elizabeth grigg - the other fourth meal

Two major topics are kicking around my world right now. One is work-life balance. This is the ability to follow through on your commitments without sending your other commitments packing. The other is personal growth. This is the ability to change and adapt for the better, by acquiring new skills such as leadership.

The most striking thing about these topics is the lack of role models we have to follow. Blogs are written by human beings, and can't live up to the manufactured successes we find in the media, nor should they, because the media is faked anyway. So blogs have just exposed this role model gap to me more obviously, as they should - they would not be nearly so interesting if the people writing them were not struggling with anything. I still have my eyes peeled for good role models in these areas, especially in the software industry. I suppose my standards are pretty high.

Second most striking thing about these topics is the fear that underlies both of them. It's no great revelation that fear is the big blocker of progress. It has a few flavors. There are big fears like death and war, medium fears like losing a house or a job, and small fears like hitting reply-all when you didn't mean to. The only thing I can confidently offer is that I'm no longer worried about the large or medium fears, but the small ones are stopping me in my tracks. This is one of those look on the bright side things I suppose, but admittedly part of the reason why I'm awake at 3am is the idea that my own success (hopefully in the 3-5 year timeframe) will be whittled away by tiny flawed choices I make, that will snowball into one big success-blocker. I'm pointing this out because it's the type of problem a few good role models would mitigate or even solve.

A lot of good discussions have grown up around Hugh's Sex and Cash theory, which is illustrative of a phenomenon in work-life balance. Hugh's position is one extreme, claiming that only by this separation can we be successful. The other extreme is more common within microsoft culture, and is why people joke about the red pill and the kool aid. The perspective most people have at microsoft is: I love my work, I am my work, there is no need for a vacation because I'm already doing what I want to do with my time. If they don't have this perspective, they can feel it within reach and are working for success under that model. Most are not using Hugh's model and trying new hobbies and looking for fulfillment elsewhere. Josh Allen's post is a good example of a common microsoft perspective on this. (Disclaimer: this is a subjective opinion, perhaps it's just the people I know that are the red pill type.)

I am loathe to place my own opinion on this continuum, but rather choose curtain number three, which says: the way you structure your fulfillment is not as important as whether you can get yourself unstuck. Stuck is bad, nimble, flexible, and agile is good. If you're stuck, and separating money from your true creative calling is something that frees you, go for it. If you're stuck, and combining money with your true creative calling is something that frees you, then go for it instead. Either action is correct and can lead to success same as the other. But the specific action, and even the success, is less important than being unstuck in the first place. Getting yourself unstuck is like opening a window in a stuffy room. The important thing is: now, you can breathe.