Get to the finish line and find that dopamine! Intensives, the 80% Problem, and deliberately finding things that we can do well and to completion in order to build trust in our own abilities to change the world.
Transcript
Hey, everyone. Thanks for tuning in. Today I
Leela Sinha:want to talk about finishing things. I am, as of this
Leela Sinha:morning, within very easy reach of finishing something.
Leela Sinha:Specifically, I'm in very easy reach of finishing the Hindi
Leela Sinha:course in Duolingo. Now, before you get all impressed, it does
Leela Sinha:not have five units like so many Duolingo what courses do it has
Leela Sinha:two courses, two units. So it's less impressive than it might be
Leela Sinha:if I were finishing Oh, I don't know Scots Gaelic or Welsh. But
Leela Sinha:do you know how long it's been since I've really finished
Leela Sinha:something and felt like it was tied up well with a bow? Do you
Leela Sinha:know how long it's been since I've had a sense of completion,
Leela Sinha:like yes, that was finished the way I wanted it to be? I don't
Leela Sinha:get to finish things in my life, usually. I usually leave in a
Leela Sinha:hurry with toilet paper sticking to one shoe, as I rush out the
Leela Sinha:door. I've had more breakup-driven moves than I care
Leela Sinha:to count. Times when I thought I could trust that we were going
Leela Sinha:to stay and figure it out. And that didn't turn out to be the
Leela Sinha:case. So often, as an intensive, I lose interest 80% of the way
Leela Sinha:through a project. I get to 80% and I can see the ending, I know
Leela Sinha:how it could end, I know that it will end, I know that I could do
Leela Sinha:it. And it's not interesting anymore, the puzzle is gone. The
Leela Sinha:challenge and novelty has worn off. It's tarnished and faded.
Leela Sinha:And my brain has already moved on to the next interesting
Leela Sinha:puzzle, which is completely unrelated and does not lead to
Leela Sinha:finishing this puzzle. And that happens over and over and over
Leela Sinha:again so much that in my business, I highly recommend
Leela Sinha:this, I hired somebody to do the last 20%. Because by the time
Leela Sinha:it's at the last 20%, I can explain what needs to happen.
Leela Sinha:And it's not creative work. It's not particularly interesting
Leela Sinha:most of the time. And so I just want someone else to finish it,
Leela Sinha:I just want someone else to put it together and get it out
Leela Sinha:there. Sometimes it does require a little of my input and then
Leela Sinha:the process is slow as molasses. I still do it eventually. But it
Leela Sinha:might take forever. And meanwhile, I'm busy doing other
Leela Sinha:things, more creative things, things that are more
Leela Sinha:interesting. Now, there's a whole judgment in our world
Leela Sinha:about, about how we aren't supposed to do that. How it is
Leela Sinha:undisciplined and undignified and un-un-un-un. That we are not
Leela Sinha:enough that we are not good enough that we are not, we're
Leela Sinha:not adult enough that there's somehow some valor in being
Leela Sinha:willing and able to do the boring stuff to finish a thing.
Leela Sinha:Guess what? There isn't. There is no moral superiority in doing
Leela Sinha:the boring stuff to finish a thing. In fact, if the thing is
Leela Sinha:not needed in the world, if it is purely pleasure, there's no
Leela Sinha:moral superiority at all. If you want to have a stack of
Leela Sinha:unfinished projects and objects, that's what we call them in
Leela Sinha:knitting and crocheting and most of the craft world UFOs-
Leela Sinha:unfinished objects- if you want to have a stack of UFOs that
Leela Sinha:reaches to the ceiling, because you don't actually care if they
Leela Sinha:get finished, you can do that. Do you know how many yard sales
Leela Sinha:have unfinished needlepoint and knitting projects in them? I
Leela Sinha:hear that some places even have swaps, where you can go and pick
Leela Sinha:up somebody else's unfinished thing that they're no longer
Leela Sinha:interested in because they are process people they're
Leela Sinha:interested in the doing of it. But once the doing of it has
Leela Sinha:been substantially completed, they're no longer interested. I
Leela Sinha:myself have a sweater that I've been knitting since 2009. It has
Leela Sinha:a somewhat complex and sordid history and there are reasons
Leela Sinha:why it's hard for me to pick up that have nothing to do with the
Leela Sinha:knitting itself. But also I just haven't put my sights on it and
Leela Sinha:decided that finishing it is its own project. Which is, by the
Leela Sinha:way, the secret, if you're an intensive, to finishing things
Leela Sinha:is to make the entire finishing process into its own project.
Leela Sinha:Allow there to be enough time between most of the project and
Leela Sinha:the end of the project that finishing the project feels like
Leela Sinha:a whole new project. And then you pick it up and you can get
Leela Sinha:20% and 20% and because this isn't theoretical physics,
Leela Sinha:eventually you get done. Eventually you get like 80%
Leela Sinha:takes you almost all the way there, and then you do 80% of
Leela Sinha:the remaining 20%, then you do 80% Of the remaining 20%. And
Leela Sinha:then it's like, come on, just do two more stitches, and this
Leela Sinha:whole thing will be done.
Leela Sinha:Also, I like to make friends who like to weave in the ends,
Leela Sinha:because I'm terrible with all those little bits of yarn or
Leela Sinha:thread, in sewing, that hang off clothes. You'll notice if you
Leela Sinha:see me wearing my homemade clothes, that often there's a
Leela Sinha:dangling thread from my cuff and another from my waist because I
Leela Sinha:didn't bother to go back and tuck those threads in. I will
Leela Sinha:eventually. But again, it might take forever. And I have to
Leela Sinha:remember that it matters because that's not the part that matters
Leela Sinha:to me. What matters to me is that I spent hours and hours and
Leela Sinha:hours, days, months, in the case of the Banyan project, figuring
Leela Sinha:out how to make this garment. Because sewing and knitting,
Leela Sinha:they're three-dimensional geometry and physics. And if
Leela Sinha:like me, you're very sensitive to the textures and the weights
Leela Sinha:of fabric on you, sometimes there are also other kinds of
Leela Sinha:ephemeral arts that allow you to find a thing that you can wear
Leela Sinha:that also looks the way you want it to look. I have reset now the
Leela Sinha:sleeves on the Banyan three times. And I may have to set
Leela Sinha:them again because there seems to be a wrinkle somewhere.
Leela Sinha:Fortunately, fortunately, the sleeve is not integral to any of
Leela Sinha:the rest of the process. Even if I put cuffs on the sleeves as I
Leela Sinha:intend to do, finish the ends, round out the hem. If I decide
Leela Sinha:that this sleeve is bothering me too much, I can clip it out and
Leela Sinha:sew it back in at my leisure. One of the sleeves is doing
Leela Sinha:fine, the other one not so much. But see this Banyon project was
Leela Sinha:conceived with the idea that I would make the one that I'm
Leela Sinha:making now as a wearable muslin, refine my pattern, figure out
Leela Sinha:the fit-which I have done-and then once I figure this one out,
Leela Sinha:the idea is... was? is? that I will buy ornate fabric and make
Leela Sinha:myself one that makes me feel absolutely glorious. Because
Leela Sinha:beige, donated, IKEA curtains just aren't cutting it. The
Leela Sinha:other option, of course, is that I could embroider this one by
Leela Sinha:hand except that embroidery is not my art. And that feels like
Leela Sinha:an insurmountable amount of embroidering. I'm less
Leela Sinha:interested in decoration than I am in shape and form. So because
Leela Sinha:I'm less interested in decoration than shape and form,
Leela Sinha:and because I have the intensives 80% problem, I don't
Leela Sinha:always finish things easily. So when I'm looking at this Hindi
Leela Sinha:course, and I'm about to finish it. Now I know they're probably
Leela Sinha:going to add more on at some point like they did to the
Leela Sinha:Portuguese course and then I will be behind instead of ahead.
Leela Sinha:And that's fine. Because I would like to see the Hindi course
Leela Sinha:built out. But meanwhile, I will finish it, I'm going to finish
Leela Sinha:something and I am excited and unaccountably nervous about
Leela Sinha:finishing things. And I feel like this is kind of where we
Leela Sinha:are in the pandemic, where we're not sure about finishing things
Leela Sinha:because the pandemic carries on-much as we wish it would not.
Leela Sinha:BA.5 is incredibly contagious. And now we have monkey pox to
Leela Sinha:contend with. And no, it's not just an STI. And when we
Leela Sinha:confront all of those realities, it feels like we're never going
Leela Sinha:to finish this project. Not only has this turned into a group
Leela Sinha:project that we're failing because most of the group
Leela Sinha:refuses to do the work. But now we're also in a group project
Leela Sinha:where they just keep adding pieces to it and we've never hit
Leela Sinha:the finish line. And the problem with that, for all humans but
Leela Sinha:especially intensives, is that the finish line is where the
Leela Sinha:dopamine is. Having nailed it is where the dopamine is. Knowing
Leela Sinha:that you absolutely got it so right is where the dopamine is.
Leela Sinha:And as we get older, we know we can't expect that dopamine from
Leela Sinha:everything all the time. But we need some of it some of the
Leela Sinha:time. I literally started working on my Hindi and Duolingo
Leela Sinha:again after years of not because I needed dopamine and because I
Leela Sinha:wanted to talk to my grandmother, but at least 50% of
Leela Sinha:my consistency with Duolingo has been the dopamine. I'm just past
Leela Sinha:120 days. And I think I've used two streak freezes, which means
Leela Sinha:that's a real 120 days-ish. I just keep showing up because my
Leela Sinha:brain needs it. So
Leela Sinha:in the middle of all of this, and as business owners where
Leela Sinha:we're constantly pivoting, we're constantly trying to figure out
Leela Sinha:what COVID's next move is, what the economy's next move is, what
Leela Sinha:are we going to do to support ourselves and our employees and
Leela Sinha:our clients? How are we going to keep ourselves moving? And our
Leela Sinha:heads above water? And how are we going to make sure in the
Leela Sinha:midst of all of this, that we ourselves don't burn out?
Leela Sinha:Because it's not just us relying on us. Although even if we were
Leela Sinha:that would be a good enough cause.
Leela Sinha:And the answer is to deliberately find things that we
Leela Sinha:can do well, and to completion. And it doesn't matter what it
Leela Sinha:is, as long as it doesn't hurt anyone else. Coloring Pages. If
Leela Sinha:you like coloring, do coloring pages. If you like walking,
Leela Sinha:walk. There's one route that I walk and when I walk it, I feel
Leela Sinha:like I have done my walk. And I use that to feel like I'm doing
Leela Sinha:something. Dishes. Do all your dishes, and then wipe down the
Leela Sinha:sink. Even if the rest of the kitchen is a complete disaster,
Leela Sinha:mine often is. Set a timer for five minutes of something,
Leela Sinha:anything, and then just do that thing for five minutes. It
Leela Sinha:doesn't have to be complicated. But it does have to give you the
Leela Sinha:sense that you are capable of finishing something because
Leela Sinha:that's what I'm realizing as I come to the end of this course.
Leela Sinha:And I'm actually like, "Okay, that's it that I can't keep
Leela Sinha:doing this." It's not like I'm choosing to stop at this point.
Leela Sinha:I cannot keep doing this because there's nothing else to do. So
Leela Sinha:now from this point of completion, I have to choose
Leela Sinha:what my next path is, do I hire an Indian tutor? Do I start
Leela Sinha:studying with a different app? Do I go back to Rosetta Stone
Leela Sinha:and see if they've improved their phone interface enough for
Leela Sinha:me to use it? They probably haven't. What is it that I need
Leela Sinha:to do so that I can continue to grow in this, because I have
Leela Sinha:completely outgrown the tool I was using. And that sense of
Leela Sinha:standing at the end of the path and looking forward is
Leela Sinha:remarkable. We don't often get to stand at the end of the path
Leela Sinha:and look forward like that. Especially in business,
Leela Sinha:especially in entrepreneurship, especially in the middle of a
Leela Sinha:pandemic and climate change and all the other things that are
Leela Sinha:happening in the world right now. It's very hard to get that
Leela Sinha:"Okay, that's behind me, now what" feeling, but we need to
Leela Sinha:have that, we need to build that up in ourselves. And we need to
Leela Sinha:invoke that for ourselves. So that we can get some
Leela Sinha:perspective. And so that we can be nourished because as
Leela Sinha:intensives, that's where our nourishment comes from. It's
Leela Sinha:ironic because the 80% problem says that, we get to 80%. And
Leela Sinha:then we're less inclined to do the remaining 20%. But the real
Leela Sinha:sense of satisfaction, the real like, oh yeah, I can do this, I
Leela Sinha:can trust myself I can. I can change things in my world, to a
Leela Sinha:state of completion- that comes from the actual 100%. It can
Leela Sinha:come from 100% that you've hired someone to finish for you. It
Leela Sinha:can come from 100% that you swap with somebody else. It can come
Leela Sinha:from 100% in any one of a number of ways. But we need to create
Leela Sinha:that sensation, that experience for ourselves so that we know
Leela Sinha:that it's possible. So that not only do we get the biochemical
Leela Sinha:hit that we get from that, but also so that we trust each other
Leela Sinha:and we trust ourselves. The more things I finish, the more trust
Leela Sinha:I have in myself. The more trust I have in myself, the more able
Leela Sinha:I am to take on creating solutions that we don't think
Leela Sinha:are possible. Thanks for tuning in.