Persistent tortoise
I have 4 orchids, the very difficult to re-bloom flowers. I only had 1 originally, then my friends gave me 3 of theirs as fostered plants. This year all four of them are blooming. The key was to act like a “persistent tortoise” to them.
Orchids want the same amount of water every week. I chose Tuesday as my day of watering. They all prefer only 1/4 cup of water. Three weeks of water only watering, followed by a week of water + 1 drop of fertilizer. I have them placed on a wood tray angled on my kitchen windows which is facing north east (it may or may not be the deal breaker). To follow this diligent schedule, on a notepad I scribble the dates of Tuesdays and mark as water only or w+f. I have been doing this for years now. Such persistence may bloom other aspects of our lives as well.
Today, as I was humming ”I am a gummy bear; yes, I am a gummy bear” to engrave this thought into my soul, I read Adam Grant’s book on rethinking.
Chapter 1
Flexibility to reconsider and rethink is wisdom. In the event that you are faced with saving your life; as was the case of a fire fighter, starting a new little fire to create a safe zone could be one dumb looking but genius way to save yourself. (See the book cover and opening story)
We have certain mindsets: preacher, prosecutor, politician. But best is to have the scientist mindset and accept that ‘we might be wrong’. This also ticks the clock from having pride to being humble.
There is evidence that lack of rethinking can lead to disastrous outcomes such as what happened to Blackberry.
Chapter 2:
As we accumulate knowledge we climb up the “mount stupid”. If we feel confident that this is the ultimate end of knowledge. we stay there as an “armchair quarterback”. But there is more knowledge, always, and the more we know the humbler we get. Then, there is the risk of falling impostor, being suspicious of our knowledge and abilities and tools. Luckily, there is the happy medium of not being arrogant or impostor which is the “confident humility zone”.
One day, the persistent tortoise will eventually cross the FINSH line. One day, all four orchids will have flowers and I will be able post them here. One day, I will manage to steer my ship in the confident humility zone.
Until then, I will keep dancing to the song: “I am a gummy bear, yes I am totally a gummy bear”.
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