02: balancing your zone of EXCELLENCE & zone of genius

there’s this concept called “zone of excellence” where you do incredible work, often times get rewarded for it, but feel no deep burning passion for the thing you’re doing. then on the other side of the coin is a similar concept called “zone of genius” where your values and passions are aligned with the work you’re doing and this is supposed to be where you produce world class results and feel a deep sense of joy and fulfillment. a quick google search will produce a heap of self help millionaire guru’s preaching that finding their “zone of genius” is what ultimately led them to be successful and find true meaning and purpose in life.

i think that’s a load of crap. honestly.

obviously you should want to enjoy what you’re doing, no one’s arguing that, what I’m saying is that you need to balance the two zones to truly be successful. No endeavor comes without doing stuff you don’t like. that’s just life. you need to do the shit you don’t like but are really good at to be truly successful. Those who can do the mundane work that doesn’t bring any real joy day in and day out in order to do the stuff you really love —those are the ones who “make it”. doing the stuff you may not truly enjoy but are really good at opens far more doors than just knuckling down and only dong the thing you love but may not be as superior at compared to your peers.

in order to grow and level up you need to seperate yourself. there’s many ways of doing this but one way is by simply being better than anyone else at one particularly valuable thing. for example if you’re a people person, making connections and bringing more business than anyone else back to your company or team is a seperator. If you can understand and explain complicated concepts simply to others, that’s another separator. If you can read and dissect reports faster than anyone else on your team, that’s another separator. these are not glamorous skill sets but are definite separators which can put you in rooms that may lead to opportunities you may not have even imagined possible, hopefully leading you to doing work you find truly fulfilling. but none of this comes if you only do the work you enjoy without identifying and leaning into your zone of excellence.

Now, i’d be remiss not to mention, you can do what i explained above and never get an opportunity to do work in your zone of genius. that’s just life unfortunately. but if you put yourself in as many rooms as you can get, your chances of landing on an opportunity to work in your zone of genius is much higher than if you didn’t.

what’s that saying? keep knocking on doors for the next one might open.

i don’t know something like that. don’t give up, basically.

:)