3 Professional and Deeply Personal Truths
From what I have learned of Seattle’s history, the city has become one of transits — and I, myself, am no exception. Most of my life was spent in the Midwest, and even my move to college was only a daunting four hour drive away at the time. However, in my move to Seattle, there was a range of new experiences waiting that had me diving head-first into the uncomfortable.
For instance, as someone who always lived with family, it was now up to me to design what my life looked like individually. I did not have someone to share the burden of home maintenance after a long day like my long-time college roommate. At work, I was starting fresh again, even if the work I had been assigned to aligned deeply with my passion. New people, new systems, and new purpose had me feeling like a freshman once again.
Like many people who have this shared experience, the first year is one of beautiful discovery and growing pains. I found there were many lessons to be learned about who I am as a working professional and as a person. Now that the time outside of work was not reserved for homework, I had the flexibility to pursue passions that I placed on the back burner in college. Introducing these passions back into my life changed it — for the better — and helped stabilize me as I navigated new situations and challenges here in Seattle.
The lessons we learn in different areas of life are not siloed. As my anniversary of moving to Seattle approached, I started to reflect deeply on the lessons that have transformed the way I think about life. Introspection has always been where I turned when I felt lost or overwhelmed, and in the hopes of helping others navigate through what is a beautiful but also tough time of their lives, I wanted to share three deeply personal truths that I learned during my first year. Each of these lessons transcended between my professional and personal spheres in my life.
1. Learn to manage your energy, not your time.
In my college experience, I acknowledge that despite the hard workload at the time, my life was also contained in a bubble that excluded many of the “adulting” things you do once you officially move away from your family. Finding a doctor to having your car maintained, I was close enough where was able to go home for it. When life is scoped like this, one can easily start to feel that as long as you manage your time, you will be able to finish everything on your list.
However, time management has always been an area of growth for me, and time itself is finite. I learned very quickly during the first couple of months in Seattle that the to-do list never ended, both at work and at home. There was always another workstream to orient myself on. There was always another home project or chore that demanded my attention when I came home. A core value of mine is structure, and a lack of it sent me running for a solution.
This lesson particularly I thank a close friend for. Learning this from her has only reconfirmed that other people’s stories can be powerful sources of wisdom. We were on the topic of discussing what our plans were for the weekend, and I was making my coffee that morning desperate for more energy to get everything I wanted done that Friday for work.
It was a simple question: “Tara, what do you truly want to do with your energy today?”
After rambling off a long list of to-dos in my head, my friend continued. “No one person has the energy for all of that. Again, how do you need to spend your energy today?”
It may seem simple, but she was onto something. Just like time, we have a finite amount of energy throughout the day. We are constantly surrounded by media telling us that this energy drink or another coffee is enough to sustain us, and there is a boundless amount of it. Yet, with all the talk about finding our working style (“what works for you”) and energy boosters, we know inside that we have a limit to this energy.
Looking at a to-do list and mapping out how much time everything was going to take was only getting me so far. If I involved this idea of energy, when I have the most of it, when I need to recharge, and what type of tasks I could do during those highs and lows — the planning became simpler. Smarter.
For instance, I was a morning person and that was the peak of where my creativity is. If I want to write, the energy I have there is best suited. If I can answer emails in my low energy state, then before lunch, where my energy dipped, would be a good time to triage new requests. After applying this to work, applying it to home became another arena of learning. The energy I get entering my space after a workday needs to be spent on cooking, which is a high-energy activity for me otherwise I deflate and order in.
Discovering these little rules about myself helped me give both focus and grace on how I naturally interact with the environment instead of forcing an undoable routine.
2. Give up on your memory and develop a Second Brain.
Currently, I’m reading this book Second Brain by Tiago Forte and it helped me unlock a key solution to a common, reoccurring problem in my life. Whenever I have been overwhelmed, sometimes I would call my family and it was always the same three questions:
1. Are you hungry?
2. Have you slept well enough?
3. Did you write everything in your head at this moment down?
70% of the time, it was the last one. The power of not holding all the information that is constantly flooding us in our heads is underestimated. Whether it’s in a meeting or on social media, when we see that piece of information that can be useful for later, we store it in our mental filing cabinet. Yet, regardless of your actual memory capability at the time, we have only stuffed more and more information about different sectors in our lives in a finite space.
The second brain is about utilizing technology to work for you and to create a digital note-taking system. Whether it be for just the scope of work or you map your entire life to it, it is a way to track and store information for near projects and possible future needs. I don’t usually geek out this much about a book, but even after socializing it with some peers at work who I admire, I find that they have started developing a “second brain” years ago. It was one of the key things that have led them to success, and it only made me more confident that learning this was going to help me unload the burden of remembering every key detail for that project that was discussed a week ago.
Before, I used to take a lot of pride in my personal capability to remember a lot. I know others could feel the same way — it’s a good feeling to always feel prepared. Yet, as you advance in your career, you may have already experienced that the matter of scope becomes larger. The largest benefit you can provide is forming connections between different areas. If you are too busy trying to remember it all, you do not provide yourself the space to make those connections creatively.
So, despite the fact that I have a good memory at this time of my life, I’m learning how to give up on it so I can use that mental bandwidth to do the fun part — the actual learning.
3. Trust in your perspective — it’s what you’re there for.
Something I majorly struggled with in my internships and starting a new role at work was the clash of cultures. I was born in America; I grew up here. However, South Asian culture influenced much of my home life in the way my values were formed. Yet, I have also developed very westernized values too from my experience growing up here. Sometimes, it means I have to choose which ones will help me navigate through a situation.
One example is the willingness to make and own a decision, even if it is the wrong one. At the company I work for, the learning mindset is a large part of the culture. Mistakes and failures are highly encouraged. Yet, I found that while I was willing to make a mistake, I also carried the value of learning from other people. In short, I loved learning from others.
In a role of a PM, you tend to do this a lot. You constantly learn about others’ perspectives on what you are creating and where those thoughts stem from in their experience. However, when times came to make decisions on how we moved forward, I noticed an inner clash. Sometimes, what felt like the decision I wanted to make felt mismatched with what some more experienced peers recommended. From my collegues’ view, they were simply sharing a perspective. From my own, it felt like betraying the value of respect if I were to make that decision that did not follow their recommendation.
I was raised to respect those with more experience and to respect their time by showing that I actually listened. This value easily blended into my high school and college years because I entered as a student, not a peer. Yet, here at this company, I was expected to bring my own perspective and make decisions.
What I had to truly learn was that my perspective carried weight too in the working world. My collegues at work were simply giving their advice but it was encouraged that I evaluate how much of it I wanted to apply. It was okay to not take it, and to take a risk to try something new. That’s what I was expected to do as a newer employee. It’s that fresh perspective that can lead to new learnings and ideas. Where I could go wrong is not taking a chance or stalling on making that decision.
I was on the same playing field as all the others when it came to the empowerment of that decision. Embracing that mistakes will happen and that success is found in making them quickly and pivoting is trusting the team on the playing field to learn along with you.
There are many other lessons that I’ve learned since the grand move to Seattle. Yet, I hope these three are refreshing. While the three of them do not connect in an obvious way, each of them have been truly transforming in how I view work and my personal life — and I’m excited to see what they will continue to bring in the future.
