If you are clicking on this video, you may just be curious or very thorough. But this video is really for you. If you have watched the material on priorities, listened to and saw the analogy of the rocks, pebbles, and sand in a jar and had a negative reaction. You didn't like it, and that's okay because I've coached and taught many people who would agree with you. You might not like my light pink shirt, so I switched here just for you to blue. The purpose of this short video is to help preserve the benefit of identifying three to five key priorities and continue to base your connected leadership on the underlying research. I'm thinking in particular of the Nelson Cowan paper that I really like, the Magical Mystery Four: How Working Memory Capacity is Limited and Why. I want to help you build on the insight to find a different analogy than rocks in your jar of life. First try, If you like the concept of the jar to convey the fixed nature of time, but don't like the rocks themselves in there, some people have called them cold, hard, and unforgiving and they're hurt when they're thrown, then how about sweet treats and candy? First, the three to five big pastries go in, then the Ferrero Rocher candies or big gobstopper sweets as we call them in Scotland. Then finally, the pop rocks or pixie dust, the stuff that you put on your tongue and fizzes. Next one, if it would help you if we depart completely from rocks and jars for your brain to be liberated, to think the way you want it to, how about a mobile that you hang above a baby's cot bed? First, you design the arms of the mobile. Under three doesn't work and over five is too fussy and they'll knock into each other. Four is perfect, and three to five are definitely doable. The next level pebbles could be represented by the key extensions on the main arms. The smallest level sand could be the smallest decorations hung on each of the extensions. This example might help you to think because you can even start assembling the mobile with the small decorations and no arms, so the ability to fritter away one's time on sand has gone in this analogy. Next up, I made a few people who want an analogy that yearns for the outside world and nature not wanting the confines of a jar or a room. How about imagining a new yard that has to be designed? You have room in this plot of land for only three to five big trees, then you grow some bushes, and then the undergrowth, the grass fills in the rest of the space. What are your big oak trees of life? This analogy is a nice one because the elements of each rock could translate in a lovely way to the big bows, the limbs of each tree as they split from the trunk. For instance, in my tree representing my crazy we family as I call them, the largest branches off the trunk could be my partnership with my wife, trying to raise good kids and cherishing and including the wider clan of grandparents and relatives. The last one I have for you is a mix of if a person meets nature. Packing a small boat to travel down a river. Ray Dalio in Principles talks about the river of time relentlessly moving forward. You only have the choice of how to steer and make decisions at the obstacles and forks. You don't have the ability to stop the river, just make good choices. In our connected leadership framework on priorities, that includes what to pack in the boat. How about there's room for only three to five big bags under the seat,. then you have room for hand luggage, then still space for some small fun items and snacks that are not packed and are loose. Packing the boat well, you ensure the biggest bags are in position first, then the hand luggage, then the small items. I like this analogy too as it emphasizes the need to pack well for our journey through life. The different items might be useful or higher priority at different stages in life, while many will be enduring wherever you find yourself on the river. In conclusion, if you don't like rocks, what else is there? I like the rocks analogy that Stephen Covey popularized in the '50s. I've obviously used it through the main modules of the course. Many people have heard a version of it and most catch on to it very quickly, especially when they see the visual. The examples I've just provided above get across the point I think just as well and maybe even better for you. The key takeaway is to use the power of analogy and pictures and stories for you, not against you. I recommend changing the analogy for you if rocks in a jar is a negative or indeed if one of the alternatives resonates more just like I am suggesting, you revisit and reclaim a positive definition of leadership and becoming a leader. Here, it is worth internalizing a positive analogy to help you prioritize. I hope my examples helped and you like the blue shirt, but maybe even better if you think of your own, and do send me an email so I can include it in a later version if you like. What really matters is that we think carefully and clearly about the few things that are most important to us and pack them not only with clarity, but with emotional power when we name them. What your three to five priorities are in real life and in the analogy are completely up to you.
