Blinded by the light 🎶. Just do it.
Prevarication is the thief of time
👀 Do you find yourself not making much progress on the change you wish to make? Are you working on the problem in hand, or just making yourself look busy?
Here’s some thoughts on focus & getting things done.
“Just do it’. Art Williams.
✅ Change is Constant is for people who want help with personal and/or business change / improvement. It is help, to help you, help you; solve challenges, make the right choices, turn ideas & visions into reality and make them work for you. It is:
Practical business, leadership, personal change insight, learning, technique, tips. From 40 years award winning change to transformation know-how & experience. Aimed at mindset, challenge & good practice. May contain topical, fun content 😉.
I’m Mark, I hope you like it and find things that help you to help you? If so, your help with any likes, comments and shares is appreciated.
What’s this one about? / Who’s it for?
👀 Blinded by the light / prevarication is the thief of time - is for those who aren’t making much progress or maybe are starting to realise they are just being busy fools. Just asking not saying. 😉.
created by a human using craiyon.com (I think – can’t recall 😉!)
Blinded by the light 🎶
Blinded by the light 🎶 was a big hit for Mannfred Mann and his Earth band in 1977.
But did you know that it was written and recorded by Bruce Springsteen, appearing on his debut album (Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J) in 1973?
Well, despite my musical interests, tbh no, I didn’t either until relatively recently.
Why am I asking you this?
People remember stuff differently.
Why am I asking you who wrote the song?
👉 Is it because I want to try and put a thought in your mind, for whenever you might need to draw upon it?
👉 Is it because it’s a well-known phrase that might entice people to read further?
👉 Is it because that people remember things using different techniques?
YES, 👍 👍 👍. All these things.
At the end of the day (it gets dark 🤣), Change is Constant is aiming for help, to help you, help you.
👀 I don’t care HOW you might remember stuff ‼️
Just that you do find ways to recall things that will help.
The main reason why I often try to mix things up a bit is that people buy-in to things in different ways.
One size (of learning, in this case) does not fit all.
I’m trying to find, a variety of, ways of doing things that help people to make their change, improvement or buy-in, stick.
For clarity - IMHO it doesn’t necessarily matter how you remember to do something, as long as you do remember, and therefore have a decent chance of doing the right things, right.
What do you think?
Where there is muck, there is brass
If you were listening to Blinded by the light 🎶 on the radio and the DJ came on afterwards and said, “well that was Blinded by the light, which was a big hit for Mannfred Mann in 1977”, you might well be thinking that Mannfred / his band wrote the song?
But we know that Bruce wrote it, don’t we.
Yeah Ok, but what the hell am I trying to get across?
👉 Firstly, sometimes we can’t see what we’re looking for because we’re Blinded by the light.
👉 Secondly, always ask the question and not just assume you know - “there’s no such thing as a daft question”.
Here’s a sort of fourth wall moment.
th
Go on, say this to yourself.
“Who wrote Blinded by the light? 🎶”.
“Ahh that’s interesting, it was Bruce, not Mannfred”.
“Hmmm, if I’d just assumed it was Mannfred, I’d be wrong. And later when I tell anyone – it was Mannfred - I will be,
Making an ASS out of U and ME! 🤔
Cos my assumption is wrong”.
Back in the room.
So, you need to dig further. Into the deeper stuff, into the muck or as the great John Cleese puts it – into the dark.
Who remembers dead parrots and cheese shops?
Recently I’ve discovered that a hero of mine from my youth, the fabulous
is also on Substack. Who out there, of a certain era and probably many others too, doesn’t remember – The Dead Parrot sketch - or The Cheese shop sketch?If you’ve no idea what I’m on about, google or YouTube it. You’ll probably find something. Bound to be in the BBC archives too.
Ok, he’s got 80k+ followers, a tad more than yours truly. Maybe that’s because he’s pretty famous. Or maybe it’s because he finds ways of getting quite important messages across in ways that resonate and help people remember?
On his page, I came across a post he did, called “A profound joke”. There’s a link to the post towards the end of this.
In it, John uses a joke he likes, to make a point about where people should be looking if they really want to find out about things that are important to them, that they are struggling to do.
In this case, his point is about looking into the dark, into places that others haven’t bothered to search, to find the real answers to the things that are causing them an issue.
And I liked that so much that I’ve made a loose transcript of the joke below, as another way of conveying the key messages above. Thanks very much John.
Here’s a profound joke.
It’s about our man who is walking down the road at night who sees a streetlamp and another man standing under the streetlamp staring at the pavement.
So, our man comes up and says to the other man,
“Can I help”?
and the other man says,
“Well, I dropped a key, can you help me find it”.
So, they both stand there and have a good look around and our man eventually says,
“Are you sure you dropped it around here”?
and the other man says,
“Oh no, I dropped it over there down that dark alleyway”.
Then our man, somewhat perplexed says,
“Well, why are we looking here”?
The other man says
“Well, the light is better” ‼️.
🗝️ Recap and reflective thoughts.
Here’s a recap of some key things to perhaps reflect upon.
“When people have a problem to solve, a deep important problem, they tend to take parts of the problem that are very easy to do experiments on, and then pretend that those are the only ones that matter and that one doesn’t have to deal those things that are pretty much in the dark, unsearched around by other people”. John Cleese.
🗝️ 👉 The easy stuff isn’t always the right stuff.
🗝️ 👉 There’s no such thing as a daft question, never assume.
🗝️ 👉 Often we need to dig further, into the muck, into the dark.
A profound joke – the link.
What’s on the cards for next time?
Well quite simply, I really must get around to doing at least one of the things I have been signposting to do since the start of the year. But,
👉 What would help you?
👉 What would you like me to talk about?
👉 What problems are you having with change that you might benefit from some independent insight to?
Change is Constant is about help, to help you, help you; solve challenges, make the right choices, turn ideas & visions into reality and make them work for you.
Please comment or DM me with any change related questions you have or what you think about this post.
Feedback is always welcome. Doesn’t mean I will take it on tho 🤣 !
What was in the last post?
You can find it here:
Communication breakdown? Clarity is vital.
What other notes are there?
This is a link to my “notes”. You’re welcome to follow me / watch this space too. There are usually a few more of these than this column, but not too many to keep up with, I hope.
https://changeisconstant.substack.com/notes
If you like Change is Constant and find things that help you to help you subscribing, sharing, commenting or simply liking - would be great!
#leadership #change #mindset #motivation #success #helpingothers