Playing to Strengths. Indeed.

The Character First! definition of Truthfulness is Earning future trust by accurately reporting past facts. Various gurus would have told you by now that you need to be playing to strengths and not correcting weaknesses. Of course, they are right. How right? Let’s take a closer look, shall we?

We are told that leaders in times of yore have tended to correct the weaknesses they saw in their people instead of emphasizing the strengths their people had. “Postmodern” sages tell us that we are so much more enlightened in our time. They say that we are fortunate to be living in the era we are living in now. To a degree, they are right. Looked at from another angle, many of them are simply perpetuating myths. Flights of fancy, as they are often called. We need to put a stop to this. Which one of you believes that you are not playing to strengths every single day? Think about the things you like to do. If you like to take bird photos, do you put in effort to learn how to take great photos? Do you take the trouble to learn from people who are good at taking bird photos? Do you invest in the equipment which would help you to take great bird photos? Of course you do! If you don’t, you need to ask yourself whether you are really that interested in taking bird photos and maybe go do something else!

White Lies?

White lies are lies. In fact, there is no such thing as a white lie. We as people have been swallowing lies hook, line and sinker since we were very young. We’ve been told that we are miserable in our current vocations because we haven’t been playing to strengths. Stop believing those lies. We’re miserable in our current vocations because we were told that having more money is key to happiness in life. We chose our vocations because we believed that those vocations would give us more money. We believed that more money would make us happy. No. It was a lie. Choosing to be happy no matter what the circumstances are makes us happy. It causes us to reach out for what makes us even happier, in a virtuous cycle. That means we can stay in our current vocations and deliberately create conditions for happiness. It also means we can change vocations or companies.

Just Do It!

What do you really want to do? What is your life calling? To put it another way, what on earth are you doing for Heaven’s sake? Well, start doing it! If you find that doing what you like doesn’t pay your bills, change how you do it! You might believe passionately that people should parkour to work. However, not many people might be willing to pay you to help them parkour to work. Well, market it differently or find customers in other places. Maybe all you need to do is design footwear that can assist people by boosting their jump distances and/ or heights. Perhaps designing a performance-boosting exoskeleton might help, too! An auto-inflate safety suit would alleviate fears of falling off skyscrapers. Then again, that might not be such a good idea if safety for others on the ground is important. You get the drift. If you’re really passionate about parkour to work, others will catch on!

Still trying to play to your strengths? Drop it! Just go do what you like best first! It will lead you to discover a more excellent way!