actually mean?
Who I am at 19 is not necessarily the same person I’ll be at 30, I can actually tell you for a fact now, this is true. Finding myself at 19 would have meant that I loved video games, eating junk food, creating random small businesses and clinging to toxic relationships — my values were pretty weak and more centred around what my hair looked like and if people liked me.
Whereas through everyday life experiences and age with more forms of wisdom and random curve balls, I’ve been able to discover more about myself.
I read a great quote from Tim Ferriss that went:
“You don’t find yourself, you create yourself”.
Tim Ferriss
I couldn’t agree more with this as that’s precisely what happens over the course of our lives.
We learn through experiences and continue to evolve.
The ten thousand dollar Instagram beach snap
I’ve seen lots of friends & family who like myself have struggled with identity and have used various methods to try and find out “who they are”.
The most popular one that most of us have no doubt been in contact with is travelling areas of the world and burning through our finances in doing this to find “ourselves” and then return to our actual life to use that realisation to go forth and conquer.
The problem is I’ve very rarely seen anyone come back from their travels with any other learning than they became good at burning money and taking a billion-holiday snaps for Instagram.
Now I’m not saying that you shouldn’t travel the world to experience different cultures, connect with new people and have an amazing time. I’ve toured Europe, America and Asia too. I experienced some beautiful moments and gained a new perspective.
But don’t pin your hopes on backpacking for 6 months and expecting to figure it all out and become an oracle — sadly life doesn’t work that way.
Personally, my path was different from those around me.
I poured myself into literature, podcasts, and videos and embraced new people from different cultures to understand new ways of thinking and gain new experiences.
The caveat for me is that I didn’t have to travel the world for 6 months and burn through multiple credit cards to live on a beach or in a sacred cave to chase enlightenment. I made the time to continually invest in myself.
Below is a quote I always ponder in relation to the who I am conundrum. Perhaps it will help you too.
“True happiness beats in your chest. Work out what you like to do best and try to do more of that. Don’t torture yourself pondering the purpose of life. It’s here, it’s now and it won’t last forever, so enjoy it.”
Before you go… 👋
If you like my writing and think “Hey, I’d like to hear more of what this guy has to say” then you’re in luck.
You can join me every Tuesday morning for more tools, templates and insights for the modern L&D pro in my weekly newsletter.
