Of all the growth strategies I’ve witnessed and tried, this is the one that never fails. And it’s so much about your growth as those you are supporting.

It’s the wrong question is often what needs to be said yet rarely it’s the case. We are taken hostage by the framing rather than reclaiming our rightful position in this charade. 

A simple dance that feels out of control and out of the passions of a single opinion blatantly, we succumb and fall into the trap of a deceitful question. 

A question that never was intended for its answer, but its purpose dwindles in withdrawing every single breath that you hold dear, so no answer except that which that question already implied is given. 

It is in that storm that we lose sight of the truth that ever is, that the question sometimes is not a question at all but an answer imposed and dressed in beguiling form, standing proud as if no other could ever be.

Simply in that context, which is depriving and naive, is to be witness to the power of reclaiming what a few words could bring forward to see outspoken and stating: it is simply the wrong question.

Of all the growth strategies I’ve witnessed and tried, this is the one that never fails. And it’s so much about your growth as those you are supporting.



Have someone’s back. It’s that simple.

 

And often, they won’t need anything from you except an affirmation that you got them. You will be surprised how powerful that is.

Are you helping others to flourish?

My book Reality Check is finally in audiobook format. It took a long time to accept that I didn’t have the time to do a good recording of the book, so I hired an amazing narrator to do the job. I would love you to check it out and grab a copy. If you already have the ebook, it is heavily discounted. Listen to a clip from the intro.

Are you helping others to flourish?

When many things don’t add up, the most obvious answer is rarely on the transport layer and typically aimed at the content. While the content might be the cause, more often than not, it’s the transport layer, the means by which we transfer information, ideas, and thoughts, that is the cause of our troubles.

Scratch and bound in its destiny to be
A symbol from thee to promise an eternity
The love, life, and reign of the one
Misguided by the sane wisdom of none

A promise or a dream is yet to be gleaned
From the porch of an empty swing leaped
The song of a lifetime bound by the one ring
Yet the beauty of life is that the rejuvenating time is king

Broken the promise will be for an expected eternity
Over a symbol of one married to none but insanity
To believe the reign of a ring is one
Yet one it remains even when the ring is broken and done

Not ounce but many folds for its tarnished edges
Witness the timeless scratches over the ledges
The ring can change or not
No difference it makes, for the reign is not bound by a knot

Rounded in a metallic sphere of an expectation to secure
What should be boundless free and beyond any brew
Of concoctions of destiny, structure or form
For the formless in a symbol dies with no norm

Reign free oh ring on the ring
Broken the promise will be echoing
Over a symbol of one married to none but insanity
In forever more it remains nothing but a piece of jewelry

The reign of what could be
Cannot be withstood from the sphere of thee
Relinquish your power and in the multitudes
Embrace the one not for its promise nor it’s platitudes

The reign, the ring can’t match the boundless
In all it’s attempt for feable greatness
It bares nothing and all with no preparedness
Once the ring, the reign disappears in the endlessness

When many things don’t add up, the most obvious answer is rarely on the transport layer and typically aimed at the content. 

While the content might be the cause, more often than not, it’s the transport layer, the means we transfer information, ideas, and thoughts, that is the cause of our troubles.



The gateway and gatekeeper, the language we use, sits at the core and in between. 

When complexity rises, investigate the transport layer and not the content only.



Are you aware of the disruption language is creating?

I leave you with a comedy skit about something that should be so obvious about change and learning delivered in such an interesting reframe. Enjoy!

Are you aware of the disruption language is creating?

Disturbing, mending, or everything in between, be wary of the power of the vibrations that we call words. Spoken or unspoken, the vibrations imprint words in our being that associate outcomes, consequences, and identification all within a single utterance. 

Over-towering and over the top looking
As it may, the presence shadows the being

We grow sometimes, but most often, we shrink
In the wilderness of overwhelm, we think

The thinking minimizes the presence
The expansion of us and all disappears in essence

Following the truth at best, feel the BIG in you
The vastness of a space beyond, living in a dew

And greater than the rain falling in a storm
Swirling in an eye, watching over with no norm

How BIG, how expanded, and vast there is
Once you are present in its greatness bliss

It transports you beyond what could be
Without leaving where you ought to be

The BIG that lives in the wonder and the beauty
Doesn’t cower now or ever lose its space willingly

In forevermore BIG it remains vast
Towering your being sits greater than a shadow cast

Spoken or unspoken, the vibrations imprint words in our being that associate outcomes, consequences, and identification all within a single utterance. 



It's hard to explain, even though it's understood. There is more to what a single word means or does. 

It drills so deep, positively or negatively, so much so that it is difficult to ignore the quakes it makes on our presence. 



Yet, have you noticed the weight of stillness and serenity in the face of the disturbance? 

Like a calm surface of water settling back into its peace after a ripple has been dropped, the sinking of the utterance deep into the depth clears the ripple's mend almost as if the void drowns the vibrations. 

Do you quake in the face of utterances or resolve in serenity?

Nile Wilson tells his story from two lenses, and in the span of a few minutes, it will hit you on two extremes — one that is positive and filled with success and another that is riddled with pain and failures. The first 3min once he starts talking, will give you a taste of the dichotomies that live in all of us, irrespective of how the story is told.

Do you quake in the face of utterances or resolve in serenity?

Everyone needs someone to have faith in them. And that doesn't exclude your boss or the most successful and cheerful person you know. If anything, they are probably the ones who need it the most.

Blurry is a beauty, 
occasionally squinting for a brief focus 
that relaxes back into the blurry 
rather than the other way around. 

The more focused we are, 
the less open our gaze is. 
The more precise our predicament, 
the worse our acceptance is. 
The more, the more 
lies the lies 
of the cruelty of more. 

The bully encroaches 
in their decisiveness and clarity, 
believing no other could be or is. 
Where the shy, the timid instead relaxes
in the ease of a moment lacking 
but respectfully probably way more than it merits. 

Conviction is such a dangerous dream
in the silence of a scream 
of the agony of clarity dancing in a haze, 
oblivious of the beauty of the blurry shadow 
that follows its every move. 

Listening dies in the eyes 
of the all-seeing and knowing, 
for it has no room to breathe, 
and in the cacophony of sounds 
played to muse and command, 
the sound that carries or moves 
denies itself the gift of seeing. 

For in the blurry of being, 
the whole of who we are melds 
in the blurry of the one. 
Withholding the seeking of clarity 
amid the haze of every day’s uncertainty 
continues to relish the moment 
where the blurry calls you 
and, in its essence, molds you.

And that doesn't exclude your boss or the most successful and cheerful person you know. If anything, they are probably the ones who need it the most.



Everyone is a leader, even if it's not in your title or job description, especially when you don't believe you are. 

And as such, your task is to inspire and root for others, and in doing so, you are rooting for yourself too.


Have faith in others, and you will have faith in yourself. And that's true more than anything because we are all connected and one. We might have different backgrounds, titles, ethnic backgrounds, genders, etc.. but in our humanity, we unite.

Can you have faith in someone you feel they do not need it?

In this interview by Mark Laita with Jack, a recovered survivor of sexual abuse and drug addiction, there were so many shocking, sad, and uncomfortable moments. But the level of compassion and love in every word he said, even the painful moments, is beyond measure. So profound and intense. (trigger warning for sure) at 1hr 10min, he shares the most important lesson he has learned, and he says: “It's going to sound so trivial, but the most important lesson that I've learned in my life is that regardless of how I feel and regardless of what others say, I matter.”

Can you have faith in someone you feel they do not need it?

It doesn't matter how strong your problem-solving skills are if finding solutions and answers is your forte by assuming you have all the answers already. Knowing is Achilles' heel. 

Ownership is the dream of holding, possessing in the mind the power to have, and in that lies a decrypt bitter old agonizing truth that keeps assuming in the ability to be never realizing its destiny. 

Such a torment the clenched fist hold in their tight grasp to bring forward immense power, never recognizing the power never stand within them rather even from them but in the arms that hold them in a body that moves them as a whole unclenched and yet swift in release. 

The undeniable bitterness pierces through recognizing it can never own, and in its charade, it continues to waltz in the halls as a king and queen naked to the stings of endless doubts about what could be held or owned yet never to be within reach. 

Swift is the justice often to teach the beguiling attempts that the clenched fist, the hold, the ownerships never will be happens in the mirage of myriad truths that never see what was the cause in the first place. 

It’s uncanny to believe one could ever escape, yet in the escape, the bitterness dissolves in the wonder of the ultimate truth that there is nothing to be owned and no one attempt will ever land a blow in a clenched fist that aims to tighten the grip on what is soon to be felt as had but never will be.

It doesn't matter how strong your problem-solving skills are if finding solutions and answers is your forte by assuming you have all the answers already. Knowing is Achilles' heel. 



Even ChatGPT-3, with its massive dataset of roughly 45 TB of data from multiple sources, comes to a halt in the face of the prompt. 

All its answers, even if they could be correct, will be wrong if we don't know what to ask.


The question is the key. Find the question first.

Are you an expert in knowing or a seeker of questions?

Intelligence is what we fear to lose to AI. Yet what all the hype is about today is LLMs (large language models) and not Intelligence, at least not yet. Today, AI can come closer to our intelligence because of its improved understanding of language. Thus, a good starting point is to understand LLMs before trying to understand AI. This explanation by Amr Awadallah, Founder & CEO of Vectara, does a great job of outlining not only what and how an LLM works but also the difference between fine-tuning and Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG), which, for those worried about data privacy, hallucinations, and explainability is a key differentiator. The whole video is excellent, but that section starts at 7:13.

Are you an expert in knowing or a seeker of questions?

When context is missing, even the best strategies fall short in telling a convincing story. Like drawing three dots on a blank sheet, lost, they look with no home to cradle them and with no story to tell. Anchor them in some frame, and the story changes.

It was given a blanket check
To edit incessantly and freely without giving a heck
Its instructions are wildly inaccurate
Yet we blindly follow like a drunken mate

Into the endless rabbit holes it takes us
Craving a better version of thee with no fuss
Yet an editor is all it is
In the frenzy and need to edit that’s its bliss

Merely a crave or a drive in shambles it derives
A story that is almost true but really mostly contrived 
Editing and editing away in fury and rage it persists
Yet in silence it can’t fathom to exist 

So, in the cage of endless ranting 
It continues to bring you down or up as if it’s nothing 
In your head, there is an editor that doesn’t shut up 
And its contract is up to expire yet what a scary reality that is if it ever did

Like drawing three dots on a blank sheet, lost, they look with no home to cradle them and with no story to tell. Anchor them in some frame, and the story changes.

Add two-axis below them; for example, we can start to visualize a growth trajectory or, in retrospect, a gloomy outcome looming. Switch it up and place two dots in a bigger circle and another in a smaller one; automatically, a clustering of sorts starts forming. 



Each frame we add enriches the story and makes it more accessible. 

That is context. It allows us to connect the dots and build an understood strategy.


And what we understand, we are more likely to subscribe to and be able to navigate. 

Is your strategy lacking context?

When we start looking one level beyond what’s obvious: “But what if our obsession with “screen time” is itself a smokescreen? What if, rather than saving us, this vanishing act obscures the deeper drivers of our digital dissatisfaction? After all, the real rot at the core of modern computing is not screens, but the Scylla and Charybdis of digital life: the unceasing acceleration of culture and human anxieties about our finitude.…These technologies accelerate the transportation of matter and ideas, scrambling our experience of time and place. In Open Sky, his 1997 polemic on technology, he mourns: “How can we live if there is no more here and everything is now?””

Is your strategy lacking context?

The second we are born, they start piling. One prison after the other, encasing the one before or renaming it. From your last name to your religion, country, race, language, profession, title, and even your hobbies, they add up.

Reclaim the space you take 
in your sphere of consciousness, 
distracting your attention 
from the things that matter in this instance.

We live inside a bubble of a self 
trying to be aware of itself, 
consumed in a vicious cycle of trying to be 
but being defeated by the same goal it tries to achieve.

Make way for you to surface 
by disappearing and not existing at all, 
as if you are forgotten and lost to this instance
from the records we try to keep. 

Remember the instance, 
and don’t be aware of it. 
It goes against everything you believe, 
yet in the essence of being 
the most pristine and pure form 
is to be not there.

Literally, figuratively, and in every other way
 you can think of, 
it’s the scariest thing 
you will ever do, 
yet it will be the most alive 
you have ever felt or been.

Let go of the idea of YOU. 

The obsession with what defines you
or the thoughts that keep you alive
and in your absence, your most authentic truth appears.

Unfiltered, unburdened
by the cognitive load of being
what it feels like is hard to explain, 
but once you find it or technically lose it, 
you will never want it back. 

Get out of the way!

The second we are born, they start piling. One prison after the other, encasing the one before or renaming it. From your last name to your religion, country, race, language, profession, title, and even your hobbies, they add up. Some are stronger than others, some weaker and more prone to be dismissed or changed.
 
Cages they are, put on a pedestal and rewarded at every turn — validated by a rap sheet resume of experience and belonging to one identity clan over the other. And after a while, they become so deeply ingrained that we forget their true nature — prisons and labels limiting and never capturing fully who we truly are.

Always a fraction of a fraction mirrored in the eyes of perception by the observer witnessing them. And as that may, the reality is that they will never disappear, and they don’t need to. Instead, use them, and don’t let them use you.



In the end, they are but a fraction of a fraction of your being, if that, a prison and cage deemed more worthy than they should be. 

Lose them, gain them, embrace them, or release them. All is fair game.


Is your identity using you, or are you using it?

This article is fascinating in and by itself and totally worth a full read, but I can’t summarize it. Instead, I want to draw your attention to this statement on unpopular questions: “The award honors Clauser, Aspect, and Zeilinger, but it is testament to all the researchers who were unsatisfied with superficial explanations about quantum mechanics and who asked their questions even when doing so was unpopular.”

Is your identity using you, or are you using it?

We make strides to be a knowledge house gathering information and growing our bank of expertise, yet despite our efforts, we remain machines designed to optimize.

No matter what, no matter who, 
No matter where, no matter. 
You are never too late. 

To be too late is to acknowledge 
that you know exactly the when, 
the what, and the where at every turn and step.

Yet as soon as you start believing that, 
then you should recognize as well 
that you are deeply convinced 
that everything is predefined 
and there is no wiggle room. 

Can you guarantee it 
beyond doubt?

For you to be too late, 
everything needs to be perfectly square 
and, in its predisposition, an elegant narrative 
you have no control of or driving, for that matter. 

For being in full control 
assumes never being late, 
and simultaneously to be driven 
by an exact path you cannot control 
reflects the precision of showing up 
exactly when you need to. 

Isn’t that a wonderful conundrum? 
And which one is it? 

You are never too late 
because the narrative of control 
escapes you in its beauty predates you. 

Be as it may, control or none, 
what stays true in either world you choose, 
never too late you are.

We make strides to be a knowledge house gathering information and growing our bank of expertise, yet despite our efforts, we remain machines designed to optimize. 

And in each optimization, we squash knowledge to condense and summarize. Thus losing some of the details in the process. And that’s all fine and dandy until you move into a new environment that requires the details, but you have optimized not to have them. 



Thus, you operate from a position where you assume you are on the same playing field as everyone, where in truth, most likely, you are not. 

Your knowledge of the details didn’t change, but the optimization is different per environment.


Are you aware of the optimizations your environment has done?

This is an insightful read on constraints in the spirit of 2024 on the horizon. John states: “Perhaps it’s worth asking whether you are the kind of person who will comply with your own rules, or whether you actually might benefit more from deep introspection, perhaps through conversation with others, to really question your character, your values, and your true aspirations in life. You won’t stick to new rules unless you have a flexible sense of identity which can adapt to accommodate the lifestyle of someone who follows such rules. If you are not willing to shed your skin and let go of attachments to the ‘old you’, you will never become the ‘new you’.” 

Are you aware of the optimizations your environment has done?

If you can hear it, then you are not listening. It sounds counterintuitive, yet the thing with truly being present and open to listening is that if you are aware of it, then you are distracted by it.

Resist the urge to agree or disagree instead ponder. 

Let the fear sway you 
And the guilt tempts you 

Let the joy lift you

Without a ceiling to break
Let the skepticism play

Without taking over
Let the criticism scrutinize

Without leaving anything alive
Resist the urge to agree or disagree instead ponder.

For in the unexpected moment 
Shall arise a seed

From outside your knowing
A beacon of wisdom will pierce the veil

From where it’s not clear
From who is even more obscure 

Yet resist the urge to agree or disagree instead ponder.

If you can hear it, then you are not listening. 



Sounds counterintuitive, yet the thing with truly being present and open to listening is that 

if you are aware of it, then you are distracted by it.



Once the hearing stops, the listening begins.
Once you recognize this, the true magic begins.

What do you hear when listening?

My partner and I recorded this back in 2019. While both of us come from very different worlds, we find the holiday season an opportunity for togetherness and embracing all identities that we hold in the spirit of love. While you may celebrate differently, the joy, care, and sense of belonging stay the same, and there is beauty in the uniqueness we all embody in the face of the oneness we share. We hope you enjoy it.

What do you hear when listening?

A problem arises, and we run to fix it. Another one surfaces even before the first one is resolved, and we are pulled toward it. The flood continues up to a point where the stack is as high as a mountain.

In the heat of moments, 
something stirs and often misses, 
and yet, even with that in mind, 
there is a will that persists, 
refusing to desist 
from taking a reprieve.

The sound shatters 
the inner cries of frustration and anguish 
and, in the middle of the night, 
succumbs to the craziness induced 
deafening the heart and mind in a single blow.

In the silence of an induced coma
of nothing and all, 
it’s hard to remember how it was long before
and where it could ever be forever more. 

The will, the might that never desists, 
sits idol behind and above in missing the truth. 
Often, it dwindles yet never falters,
for its might is not for us to bear 
or its will a feat that we could dare
to witness in all of its care.

A problem arises, and we run to fix it. Another one surfaces even before the first one is resolved, and we are pulled toward it. The flood continues up to a point where the stack is as high as a mountain. 

And as we fervently try to peel one issue at a time, the pile never seems to get any smaller. It's hard, and to be fair, sometimes we do not really have an option. If our home is on fire, we can't wait and come back tomorrow to put it out. It needs to be extinguished now.

And in that now, we need the most immediate resolution. Otherwise, everything will burn to the ground. 

This scenario plays out more often than not in our personal or professional lives. And yet, amid this commotion, what is often missed is long-term strategic thinking. One occludes the other.



And in reality, if a problem is a fire, there is no choice but to handle it. Yet, is every issue a fire? 

Consider the weight and the label as in that characterization lies the answer to allow for a breathing room for strategic thinking to happen.



Are you thinking strategically or putting out fires?

This very short post by Dino has such a clear message that I wish everyone hears. He said: “Presence is the math that a divided mind can't grasp. The energy busket gets empty only when there is conflict between you and this moment. Then you can be tired 100% and living life ...%.” I love the way he frames different situations.

Are you thinking strategically or putting out fires?

We love our processes, frameworks, models, and structures, yet often, we don't realize when the focus moves to be on them rather than the purpose they were created for in the first place.

A body feels and responds is fair
A mind thinks & thinks until despair

All natural and human, nothing to be scared 
Where the differences started and dared 

Is in the irony that our essence is touched
By the shenanigans of the divisible sum crushed

Of a belief that strife is our nature
In passing of time it dressed itself as the future 

Yet the reality is nothing more or nothing less 
It can’t be subtracted or added into that mess

The infinity and purity in the silence of who we are
Is more than more could ever be whether too near or far

The body and mind survives that’s understood 
As struggle, fragility and division is what’s under the hood 

Yet the truth lies in a we and unity that thrives
Because it doesn’t have any other lives 

But in its essence it’s sufficient and pleasant 
From surviving to thriving our story is ever present.

Neither truth will diminish over time or fail
The fact is that one doesn’t have to prevail 

To set the thriving free and out of the clutches 
Of the surviving that keeps trying to be.

We love our processes, frameworks, models, and structures, yet often, we don't realize when the focus moves to be on them rather than the purpose they were created for in the first place. 

And that is happening not only in the workplace but also in our societies and communities. 



And the worst part is we rarely take a moment to correct course.

 We instead plunge deeper into the abyss of the form, so deep that we are bathed in darkness, thus losing sight of our priorities.



That said, don't get me wrong, frameworks are a great way to start, and they do work, but can we recognize when they stop working? Now, that is the challenge.

Are you working against form or purpose?

An incredibly authentic conversation from the CEO and chairman of Morgan Stanley, James Gorman, with Nicolai Tangen. There are many interesting nuggets of wisdom throughout, but you can jump to 23:03 for a deep dive into his journey on what makes a good CEO and how he navigates the stress of it.

Are you working against form or purpose?

90% of the time, we want to communicate, but we are not communicating. And that’s because we often mistake communication for talking and speaking. And in reality, it is not either. 

The only moment seemly in control 
is that of the full senses, 
blaming the thought 
crucifying the soul 
for the lack of control 
it deemed to seek in the first place.

Betrayed and berated by the sense of being
in the divergence of seeing
the truth evading the most precious of all; 
our affinity to hold dear those close 
in what could be love, care, or a sharp knife twisted 
in the midst of …

Whatever of … is, 
it lacks and holds this immense power
to leave one in agony and pain
strained to a thin silver line of pristine nonsense
that leaves no bodies alive in its wake
daring to call itself merciful.

Be well, be carefree, 
or lost in the ocean of thee
remains, in truth, a story that escapes the breath
on its last sigh to regain a smidge of hope
to leave and never come back …

May it be in control and out of its mind 
in crazy town calling for a reprieve 
nothing ends where it starts 
or dares to call itself a lesson 
foretold in the abbeys of the long-forgotten song of life
dancing on the foothills of hope’s dreams 
and most of all a shred of happiness prolonged.

When expression lacks presence
and in its glory, a morning sunset 
on the window of an eternity boiling 
in the brittle waters of a condescending note, 
the bearer gripes and shrugs in walking down the road, 
hands flailing or tucked in a closed posture 
hammering the ground with every step 
as if the weight of an elephant is bearing every move, 
the song starts dwindling, losing its control 
and in the step regaining, its’ hold lost, 
out of whatever of… was.

Mind-boggling, I know. And it sounds incredibly banal and common sense, I know. Yet trust me when I say 90% of the time, we want to communicate, but we are not communicating. And that’s because we often mistake communication for talking and speaking. And in reality, it is not either. 

Gossiping and preaching is talking.
Accusing and blaming is talking.
Defending and deflecting is talking.

Yet none of the latter is communicating. For communication to happen, there needs to be a level of understanding — an exchange.

And more often than not, the exchange happens with almost zero talking involved. Instead:

In silence, we communicate.
In action, we communicate.
In listening, we communicate.

And none of the latter requires speaking. Now, do not get me wrong, talking under specific conditions could work, yet it is the least effective because many can’t get it right.



So before you dive in and open the gates of your mouth to blabber in an attempt to communicate, 

instead pause and be silent, listen, or act, and as a last resort, speak. Your rate of success in achieving communication will be way higher.

One of my favorite TED talks which was an influential point in my life. Julian Treasure's speaking on voice and the power of this toolbox got me into singing, and his talk still resonates with me till today. Jump to 4:10 if you’d like to skip to learning about your voice and some exercise you can do before every important conversation you need to have.

the presence pulse

Practical Insights to See Patterns Others Miss