W.I.N. Wednesday: Are you shaming your past self or educating your future self?

In an insightful LinkedIn post by Adam Grant, he shared the following:

The point of reviewing your mistakes isn’t to shame your past self. It’s to educate your future self. Rumination is recycling your old thoughts about what went wrong. Reflection is looking for new insights on how to do it better.

So, where do you spend most of your time? In reflection or in rumination? It is easy to get sucked down the rabbit hole of rumination. It is easy to get caught up beating yourself up over mistakes, failures, and decisions that in hindsight we realize were less desirable. Usually, we do the best we can with what we have at the time. Sometimes that works out and sometimes it does not. 

When you ask people what the role of a critic is, they will say it is to look for and find fault. Sadly, most adults will say that they are their own biggest critic. The world has enough critics. As a result, we are saturated with media “stories” and social media posts that are continually pointing out the faults of everyone else. Sadly, many of those critics spend little or no time looking in the mirror. 

There is no value in being your own worst critic. Make the shift to be your own best coach. People will pay thousands of dollars to a coach to hold them accountable to do what they said they would do. The coach is there to pat them on the back at times and kick them in the ass other times. Be that coach for yourself. Focus on Feed Forward, “looking for new insights on how to do it better” rather than Feedback, “recycling your old thoughts about what went wrong”. 

“I cannot help believing that the world would be a better and happier place if we’d learn to talk more about what’s right than what’s wrong. We have so much to celebrate.”

Michael R. Parry

What’s Important Now? Spend time in reflection, seeking new insights on how to do it better. 

Take care.

Brian Willis

www.lifesmostpowerfulquestion.com. 

ONE QUESTION BRINGING FOCUS AND CLARITY IN THE CHAOS AND COMPLEXITY OF TODAY'S WORLD.

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