jungle jeff

What Is Normal?

Are you a workaholic?

Heads Or Tails?

Age-old question.

What do you think?  What’s your opinion?

“It depends,” is the first thing that comes to mind.  Mostly the long hours are worth it.  If.

If?

Yes, if.

If it drives your ego, your title, your salary, your corner office, your feeling of self-worth – then no.

If it drives your ability to make a difference: to expand your reach, your relevance, your impact – then yes.

The challenge, when you’re insanely busy, is to not confuse the two.

Any one need a quarter?

Received an email from a jungle jeff blog reader, seeking clarification on the “Don’t Bother” blog post from last week. The reader’s email challenged my thinking, in a good and healthy way.  By the way, thank you for that.

Do you give obsessive diligent consideration to your work?

Most people, myself included, probably rush to, “Of course!”

May I audaciously suggest we (again, myself included) don’t do nearly as well as any of us think we do?   Huh?

Exactly. Huge.  Here’s what I mean.

This is simple, and also “dangerous”, because there is a human flaw in most of us. We are conditioned to judge others on what we see them do. It happens without even trying.

What’s complex, and perhaps arguable (but I argue it isn’t), is that we overwhelmingly judge ourselves on our intentions.

Huge difference here.

You see, I perceive my approach to balance as better than anyone else I observe, and yet others….

What others may think is that I preach balance, but lack balance, and therefore am a phony. This thought crosses my mind daily, “Am I a hypocrite?”

Do you ever catch yourself privately asking, “Am I a hypocrite?”

Tomorrow, maybe, I’ll dive a little deeper on this.