What’s one thing you wish you had started doing earlier in life?
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Making peace with what I’m good at and what I suck at.
In my fifth decade of this thing we call “being human,”* I’m finally aware of (and more at ease with) where I can deliver and where I will fall short.
*Being human: a lifelong subscription with no manual, no refunds, and terms and conditions you only get around to reading in your forties.
I think many of us struggle with this, especially when the parts of us that are outliers don’t match what society treats as “the norm.” The pressure to conform is real, and it’s tough to feel like a typo in a world that loves a clean draft.
Allow me to present three of my own typos, left in on purpose.
Introvert (aka the Tubelight)
I’m a card-carrying introvert. Don’t get me wrong, I can say a few semi-intelligent things in a meeting, but my best and deepest reflections show up later, when I’ve been handed a problem to noodle on. Picture a tubelight warming up. It stutters, it hums, and then it’s the most reliable thing in the room.
I’ve learned to carve out this space for myself with creative subject lines like “Re: Thoughts on the Meeting (Composed in My Head Since 10:15, Now Available).”
Initiation Energy When It’s My Idea, Struggle When It’s Not
When I have an idea, I go from zero to a five-part workshop series in eleven minutes, complete with a title slide and no registered participants. For years I wondered why I was always the one starting projects or organizing get-togethers, until I realized that other people’s ideas just don’t give me the same ignition.
Follow-through is the other half of this though. I definitely need the energy of others, or else my project moves into a folder called “v2_final_ACTUAL,” where good intentions go to nap. So I’ve learned to enlist people.
Taking Time to Make Decisions
Sometimes a decision takes me a while, and I’ve stopped pretending otherwise. When a big one shows up, it’ll wait by the door with its coat on while I look for my keys, my shoes, and possibly my feelings.
Living with that uncertainty used to drive me crazy. Now I understand it’s simply my process, and I’ve learned to sit with it:
I’m not indecisive. I’m in a due diligence period.
Future me will have more information and better lighting.
Nothing is on fire. Probably.
I think we all have a few things we were taught were wrong. Too slow. Too quiet. Too sensitive. At some point you stop trying to correct them… a typo left alone long enough starts to look like handwriting.
If you need me, I’ll be reading through the fine print of “being human.” So far I’ve found no clause requiring me to be good at everything. I’ll send my full thoughts in a week. Subject line: “Now Available.”
