Symbols

The picture above is a collage containing different shots of my desk at home. If you have no idea who I am and were asked to describe my character?

If you said I was nerdy, I would probably agree with you. The abundance of Lego minifigures, Nintendo amiibo, and Portal drink coasters clearly lend toward that.

You might also look at the books and form another opinion. That design book by Aaron Draplin (which I am totally in love with right now) might lead you to believe that I am an artist of sorts.

You may even garner an opinion from the subtle details of this picture. For example, the desk is obviously black wood instead of brown wood, and this was a purposeful choice by me because I think black wood looks classier. (And I'm a classy guy! Can't you tell by the Legos and plastic figurines?)

The point is that the symbols we surround ourselves with define our character just as much, if not MORE, than the way we behave toward others.

This is an idea I picked up from a person who spoke at a recent event I attended at Eastview Christian Church called "Faith & Work". His point was that he wanted people in his secular job to know his character as a Christian, so he keeps a Bible on his desk at work. I could digress and focus on the faith aspect here, but let's keep things at a higher level since this is an idea that spans far beyond just the faith aspect.

The reality is that we are constantly crafting a narrative to people, even on a subconscious level, and it's super important to be mindful of this, especially given its power to influence a person's opinion one way or the other.

We're going to be delving into this more in my next post. Specifically, that post will talk about trust and how consistency of character is important to building trust.

Consistency of character starts with making sure the symbols we choose to surround ourselves with match the narrative we are trying to share.

What do you want people to see you as? I'm totally okay with you looking at me as a classy, nerdy artist. While parts of that might be exaggerated, that is the story of my character that I'm hoping to build.

I hope you stick around for the next post. :)

Comments

Pay Attention to Subtle Physical Reactions

Ever clench your fists in anger? Chuckle out loud when reading a joke? Sigh when thinking about something disappointing? Often, we don't do these things intentionally. These are subconscious reactions to things around us. Think about it. It would be absurd to think to yourself, "I thought that was funny, so I am purposefully going to laugh out loud." After all, we don't laugh out loud at 100% of the things we think are funny. (You all who use the LOL acronym in your text messages know this well!)

Review: "The Dip" by Seth Godin

If you think you've seen this book before, you're probably not mistaken. It's not a new book at all. It came out in 2007, and the first time I read this book was actually back in 2011. For personal reasons, I chose to pick it back up, and I'll talk about that in a separate post. Having been five years since my last read, I'm glad I dug this back up. It's a pretty teeny book, as you can see in the image below. A person can definitely breeze through the entire book in an hour or two. Anyway, this is a book review! How does this book hold up in the nine years since it's initial release? Let's get into it.

Balancing a Roadmap with Spontaneity

Think about the last family vacation you planned. It's exciting to think about what your family and friends might do and the places you'll travel. But there's quite a few factors that play a role in planning a vacation. Things like... Where are we going? Who all is going? How many days will we be gone? How much are we willing to spend? What form of travel will we be taking? And so on. You get the picture. This isn't a bad thing to do at all. Rarely will you find people that step out the door on a vacation with zero plan in mind. But how many people follow their very precise plans once the vacation takes place? Oftentimes, things change at the very last minute. Folks on a road trip might pass a billboard for something cool they had no idea existed. Many people will change those plans last minute and be happy they did so. Others will stick to their original plan and likely end up regretting doing so, always wondering what it would have been like to venture of...

The Relevance of Sunk Cost and Opportunity Cost to Learning

When I grew up, my mother told me about this club. It was a ritzy club that had very exclusive, prestigious members. It was praised by the masses as something that everybody wanted to be in. Every day, she would encourage me to do everything I could to join. Fortunately, membership had a relatively low barrier of entry, but it required an ongoing activity. One that would be the death of me, but my mother assured me it was worth it. The name of the club?

Parkinson's Law's Relevance to Business

A few posts back, I noted that we should focus on big things because we become preoccupied with the details of the goals we set for ourselves. So if you set the goal to lose 20 pounds over 6 months, you'll adopt strategies to make that goal a reality when if you set a goal to lost 100 pounds over 6 months, you'll adopt strategies to make that goal a reality. The time doesn't change, nor does the mentality. I'm currently reading through Mark Manson's The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck and learned about a concept called Parkinson's Law. Parkinson's Law states the following: Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.

Search This Blog