Ep 408 | The Journey from Anguish to Anecdote

Thank you for joining me today. It's Brian Gubernick, and welcome to the No Days Off podcast, where we believe that every single day brings a new opportunity to get better. About a decade ago, I was in a mastermind, and I was with probably 25, 30 others, and we were sitting in front of our mentor and he was running through his business career. And I'll never forget something he did that day that wasn't all that significant to, I think, most anybody, but for whatever reason, it just struck me. And it was a big aha for me about a decade ago. And it's, it's impacted the way I think about things through today. My mentor at the time was telling a story and about his career. Kind of the whole career. And I'll never forget, he said, you know, he was describing different times, and he's like, in the '80s, you know, this happened, and then that happened, and then this happened. And then he got to the '90s, and this happened, and that happened. He said something like, then in 1991, this happened, and then in '94, that happened. And I'm like, whoa, whoa, wait a second. I put my hand up. I'm like, What are you talking about? '91 to '94, I know, was a struggle in your company's growth. And that, that phase of time, I know your history. I know that that was a struggle. I don't get it. You just summarized— you just skipped over, I'm sorry, 3 years and really summarized that whole scenario, that whole— I'm sorry, that whole period of time in like 8 seconds. I don't get it. And he looked at me and said, you know, it was tough in the moment, but when I reflect back on it, it really wasn't a big deal. It wasn't a big part of my story. And I remember hearing that and just kind of laughing to myself as to how somebody could just talk about a 3-year period in a matter of 8 seconds and move on. I found it funny. Years later, here I am today, and I found myself having done that multiple times. What am I talking about? What I'm talking about is those moments in time in your career or your life or whatever it may be when you have a decline or a struggle or something you're needing to overcome or a crisis. And when you're in the moment, when you're in the moment, it feels like a freaking eternity. I mean, you're going to bed thinking about it, you're waking up in the morning thinking about it. You have struggles internally and externally. There's people that you're impacting, and it's just weighing so much on you. And in the moment, it feels like it's never, ever, ever going to end. But then, years down the road, well past that crisis or that experience, when you speak of it to others, it probably takes you a matter of seconds or maybe possibly minutes to describe the scenario. But the scenario may have played out over weeks or months or even years. But again, when you summarize that story, when that story becomes an anecdote, when that anguish becomes an anecdote, you speak of it in only— as if it was only a matter of minutes. I find that funny. And I also think there's a lot that we can learn around that when we really think about it. I want to talk about that because if you're listening to the No Days Off Podcast, my guess is that you're going to have some hardships or you've overcome some hardships. My guess is that you're going to have some moments where you've got to persevere and be resilient and things are going to feel like, like, like endless moments. But the reality is, in the grand scheme of things, it's just a blip on the radar. If you're listening to the No Days Off podcast, you know what I'm talking about, or you soon will find out at some point. We're all going to go through it. What can we learn from this? What can we gather from this? I think that there's a number of things we could take away. The experience that I'm talking around has several important lessons about perspective, about time, about growth, and, and I think about resilience. Number 1, time distorts your perception of hardships. In the moment, struggles that you may be experiencing, they feel overwhelming because why? Well, because we're deeply immersed in the emotions and the challenges that those struggles bring. This is actually due to something that's called temporal myopia, temporal myopia. Which basically means, which is basically a, a, a, a, a significant or serious way of saying we're just unable to see past the immediate difficulties. When you're in the moment, it's difficult to see past what's immediately in front of you. However, as time passes and we gain some distance, of course those feelings, those intense feelings begin to subside and the struggle becomes far more manageable. And it becomes a manageable part, I would say, of this larger life story. It's a blip on the radar. It is a moment, a fraction of time over a very long life— business life, personal life, whatever it may be. So number 1, time distorts perception of hardships. Number 2, I think there's this narrative simplification. That's what I would call it. When we reflect on past hardships, we oftentimes summarize and we really condense the experience into a brief story. And this makes the event feel shorter in hindsight than the actual months or even years of the actual hardship. Now, storytelling— this is important, right? Because storytelling allows us to really focus on the key lessons, extract the key lessons from that experience or the turning points. And that turns what felt like an eternity at the very moment into some sort of digestive— digestible narrative that we could better understand, that others can understand as we're telling it. It's a narrative simplification. So this aligns with what we'd call kind of the peak-end rule, which is when our memories of experiences are shaped largely by the most intense moments, which would be the peaks, and how they ended, but not by the duration. See, when you're in it, you're playing, you're playing a role in the duration of it all, right? Like you're experiencing it. But when you're reflecting on it, Your memories of the experiences are just, you know, generally going to be around the more intense moments, the peaks, and how they ended. So there's a simplification of the story. But that leads to the kind of the third thing I want to talk about, which is really resilience and growth. See, struggles oftentimes feel endless because we don't know how they're going to actually end up resolving themselves. Yet in retrospect, so many crises serve as catalysts for growth and transformation. As my buddy, Mack Newton, used to say, when you're experiencing crisis, it's usually just change coming, trying to come out. Just change trying to happen. Crisis serves as a catalyst for growth and transformation. So once we have overcome a challenge, we oftentimes will look back on it as a turning point or as an opportunity to become stronger, become wiser, become more resourceful. So the fact that the hardship becomes a mere minute in the retelling, to me it reflects the resilience we developed and in our ability to endure what in the moment may have felt insurmountable. So I want to say that one more time. The fact that the hardship is described in just— it's just like a moment or mere minutes when we're retelling it, what that reflects is the resilience we developed. In other words, we should be proud when we look back and we could tell these stories as though they're fractions or fragments of time. It's because we've developed some resilience, which leads to number 4 for me, perspective and gratitude. What feels unbearable in the present may seem less significant when viewed from the future. This perspective, right, helps us develop gratitude, gratitude for overcoming adversity. It makes us realize that our past struggles, they don't define us. Rather, they contributed to who we are today. They contributed to our development. So by recognizing that crises are temporary, because they're all temporary, we actually can approach future difficulties with a greater sense of calm and confidence. Because what do we know? We know that whatever's in front of us is going to pass eventually as well. So as we become more resilient, as we gain greater perspective over the course of time, we can then gain greater gratitude. Again, because recognizing that the crises are temporary, it allows us to approach future challenges or difficulties with more calm and confidence. Again, because we know it's going to pass. Lastly, number 5, I think I've got to reflect around kind of the importance of patience and the importance of hope. When we're in the middle of a struggle, we're in a decline or a dip, and it feels like an eternity, it can actually help to remember that time has a way of reducing the perceived severity of, of crisis, right? Like, I, I've talked about it here at No Days Off before, one of the most important variables to consider in most anything is time, but it's always hard to factor time into it, especially when you're in the moment. In other words, things tend to shake out as time plays out. That's why some people, they're able to really display incredible patience. That patience may from time to time be frustrating for those around them, but those that have that degree of patience that could just let things unfold and, and just hang out for a moment, what they know more than maybe most of us is that time will time will do its thing. And the perceived severity or complexity will be reduced. So what feels overwhelming right now might be something we can laugh about, laugh about at some point, or even look back on with pride in the future. We know, or they know, those with patience and those with hope, they know that. So this realization, what does it do for most of us? It should encourage patience. It should encourage endurance. And hope. The more you experience this, the more patience you'll develop. The more you experience this, the more you know that time is going to play out. You'll have greater hope. So in summary, the passage of time and having the ability to reflect helps us really see struggles as less catastrophic. It makes it clear that adversity usually leads to some degree of growth and frankly, just a better perspective. So going forward, and I think the focus for you or the challenge for you today is to embrace this chaos, embrace this, embrace this struggle, right? Embrace this crisis because it can help you navigate future difficulties with greater resilience and greater optimism. That's what I want to challenge you to do. Not just today, but moving forward. If you're in a rut, if you're, if you're struggling right now, keep going one step in front of the other and recognize that you'll be looking back one day and you'll be speaking of this month-long or months-long or even years-long struggle. You'll be speaking about it as though it's just a fraction of time, and you'll be telling that story in seconds, maybe minutes at best. That's all I have for you today. All I have for you today, the No Days Off podcast. Thank you so much for listening, and remember, every single day brings a new opportunity to get better. So let's get after it.