Just the facts.

An excerpt from The Art of Possibility - The Way Things Are: The practice of "the way things are" is a reality check on the runaway imagination of the "calculating self". It’s like the world-weary policeman saying, “Just the facts, Ma’am, just the facts.

Near-instant gratification.

Most of our strategic goals take time in order to lead to results. For instance, going regularly to the gym or eating healthier might show changes in a few months. Consistently initiating conversations and creating opportunities might lead to a financial return in a similar time period. Organically reaching out

What's it for?

If we are not clear about what’s it for, it’s very less likely that we will be effective. “We always do it this way” is a good place to hide, but is rarely effective if things haven’t turned out the way you have wanted them to.

"I" or "We"?

Which one to use when writing a message, "I" or "We"? "I" makes the message personal. It puts you on the hook. It makes it better for the reader because she now knows who is talking to her. "We" can become a

Let go.

Let go of the stresses... of the achievements and the failures... of the striving and the wanting... of the inadequacy and the insufficiency. It might be difficult to let go. But, we can start to practice it one day at a time.

Constraints are good.

Constraints create the conditions for us to be effective. If we are in the gym only for 60 minutes, we focus on getting our reps in and getting out. If we decide that we close our office at 3 pm, we are focussed to get done with the things that

A thousand cuts.

As a professional, we learn to show up even if we don't feel like it. That makes sense. The client did not sign up for our emotional turmoil, they are paying only for the pizza we decided to add onto the menu. But what doesn't make

Energy magnets.

We are all energy magnets. We absorb what we are exposed to. Some people have a stronger filter. Some, like me, don’t. What we can do is to be conscious of which energies we get exposed to. If we keep spending time with radioactive stuff, we shouldn’t really

The unpaid professional.

Steven Pressfield talks about turning pro in his books The War of Art, Turning Pro and others. And Seth Godin teaches us how to become a professional in The Practice. But, what does it mean to be a professional? Does it mean sitting at your desk from 9 to 5

Downward spiral talk

Some excerpts from The Art of Possibility: Downward spiral talk is based on the fear that we will be stopped in our tracks and fall short in the race, and it is wholly reactive to circumstances, circumstances that appear to be wrong, problematic, and in need of fixing.... Focusing on

Stories we don't tell.

There are stories we tell and there are stories we hide. The latter affect our lives as much as the former. And unless we create spaces where we are able to tell the stories we usually hide, we would find it difficult to see them and to change them for

A game to play.

Here's a game you might try from the book "Pathways to Possibility" by Rosamund Stone Zander: There is another open-ended game that I am particularly fond of. It functions like a towrope to pull you out of your habitual decision-making patterns.... It is played like this:

What battery are you at?

Not your phone. You. Is it in the 70-80% or the 15-20% range? Or maybe it is 3-5%... If your phone was at 3%, you would use it carefully until you can plug it again. Generally, when we are at low battery, the critical voice and the hungry ghosts take

Lightness.

What if we start choosing lightness?  Yes, in contrast to heaviness.  But also in contrast to darkness.

Creativity & chaos.

When Steve Jobs launched the iPhone in 2007, it "disrupted" everything. Of course it disrupted Blackberry and Google and all the competitors. But it also disrupted the whole economy. It changed how companies did work and how people interacted with each other. There was no organised way of

"We always do it this way."

There are people who aren't interested in change, whether it makes things better or not. You can try to change them. It's going to require a significant investment of effort, time and money. And it might (most likely) still not work. Or you can find the

Being a contribution.

Being a gift. Being love. Being friendship. Being compassion. Being kindness. If we have a choice of being, we can choose to be these.

Low confidence.

Self-doubt or low self confidence takes away our ability to trust ourselves and our belief in ourselves that we can make things better. Sometimes, this takes the shape of procrastination and sometimes perfectionism, but almost always, it stops us from shipping. Thinking that it's better to not ship

Making less mistakes.

Making less mistakes is not an actionable strategy. You can't strive for less negatives. You can only vie for more positives. Trying to avoid mistakes leave us paralysed and unable to move forward. MISTAKES CAN BE like ice. If we resist them, we may keep on slipping into

A "professional" salesperson.

As an independent professional, you may call yourself an entrepreneur, a freelancer, a bootstrapper, an impresario, a writer, a creative, an artist or whatnot. These are all good, but if you are not on a salary, you are now a salesperson. It's your choice though, whether you want

Smallest version.

The smallest version of action that heps you move forward is always better than the version in your head that keeps you paralysed.

Move the pin.

James Clear talks about the paperclip strategy in his book Atomic Habits. It's simple. You keep one box full of paper clips and another one empty at the beginning of the day. As you take any action that moves things forward, you move one pin from the first

Plug it in.

When your phone runs out of battery, you don't expect it to charge itself. You plug it in into an external source of energy. Same with your car. If it runs out of fuel, you don't expect it to go anywhere unless you pour some fuel

The carrot and the stick.

The carrot will make the mule move towards where you want it to go, effortlessly. The stick will keep it in place, frozen. Mostly, we keep brandishing the stick and wonder why the mule doesn’t move.

Where are you going, next?

When you book a flight, you have to choose. Are you going to New York or New Delhi? You might need to go to both places but the same flight is not going to take you there. Where are you going first? Which flight can take you there? What about