"Change breaks the brittle." – Jan Houtema

I saw this quote via Paul Graham and like it. It's Short. Pithy. Meaningful. When I went to learn who Jan is as I always want context around a quote, all I found were references to this quote, mostly from others in the tech world. But no information on Jan Houtema. I even went to page three of Google. Alas, only more references to this and a couple of other quote. There is Jan Huitema, who's a young member of the European Parliament from the Netherlands.

It makes me think others also latched on to this quote but haven't unearthed the human behind it? Maybe it's Jan Doe? Or maybe it highlights how quickly we grab fleeting bits of digital flotsam without looking beneath to learn the why. Our superficiality can cause us to miss the connections that make our lives richer. No wonder we feel emotionally vacant and depleted even when we have the world at our fingertips. Okay, you may not feel that way, but I believe many do. Myself included at times.

If anyone knows who Jan Houtema is, I'm all ears.

Let's talk about boiling frogs and radical adaptability.

I equate boiling frogs to complacency. We don't notice change until it's too late for us to adapt. And it gets us caught flat-footed. However, this might be a myth. Assuming you believe everything you read, frogs due jump out as the temperature rises. With climate change, it might be hard for us to jump out or off the earth. That's the most obvious parallel, but what about your work? What about the stories you tell yourself? When we're complacent, we assume things will always be the same.

This year has created many forced awakenings and I know we'd like to go back to sleep until the nightmare is over. It feels like there are too many intractable huge problems coming at once causing a sense of helplessness. That we can't do anything to fix them ourselves. The powerlessness is palpable yet we have more power than we give ourselves credit for.

I talked last week about fear and moving away from it. Complacency is about sticking your head in the sand. Enter radicl adaptability. Agility. A nimble posture. When you are agile you are not brittle. You won't shatter easily under pressure. Rather, you'll adjust course.

We know what it means to adapt. But what about radical adaptability? The ability to adjust fast and strong. It's almost like honing your ability to think on your feet.

Most of us have varying levels of adaptability. From a fixed mindset inability to adapt to a mythical sense that nothing gets in the way. This year has put each of our abilities to the test.

Fortunately, like many aspects to life, there's a framework to help you! I stumbled upon Personal Resource Allocation (PRA) from Psychology Today when exploring the concept further.

The essence is that each of us has a fixed number of personal resources (time, energy and money) which get applied to meet their demands (work and life). We have to determine how to allocate these resources to achieve our desired outcomes. Some blindly don't think about this and time gets away, projects go unfinished or money depleted. And the results are subpar.

But what if you took stock of what's available to you now and could envision some of the demands you are facing, and will face, then leave some reserve for what you don't know? Imagine how you could influence your future success.

Given there are always constraints, I go back to a favorite book, A Beautiful Constraint and ask, "how can I achieve X given I only have X, am X or have to . . .?"

This opens the door to actually achieving your long term goals. The ability to be radically adaptable doesn't mean you have to be cold and calculating. Or go off the grid. It means you build in more resilience and adjust your mindset. Thinking about what resources you have can take some pressure off as you realize you might have what you need after all.

If it's time you lack, look at your priorities. Maybe they're misaligned. Things that get focus get done. Simple is better so don't overthink the framework and parse every morsel you've got.

The one person who'll never leave you.

We've all got that one person in our life that sometimes we love and sometimes we hate. Sometimes we just wish they'd leave us alone. Stop yammering all the time. Yet they won't. They can't take a hint. No matter how direct you are. They just won't leave you alone. And that's you! Yes, you.

Isn't it comforting to know you've got one person you can count on at all times? Which makes it all the more important to get to know yourself. That can be hard when you're focused on a screen with fingers scrolling.

Find the quiet. Endure the quiet. Not all can hike the Pacific Crest Trail like Cheryl but what if you took a day? No phone. No technology. Just you and you.

Matthew McConaughey teed this up in a podcast I heard last week. He went off on his own for 52 days (not consecutively) to write his book. Perhaps it's silly to think in these terms with loneliness plaguing much of the world, yet it's a reminder of how your success is up to you.

You get to choose how you process the inputs and outputs. It's why I wrote last week about how all of us can be wealthy if we choose. The kicker is don't wait. Take action. Small action that compounds into something big.

James Clear writes in his book, Atomic Habits about how we often dismiss small changes because they don’t seem to matter very much in the moment. But small unhealthy changes create highly toxic results. And vice versa. Climate change is prime example.

Others have said and I'll say here that we overestimate what we can do in a day but underestimate what we can do in a lifetime. Get to know yourself. Embrace your inner voice. Give it air. Help direct it where you want to go. Make it work for you. Not against you. After all, it's going to stick by you through thick and thin.

Let's talk business and brands

As a long time brand builder, I watch what's trending in the branding world. Given the pace of change today, it's not likely we'll see many 100 year-old brands like John Deere. Brands have to stay fresh and relevant yet they can have continuity in what they stand for and how they talk.

Just like you should with your personal brand. Who wants a friend that changes their personality every month? Brands are not different in that regard. Here are three I'm finding interesting right now:

Liquid Death: Turning how water is marketed on it's head a brand that takes a heavy metal approach to pitching water. With a tagline "Murder your thirst" they set the tone.

Why this matters: in the days when people went clubbing, the designated driver had to settle for an uncool looking bottle of water. Enter liquid Death and they can feel like they're part of the party while staying sober.

Pou-pourri: Still one of my favorites with their viral video from 2013 (7 years old and still relevant), they turn a crappy subject into something to talk about in polite company.

I had the opportunity to meet Suzy Batiz at a conference in 2015 and learn more about the growth of their company. Like Liquid Death, Pou-pourri has developed a strong voice around their product. Suzy shipped me her range of products after we met and I can attest they work if you haven't tried them. Last year they turned heads with their giant poop emoji that plopped right into Portland for a few days.

Pategonia: An older brand and an example of how to stay current and relevant with the times. Especially in the fickle fashion and outdoor industry. Original Pategonia jackets sell for multiples of their original price on the resale and collectors markets. They, too, have their own voice and live their values. They put this front and center. Above selling yet they still sell just fine.

While many companies play it so safe that they all either sound alike or spew corporate gobbledygook, these brands exude personality. They let you know who they are. And who they're for. They're not shy nor worried about offending people. They know who their customer is.

Take a good look at how you walk and talk. Be willing to stand for something that matters to the people that matter to you. Infuse that in your emails. In how you approach what you do.

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The future of jobs in 2025

I'll end this week sharing a report from the World Economic Forum on 5 things you should know about the future of jobs. Number 4 is about the top skills that will be in demand by 2025:

1. Analytical thinking and innovation
2. Active learning and learning strategies
3. Complex problem-solving
4. critical thinking and analysis
5. creativity, originality and initiative
6. leadership and social influence
7. Technology use, monitoring and control
8. technology design and programming
9. resilience, stress tolerance and flexibility
10. reasoning, problem-solving and ideation

Read the report for the rest. Note the demand for resilience. In other words, don't be brittle!

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