I realized yesterday that the election results have impacted me at a deeper level than I originally anticipated it would. I posted on Facebook that I was still in the throes of “post-election depression”. My productivity and ability to focus has been impacted. I’ve had a difficult time actually sitting down to write content for Ask Leo! as I have in the past, for example.

One person mentioned the five stages of grief: Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, and Acceptance. It’s a model that seems to fit, and I’m currently, and solidly, at stage four.

Falling back to meditative practice and even some Buddhist philosophy, the key to moving on would appear to be gratitude. How timely, then, that tomorrow is Thanksgiving.

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The solution to one problem is merely the creation of the next one. – Mark Manson(†)

Common thinking is that a life without problems would be idyllic. “Not a care in the world” is the operative phrase. Sitting on a beach, sipping Mai-Tai’s is another vision.

Even if it were possible, thanks, but no thanks.

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I don’t consider myself a conservative. But then I also don’t consider myself a liberal. Rather than aligning myself with one set of policies or philosophies my approach is to take it all one issue, or one candidate, at a time. I’d probably call myself a “free thinker”, but I’m afraid that term has overly-liberal connotations to those on the right.

One of the things that this recent election cycle has made crystal clear is the existence of, and the dramatic impact, of what we’ve come to refer to as the “echo chamber”. By exposing ourselves to only those ideas and ideals with which we agree we deny ourselves the opportunity to objectively evaluate opposing views and values. If you lean liberal, for example, not only are you more attracted to like-thinking opinions and sources of information, but social media – specifically Facebook – reinforces that environment by showing primarily things that agree with its perception of what you “like”, and are thus more likely to interact with.

This isn’t good. This isn’t healthy. This isn’t how rational and reasonable discourse happens.

This is how polarization happens.

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I mentioned in an earlier post that my “one word” was “learning”, or rather, my more comfortable version: “always learning”.

It’s more than just seeking out opportunities for more knowledge.

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Being a “jack of all trades” gets a bad rap.

The traditional criticism is that instead of doing one thing very well, a jack of all trades does a number of things poorly. The full title in cases like this is “jack of all trades, master of none”.

I am unabashedly a jack of all trades. I’m quite proud of it, for that matter.

And I don’t think the whole “master of none” thing either applies or matters.

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As part of a recent talk to a group of university students, I emphasized my biggest “if I had to do it over again” thought: I wished I’d spent more time in English class. The big lesson was that I’d undervalued writing and communication skills as I made my way through school. In hindsight that was a mistake.

It’s something I’ve written about before. I wished I’d done things a little differently and invested more time and energy on those skills.

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I’m a lucky guy.

I’m truly grateful for the many moments, coincidences and random events that lead me to where I am today.

So, if I’m so lucky, why do I say there’s no such thing?

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Having a discussion with someone and the concept of who (not what) I’m writing for came to mind.

This personal blog is easy: I’m writing purely for myself, and anyone that cares to pay attention is welcome to do so. Similarly, everyone else that cares to ignore it is also more than welcome to do that, too.

No, this is more about my professional writing efforts over at Ask Leo!.

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It’d be easy to sit back after this election cycle and honestly wonder what happened to humanity.

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I just signed up for a monthly cash donation to the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), increasing my support of that organization.

I want to share a little about why.

I’m not expecting anyone who reads this to follow suit … though of course, it’d be great if you did. What am expecting is that if you’ve read this far you’re open to thinking about the issues at hand, and taking action that you feel is appropriate in the face of changes in the current political climate.

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Our ideas are precious, especially to ourselves.

However it is that we arrive at them, we come to believe that they have immense value – so much so that we often consider them more than mere ideas or opinions, but elevate them to “The Truth”.

Our ideas make the leap from opinion to fact.

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Yes, there is always hope. Hope is not a binary, yes/no condition. Hope is not absolute.

When we ask whether or not there is hope, what we’re really asking is “how much hope is there?”

When it comes to our new president-elect, many people seem to be reacting in binary fashion – all or nothing, joy or despair, parties or riots.

It’s not that clear. Not at all.

Even I have seen some glimmers of, dare I say it – hope – in recent days.

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As you can imagine there’s a lot of finger pointing today. It’ll continue for some time to time, I’m sure.

What it brings to mind is something that I read not that long ago with respect to blame.

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I’ve been trying to think of the various types of work I do on Ask Leo! and how there are different types of work. Most commonly the biz/entrepreneur types will tell you that there’s strategy and there’s tactics.

I think there’s something else.

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I’ve just started listening to the book Deep Work by Cal Newport, and it’s hitting a little too close to home.

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This happens to me so often accidentally that I’m starting to think I should do it on purpose.

This morning I had a problem with one of the online services I use. It’s in an area that has been problematic for me before, so after checking that things were as they should be, I began to suspect the service provider.

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I’ve seen and even purchased my fair share of products that are aimed at entrepreneurs trying to “make it”. Typically they’re all about how to break through, how to get noticed, how to play the social media game, how to do everything except one critically important thing.

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I watched a TEDx video the other day (Risk Forward: the Rewards of Not Knowing | Victoria Labalme | TEDxSantaBarbara) where the speaker began, in essence, “there are people who set goals, plan for them, work towards them … this talk is for the rest of us”. I forget how I stumbled into this video – I think someone had mentioned it or the speaker somewhere – I’ve since lost track.

Now, I can’t say that I don’t have goals, but I can tell you I have no idea what I expect to be in 5 years (one of the classic goal-setting questions).

But I did come up with something that might … just might … sum up what I want my life to be.

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Interestingly enough a few days ago I posted (or rather, re-posted) an article of mine called If I Had to Do It Over…, which starts:

I never planned to be a writer. And yet here I am. I kinda wish I’d approached a few things differently along the way.

It’s an article that’s been revised a time or two on Ask Leo!, and is always well received. This time ’round it was about republishing on an different platform in the hopes of additional eyeballs. You know, marketting.

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