#27: Fears That Warp Ambition

#communication #fear #ambition #vulnerability #regret

Jul 14, 2023

👋 Welcome to this week's Pursuit. My name is Amir, and each week I go over 10 hours of content in pursuit of living a meaningful, fulfilling and balanced life. I'm grateful to share my findings with you and hope I can have a tiny impact on your life. Subscribe now if you haven't already!

This week’s discovery:

🔎 Choosing Curiosity Over Victory in Conversations
🐉 Fears That Warp Ambition (Part 1/2)
🎉 Having Fun
⚖️ The Balance of Confidence and Vulnerability
😖 Why Regret is Universal and Healthy
🗒️ A Quote I'm Pondering On
🎵 Music I'm Listening To

🔎 Choosing Curiosity Over Victory in Conversations

If you want to improve your conversations and avoid confrontational dynamics, there are a few things you can do. First, choose curiosity over victory. Instead of focusing on persuading the other person to your side, approach the conversation with a scientist's mindset. Ask questions about their beliefs, their experiences, and their perspectives. This not only makes the conversation less confrontational, but also more interesting and less frustrating. Second, try restating what the other person says to their satisfaction before you respond. This way, you show that you're listening and engaged, and you ensure that you understand their perspective before you respond. It's a simple tactic that can go a long way in reducing confrontational dynamics in conversations and improving communication. Remember, the goal is not to win the conversation, but to learn and understand.

🎧 3-min

🐉 Fears That Warp Ambition (Part 1/2)

Since I know everyone is busy and may not have time to read the entire article, I have decided to break it up into two parts. Reading this article showed me the possibility of what could have possibly driven me to continue working on my mobile gaming startup years ago. It never crossed my mind that fear of unworthiness might have been the fuel for my engine, driving me to show up for the grind day-in and day-out. Next week, I will provide some examples of these fears in part 2, for those who don't have time to read the whole article.

We start a project because we’re excited by our dream of what it might become, and then fall into a rut where we become more motivated by fear than by vision. We stop playing to win, and start playing not-to-lose. When small worries arise, we may be able to experience them while staying connected to meaning. However, when something touches a core fear, our lives and work can become about managing that fear. One way to catch core fears is to notice where in your life you are overly-attached to a dream. Dreams can serve as a metaphorical shield, buffering us from thoughts and feelings that we find difficult to tolerate (fear, shame, etc.). If you pay attention to your most tightly held ambitions, that can point you toward what you’re most afraid of.

It’s perfectly normal and valid to experience fears around death, unworthiness, uncertainty, scarcity, and rejection in the course of one’s work. Rather, the problem is that when these fears get big, our focus shifts toward managing the fear and we lose touch with what we ultimately care about. The answer, then, is to learn to hold our fears in a more flexible way, rather than putting them in the driver’s seat and letting them run our projects. We don’t want to try and suppress our fears—that just gives them more power. Instead, if we can make space for fear when it arises, over time we can learn to experience it without needing to manage or control it. Perhaps all the dragons in our lives are princesses who are only waiting to see us act, just once, with beauty and courage. Perhaps everything that frightens us is, in its deepest essence, something helpless that wants our love.

📖 8-min

🎉 Having Fun

There’s no point being assertive if you’re assertive about the wrong thing. And what’s the right thing? The right thing is the one that feels fun. You have to do the thing you actually enjoy doing, not the thing you find conceptually exciting. You have to date the person you actually like, not the ideal of perfection you fetishize in your mind. And you have to have enough self-knowledge to know what you enjoy.

📖 3-min

⚖️ The Balance of Confidence and Vulnerability

When it comes to relationships, vulnerability is key. However, there is a fine line between opening up and dumping your emotional baggage on someone. The former is attractive because it shows that you are willing to be honest and work on your issues, while the latter is unattractive because it makes the other person responsible for solving your problems. So, if you want to be attractive to a potential partner, be open about your struggles and take ownership of them. Remember, vulnerability is a form of openness, not a form of neediness.

🎧 2-min

😖 Why Regret is Universal and Healthy

If you've ever been told to "live without regrets," that advice might not be as helpful as it seems. According to a survey of nearly 4,500 Americans, regret is not only a common emotion but a healthy and universal part of the human experience. In fact, the only people who don't experience regret are young children, individuals with brain damage or neurodegenerative disorders, and sociopaths. So if you're feeling regretful about something in your life, don't beat yourself up over it. Instead, acknowledge that it's a normal part of the human experience and use it as motivation to make positive changes moving forward. Remember, regret can be a powerful teacher if we allow it to be.

🎧 1-min

🗒️ A Quote I'm Pondering On

People change in four seasons: when they hurt enough they have to, when they see enough they are inspired to, when they learn enough that they want to, and when they receive enough that they are able to.