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Professional Human

Humans are professionals.

Professionals are humans.

I'm Jess And I'm a Professional Human. Who's too often grappled with just how much of my authentic self is "appropriate" in professional spaces...

...And I'm just really tired of feeling resigned to hiding myself, to toning it down, and to endlessly attempting to acclimate to an outdated professional ideal - aren't you?

Each edition of the newsletter contains the following sections:

• On Being Human
• On Being Professional
• In Hindsight
• Professional Human Strategy
• (Coming Soon!) Spotlights

Today we talk about... "planting trees", taking action to get unstuck, redefining success and failure, and the importance of celebrating even the tiniest wins!

Let's dive in...

It's been 2 weeks...........

The taste of infection continues to taints every breath I take in,

the thickness of it threatening to trigger the digestive evacuation system 🤢

It feels like it’s been this way forever ♾️

Once it finally subsides,

• What will happen then?
• How do I get back on track?
• Where do I even start?

The best place to start is to

"Do the next right thing"

But how do you know what the next right thing is?

Intuition plays a role 🔮

You have a feeling, a sense, an inkling.

But then the intrusive thoughts come 💭

And they drown out your intuition.

That next right “thing” is not enough!

That action won’t make a difference!

There’s so much to do and you’re going to start there?!

Pitiful.

We tend to let this sense of urgency 🚨

and overwhelm take the 🛞 and steer-

a sense of quickly impending doom tricks us into making promises to ourselves,

to others,

that we just can’t keep.

We throw ourselves into full-scale efforts to increase our maximum output,

🛑 But if we stopped to think about it for a moment… 🤔

…If we were capable of that type of long term maximum output, don’t you think we would have just avoided this place altogether?

On Being Human…

All humans* do well when they can.

(*psychopathology is a real thing, so of course it can’t be ALL humans, but I also believe a lot of what we chalk up to psychopathology are maladaptive coping mechanisms employed by humans struggling to meet their needs)

And when a person isn't doing well,

it always shakes out to an unmet need or an unsolved problem,

usually related to lagging skills.

Think about it 🤔

If we were wired that way

to wake up one day and

make a decision to be completely different ⚡️

and then were able to just start *being* different??

Well, New Years Resolutions would be a smashing success 🎉 and

the self help industry wouldn’t be worth billions 💰 every single year.

Do the next right thing is a reminder that it’s the consistent application of small acts that lead to desired outcomes,

not huge leaps that take us from sub-par to maximum results.

Try this mini-strategy…

Feeling stuck?

Ask yourself: does this feel like the next right thing?

And listen carefully and earnestly for the answer.

When we fall behind we are in such a rush to get back on track

We just can’t resist acting and thinking in BIG ways

There’s time and ground to be made up! we cry!

and so we act fast and we act big,

but that leads to mistakes missteps and disappointment

In Hindsight…

I started nursing school in 2009.

After my 2nd year, I had to take some time off.

When all was well, and I started to look at going back,

I started to process the idea that my graduation would now be in 2016 - 2017,

and it was somehow just completely unacceptable to me.

There had to be a different way!

I can’t wait that long to get “back on track”!

Good things take time.

When’s the best time to plant a tree?

20 years ago.

When is the next best time?

Right now.

'The thing' is going to take as long as it’s going to take,

but when we calculate that it's going to take longer than we *want* it to take,

we start searching for shortcuts, alternatives and “hacks”

Why?

It has a lot to do with the hustle culture ideal* of

and it’s toxic and harmful

(*Which is hustle culture yes, but also reality for anyone living without their basic needs met, which we can talk about when we talk about Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs sometime in the future)

On Being Professional…

We are trained to see success and failure in binary terms,

and typically depend too much on the input of others to define them for ourselves,

We are unable to define them in ways that are truly meaningful to our unique composition and journey 🧭

What if we let go of the idea of failure 💡

and embraced the idea that learning is valuable

just for the sake of learning?

What if I could embrace the idea that the time I spent in nursing school still serves me today in many ways,

that nursing remains a part of my identity and the richness of my experiences.

It’s all valuable to know, just for the sake of knowing,

that I’m not a great fit for nursing.

I was in such a rush to go back, to finish,

That I failed to properly assess what I was going back to, and why.

I was an excellent student, but missed a lot of clinical time.

It was the same then as it is now: I was sick a lot.

But since I perceived success and failure as binary

- the only success is graduation and professional practice, anything else is failure -

I couldn’t allow myself to choose to move on to something else:

that meant I was CHOOSING failure ‼️

I didn’t yet see that my success was in having explored and evaluated a possible avenue,

and being able to determine it wasn’t the best fit.

But what if instead success meant standing up proudly to say

Another Mini-Strategy...

Celebrate all things 🎊

all wins 🥇 🏅 🏆

Big and small.

Even if it seems silly or pointless,

I promise you it's worth it.

It triggers a neuro-chemical reaction that supports our aspirations to create sustainable change in our lives.

If me NOW could coach me THEN, that’s just what I would do:

I would tell myself to celebrate the whole experience as a learning and growing opportunity

and honour it as valuable, every bit of it.

I would encourage myself to keep going,

I would remind myself that success isn’t defined as completion,

Success is more like fulfillment

I would remind myself that the best time to plant a tree might have been 20 years ago, but the 2nd best time is NOW.

I would look myself square in the face (even though I hate eye contact 😛) and say:

So what do I do when I've been sick for too long?

I rest 🛌

I drink plenty of fluids 🫖 💦

I listen to myself and my needs 🧘‍♀️

I show up where and when I can to the best of my ability

And I communicate with those around me 🗣️

What more could I do?

See you next week,

Jess

PS

You may have noticed this didn't come to you Friday, which isn't just because I've been wrestling the sick.

It's because I'm experimenting with the best day of the week to send.

Is there a day of the week you tend to use for newsletters? I try to use Sunday.

Is there a day of the week you tend to prioritize self care? Mine happens to be Wednesday but not on purpose: I've found I feel behind on a Friday, try to catch up over the weekend, work my ass off Monday and Tuesday, only to crash by Wednesday. It's sort of broken 🤷‍♀️ I'm working on it......

What are your top challenges showing up in the world as a Professional Human?

Hit reply and let me know!