Synergy: The Secret to Finding Alignment in Life
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the factors that make things work, whether it’s business, careers, relationships etc.
To illustrate some of my thoughts let’s focus on business and careers as I think it’s a useful example that helps highlight some of the points I’d like to get across.
When it comes to choosing the right career or business to work for, there’s a lot of content out there right now focused on finding your “purpose” or “path”, and from another angle, on gaining “fulfilment” and “inner peace” etc.
I do think it’s important for people to feel fulfilled in their work and confident that they’re on the right path. In fact, I think it’s one of the most important things in life. After all, who wants to wake up each morning and go to a job they hate? It’s probably one of the biggest causes for misery in life if you’re located in the developed world and are living an existence which is completely unfulfilling.
Choosing the right path in life, is a question that continually plays on my mind and I’ve made my fair share of mistakes and taken risks in order to overcome this dilemma, although in my case it has been particularly difficult as through experience I’ve discovered I don’t really fit into any of the traditional societal moulds.
So I guess from my experience and the mistakes I’ve made, I’ll share some of the insights and conclusions I’ve drawn in my search.
The two major sides of the debate:
As we’re using the business and/or career example, let me outline the two major positions or advice given when it comes to this. On one side you have the traditional, old school advice of “go to school, get good qualifications, get a good, well payed, stable job etc”. To me, whilst there is reason and truth in every argument, this is BS and I will discuss why further on. Then, on the other side, you have “do what you love”, “follow your passion”, “don’t chase the money” etc. Again, whilst this advice is more modern, influential and common in online content, and whilst there is definitely wisdom there, I find a lot of this advice can also be problematic (and I will explain why).
Now whilst I definitely do think that the idea of engaging with a job, business, profession because you enjoy it as oppose to financial rewards is definitely an improvement on the traditional advice, which on the face of it seems to overlook this, like any problem you have to consider both sides and take the elements that are relevant and apply it to each particular case. So one of the reasons I believe that the advice is BS, is because it’s of a one-size fits all variety, and by definition it has to be because it’s generic advice.
However, the real reason I believe these two arguments are unhelpful is because I feel they miss the point of what in particular we’re trying to achieve with the advice given, they overlook the end result.
Go to a good school and get a good job:
The first position of getting a respectable, well-paying job assumes that finances, status and security are what are needed to help people feel a sense of purpose and fulfillment. They’re not. I believe they are definitely important in life, but if this was all that was needed why do people leave high paying corporate jobs on mass and take a risk going into the unknown or “finding” themselves? Better yet, why do some people who have degrees from top universities, high-paying respectable jobs feel empty, miserable, depressed and anxious? I’ll outline one example I recently came across below—although there are many.
Rich Roll is currently a health and fitness blogger, ultra-marathon, triathelete (one of the top people in his field). I’d previously come across him online and on the surface it seems he was successful in the corporate world and I’d assumed he’d made a smooth transition into his career as a health influencer with savings behind him, once things gained traction.
The real story about Rich, which I learned, was that he graduated from top US colleges, Stanford and Cornell Law School, worked as an entertainment lawyer, and it’s reasonable to assume making well into six figures in the US. Yet, he was miserable and an alcoholic, drinking vodka in the shower in the morning and throughout the day at work. He got to the point where he burned his options, became, as he describes, pretty much “unemployable”. At 40 he decided to make a change and get into health and fitness full time (after being overweight). It got to the point where he couldn’t put food on the table for his family or pay $60 to have garbage taken away, which he described as “emasculating”. He did manage to release a successful book and assumed business would come pouring in (it didn’t, at least not initially). As I’ve mentioned he’s now one of the top people in his field achieving success and a feeling of inner fulfilment. There’s many other examples I could cite of people in similar situations turning to alcohol and even hard drugs.
So with this illustration of someone who ticked society’s “boxes”, being miserable and having their life in a mess, just being one example out of many, we can see that “outer achievements” do not necessarily lead to “inner fulfilment” and this is the problem as we can’t really put a price on feeling a sense of purpose, fulfilment or peace in our lives. It begs the question, what is the point of putting all the hard work and energy in to achieve what you “think” you want only to feel like it was a waste afterwards? There’s a famous Tony Robbins quote which sums this up perfectly:
“Success without fulfilment is the ultimate failure.”
Again, I’ve spoken to people who’ve made a lot of money at relatively young ages and told me they felt miserable. I’ve walked away from business opportunities and offers that were financially very rewarding because I knew I wouldn’t be fulfilled by it and I would just ultimately be wasting my time. The problem is we’re human beings, we’re not robots. Maybe in economic theory the price mechanism is what attracts investment, talent and resources and it does, but to an extent. Even though money is tempting, I don’t think it’s enough for people to give up their deeper core values to trade that in and ultimately just become an economic slave. After all, if you’re trading your life for money, you’ve decided one is more important than the other and in some sense you’ve become a slave to money. And I understand that we live in a real-world economy where people have to put food on the table and pay rent so in some cases you have to compromise, the hope at least, being that you can transition into a track where you enjoy your work and get paid for it—i.e. integrating and aligning the two.
Just do what you love:
Ok, so we’ve described the first position and some of society’s more traditional advice, and then elaborated on it. So obviously, if that doesn’t work then we should just figure out what we’re passionate about and find a way to do what we love, after all with the internet and technology people can literally work in any industry, sector or niche or just create their own right?
It’s true some people really like walking dogs and are good at it. Traditionally, you’d never think to make as much as a doctor or lawyer with this kind of occupation, but thanks to the magic of the internet, scalability and Facebook Ads some people can actually make more than doctors and lawyers with a dog walking business, or selling tea on Shopify etc. So in some ways, just do what you love and the money will follow makes sense and definitely incorporates the missing element of inner fulfilment that the more old-school advice either ignores or glosses over, so why is “do what you love” BS advice?
Because you need to have logic mixed in and build an actual business. You need to have business brains when it comes to building a niche, this can be developed but it’s important you understand what you’re doing. First of all, there needs to be a unique reason or selling point for someone to become a client or customer.
And whilst the “get a good respectable job” line of thought is based on logic, the “do what you love” line of thought is based on emotion. Listen, what you love changes—interests, passions can change over time. And even if you do find something you can stick with it doesn’t necessarily mean you can make a business or career out of it. That could just be a point of interest or a hobby, it doesn’t mean it’s going to take off into a business that can sustain you, but I definitely wouldn’t advise against trying different things and building on these passions because it could well be something that works out. The truth is that some things are just meant to stay as hobbies or things you do on the side and that is fine. If you are to take an area of interest and try turning it into a career or business there needs to be something solid to base it on. There needs to be a unique service / product or offering that stands out from the rest of the market otherwise you’re just competing with everyone else. But, I do strongly agree that you should have interest in the area you do decide to pursue, otherwise, what’s the point?
What’s the solution?
I’ve outlined both sides of the argument and the areas I feel they fall short, but I haven’t yet outlined the area I feel they’re both at their core missing. I believe that the question they’re trying to answer, in this case, what should I dedicate my life and career to, needs to be clarified because then we can decide on what it is we’re trying to achieve—in this case I believe people want to have a job / career / business which does bring them respect, status, money, security, but also fulfilment, purpose, satisfaction and has some kind of greater contribution to society—then we can get clearer on the solution.
With this question in mind I believe that what we’re really looking for in our working life isn’t necessarily money, status etc. And it’s not necessarily just a passion or interest either (even though that definitely helps). What we’re looking for is an area we can add value to and an organisation or environment that equally adds value to us. To sum it up in a word, synergy.
What is synergy?
Synergy (noun):
the interaction or cooperation of two or more organizations, substances, or other agents to produce a combined effect greater than the sum of their separate effects: (the synergy between artist and record company.)
ORIGIN: mid 19th century: from Greek sunergos ‘working together’, from sun- ‘together’ + ergon ‘work’.
Here the word synergy means an interaction of elements to create something greater than the sum of their parts. Or from the Greek ‘working together’. I believe that that dynamic in all areas of life, but in this particular example of career and business, is vital and what we’re truly looking to achieve.
I believe this is the reason why people will feel miserable even when they’ve ticked all “the boxes” given by societal norms, it’s because inside they feel that the synergy isn’t there and things will start breaking down until they can get into an area where they feel they’re truly contributing and adding value.
If you think of a business like an orchestra, then each component is adding to the greater whole to create a harmony. I believe this is true in business and relationships, if there is a lack of coherence or harmony, then things will break down in one form or another until that is restored. Whilst I believe this is where the “do what you love” advice is useful as it is based on trying to find some form of synergy or some form of harmonious symbiotic relationship, it also needs to incorporate the logic of bringing together the right elements and resources in order to achieve that greater synergy and value add. This is how value can be created by finding that combination of ingredients to blend together and make something great. And I believe if we try to mix the logic of finding a good position with the emotion of following your passions and blend the two together we can focus on creating greater synergy which is the true objective once we’ve delved deeper into the process. Focusing on areas of synergy gives us a much better direction in trying to find where it is we “fit” and hoping to accomplish the goal of both adding value to an organisation, team or relationship, as well as receiving reciprocal rewards such as money, recognition, status etc.
So in conclusion, just by understanding the true aim of what we’re trying to achieve as well as changing the perspective and definition of what we’re searching for we can gain greater clarity and save time and resources by not chasing the wrong opportunities and looking for areas where we can find that ‘fit’ and synergy, along with all the benefits that come with it.
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Thank you.
Ryan
