The Magic Power of Doing Things Badly
A young man I worked with was on a success mission. He was a straight-A student who’d beaten off hefty competition to score his first corporate job. He was smart, focused, socially savvy — and utterly miserable.
His problem was prodigious talent. Studies. Sports. Guitar. Debating. Dating. From a young age, he’d participated with gusto— and made a smash success of everything he’d touched.
But in his early 20s the balloon had popped. He was good at his new job but not (yet) a star. He’d lost his drive, he couldn’t see a way forward — and he wasn’t even sure if he liked the field he had chosen.
He wasn’t feeling any Passion.
A psychologist can’t tell an ambitious young person to put their talent on ice or not to go all out in pursuit of their dreams. That would be weird, potentially even damaging.
But you can help them think less about what they want from life, and more about the kind of life they want.
So I asked him: “What’s fun for you, Jack?”
He stared at me blankly so I asked again. “What do you do for fun? For no purpose other than it makes you feel good.”
“Parties. Alcohol and drugs,” he said, with a wry smile. “But it’s a wet blanket kind of fun.”
