Can You Spot That One Tiny Thing?

It's always been my belief that a typical day has the potential to leave us feeling two distinct types of tired.The first is the wonderful sense of exhaustion born out of achievement. When we produce, create, marinate on ideas - this makes us bone weary. And we sleep well.The other type, often the more frequent experience, is the sense of emotional drain we feel from a day in which we may have sought many approvals or re-written an email six times to ensure deferent tone, or sat through endless meetings - none of which yielded a namable outcome. This is the kind of tired more likely to keep us up at night... perseverating.It is also my belief that each of us has the power to spot small things that leave us in category two. And it is only in spotting these energy-drains that we have the power to change them - quite incrementally.You know that thing that happens when you learn a new word or phrase, and then suddenly you start reading or hearing it everywhere? (nerd alert: it's about the Reticular Activating System (RAS) if you're curious as to why this happens)Related: How Do You Achieve Flawless Execution? For now, let this brief note be the thing that triggers your RAS. Find a few moments throughout the rest of the week in which you simply pause, observe, and reflect.Can you spot one small thing? A decision you made for someone at their request when they could have been empowered to make it on their own? A meeting that could have been tightened up by 10 minutes with a simple agenda or clearer objective or a more curated list of names on the invite? Or how about an email you found yourself crafting on repeat when maybe a quick call would have served?We all deserve the bone-tired feeling of achievement. And we're all accountable for unleashing it for ourselves and for our teams .What one tiny thing can you see?