This thoughtful Friday5 will help you get your head together as society opens back up for many of us. Subscribe here and Michael will get you a pony!
Think about this...
Earning
For the first time in history, the spoken word has become at least as important as the written word. Don't believe it? Spotify is paying Joe Rogan $100 million to move his podcast to their platform, zowie! Joe's long-form, mostly unedited conversations have re-made the angry talk radio platform. It doesn't hurt that Rogan mostly interviews celebrity guests like Robert Downey, Jr. (9.4 million views), Mike Tyson (13 million views) and Elon Musk (34 million views). Talking The Joe Rogan Experience is a juggernaut, partly despite the three-hour conversations he has with guests. This is rare during a time of shallow chats and lightning-quick exchanges. Rational thinking doesn't come naturally. Most of us operate in a mashup of reflexive opinion, long-held prejudice and provocative sound bites. Reach better conclusions by doing what psychologists refer to as "cognitive re-framing." In other words, think about the issue in a different way or from another perspective. Quoting
"If everyone is thinking alike, then someone isn’t thinking." –General George Patton Thinking We don't know how to be idle anymore and since we're never alone with our own thoughts, we're always with other people's thoughts . Pre-digested news reports, misleading statistics and agenda-laden platforms tell us what we should think. But what if you want to make your own decisions? One way to reach reasonably accurate conclusions is to simply delay making up your mind, even if for only two seconds. (Subscribe to my YouTube channel to receive ongoing communication tips.)
Don't worry, not knowing isn't the same as not caring. More data and conversation will almost always help clarify what's really going on.
Deciding It's hard to know what to believe anymore. Reality shows like Tiger King only show what they want viewers to see; everything else is edited out. Sometimes the edit itself is designed to create tension and drama. The "direct to camera" technique seems more honest, which is one reason almost all the videos on my YouTube channel are edit free. Check out the first story of a keynote I did in Manchester, England. It was a multi-camera shoot, but there are zero edits. What do you think?
Better days ahead!
Lots of good things are going to come from this unfortunate pandemic. Program yourself for "post-traumatic success!"