“We look at the present through a rear-view mirror. We march backward into the future.” — media theorist Marshal McLuhan.

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Hello Reader,

This edition is a bit longer than usual.

This week I've been thinking about how we got here. And where we're headed. Here are three streams of thought to help you turn overthinking into forward thinking, situated in the past, present and future:

The past is complicated.

We understand new things by looking at our past experiences. “…we cling to the rear view mirror because the view it offers may be more comforting than confronting what is visible through the windscreen.” – Andrew Prescott, Avoiding the Rear View Mirror (very long transcript)

Even though we move forward in time, our mindset is often backward, as we look to what's familiar and comforting to help us make sense of it all. For example, airplane parts are named after ship parts, keyboards have carriage return keys like typewriters, and “social media platforms and their algorithms are designed to function as perfectly optimized nostalgia-production machines.” – Gabriel Helfenstein, The past misses you: the dangers and radical potential of nostalgia.

That link is fairly heavy and I don't want to leave you sitting with this with no way forward. Here is a useful article with useful info, clear tables and preventative tips on nostalgia addiction, from NeuroLaunch.

Being present is challenging.

When I am having trouble giving a task my full attention, or even just getting started, I am reminded of a favourite saying from coach Kara Loewentheil, “Go half-ass something you've been not-assing at all.”

Sometimes we have to side-eye or mask our way through the day. And that's enough to keep going.

Now more than ever, we need to be future-focused.

I like to keep track of things I’ve changed my mind about. A recent one is my stance on expertise. I’ve spent a lifetime gaining it and now, as I pay back my massive debts and try to put all this knowledge into practice, I’m finding that expertise is less useful than I thought.

For the past five years, I’ve built my coaching practice around the idea of “turning overthinking into expert thinking.” But I’m starting to drift away from the back half of that sentence.

We don’t need more experts. Or expertise. What we need right now, more than ever, is forward thinking. The kind that is reasoned, sensible, and compassionate. If expertise comes along with that, great! But it’s not necessary for progress.

In keeping with this forward-focus, I updated my website and LinkedIn page. I'm still focused on thinking and I still believe that overthinking can be repurposed for good, once we understand the anxiety that drives it. From there, we can turn overthinking into forward thinking.

Because unlike expertise, forward thinking takes what we've learned from our past and folds it into how we do things now. So we can build the future we want.

For example, I've learned a lot of painful lessons from awkward and unsuccessful conversations around pricing. It's informed the way I value and price my work today and moving forward. So that the future I want — where people are supporting each other to think clearly and be their best selves — is within reach to anyone.

Here's what forward thinking looks like in practice:

This week's underthinking link is…

​Heartfelt: drop any picture onto your screen and enjoy the cozy comfort of viewing it through a rainy window. Thinking score: 2 out of 10.

Extra Thoughts…

What new thing ahead have you been looking at through your rear-view mirror?

What task have you been side-eyeing?

And what do you have the unique ability to look at directly, with your full focus?

I wonder which ways all these views may be connected.

See you,
Kim

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Turn overthinking into expert thinking

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In last week‘s newsletter, I wrote about what it means to hone our craft​

My craft is conversation. The kind that touches hearts, unlocks creativity, and inspires action. And even though I’ve been honing this craft my whole life, it’s only been the past 5 years that it’s been my paid profession.

I am now proud to offer the benefits of a PCC-level certification to the people I coach. Here’s a bit about what that means. Not to me, but to you​

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Maybe you want to go deeper with your craft, too? If you are struggling to articulate the value of what you do (or what you’ve achieved), we should talk!​