This Nobel Prize Winning Writer’s Advice on Love & Life is All You’ll Ever Need
The best piece of relationship advice I have ever read is coincidentally the best piece of life and business advice out there as well.
And of course, it’s from one of the most celebrated writers of the 20th century, John Steinbeck.
In a 1958 letter to his son upon finding out that he was in love, Steinbeck offered this one piece of golden advice,
“Nothing good gets away.”
The simple truth of that statement struck me from the moment I read it.
Unfortunately I didn’t see it until after I put myself through many contortions trying to make my first major relationship a success.
Looking back, if I had stumbled upon it at the beginning of my relationship instead of after it was over, it likely would have shortened the time I spent trying to “make it work”.
Passion Doesn’t Equal Longevity
As my ex was my first love, going from a crush to something deeper didn’t increase the viability for long term partnership for either of us.
I had a burning desire to learn everything possible to make my mark on the world and he just wanted to hang out with friends, the rest of the world was not really interesting to him.
This was the exact same truth with regard to my career in corporate finance at a Fortune 500 company.
Did long term projections fascinate me and did I love telling people I worked in finance?
Yes.
Was it also making me hate my own existence because of all the work you had to put in to get to the fun future talk?
Also yes.
When Grit Becomes Struggle
When I finally left my ex, the way I explained that relationship to people was that it was like stumbling upon this amazing meadow with a bunch of brambles bisecting it.
You can see the other side and you know it’s going to be awesome once you get there so at first you charge ahead, trying to break through the brush. Sure, you’ll get a few scratches but it will all be worth it when you get to the other side.
After several years and many, many scratches, you recognize that charging through doesn’t work so then you sit down and patiently try to peel the thorny vines apart from each other. Maybe you can’t work through all of them but if you can at least get through where you are, that’s all you need.
More years pass and finally at the end of the relationship, the overwhelming feeling is not anger or sadness or resentment — you’re just tired.
And you give the brambles one last look, admit they beat you, shrug your shoulders and walk away.
When a relationship isn’t right, it just isn’t.
There is no badge of honor issued because you “stuck it out”.
Business is the same way.
If you find yourself with an overwhelming sense of dread before you get to work every morning, something is wrong.
Even an entrepreneurial venture, if you literally jump out of bed in the middle of the night because the issues in your business won’t let you sleep, it might be time to take a look at your overall strategy.
This is not the same as experiencing the occasional blip on the radar. If you’re mostly in love with your work or your relationship and the good days far outweigh the bad, then maybe it’s only a rough patch.
The simple test to figure this out is to ask yourself, overall, are you learning and growing and happy?
Are you sleeping well at night and are you excited to get up in the morning?
If the answer is no, then it’s time to make a change.
History Does Not Equal Happiness
There is a term in Behavioral Economics called Sunk Cost Fallacy.
This means that if we have already put time and resources into something, we are more likely to stay with that thing, even if it is not serving us in any way and there is little evidence to support the possibility that it’s going to do so in the future.
My ex used to say that to him, our relationship felt like playing a slot machine.
Every day he’d keep pulling the lever because he didn’t want to walk away and have someone else hit the jackpot.
The reality was, we were not a good fit for each other and unlike a slot machine, there would never be a jackpot for either of us as long as we stayed together.
When you are nearing the end of your life, saying that you worked at a job for 35 years only has meaning if you are proud of the work and if your contribution has made you fulfilled.
If you hated your job and just stayed because you were afraid to lose what you had, you are going to spend your retirement with a constant reminder of how many years you wasted.
Stop Worrying About Proving Everyone Wrong
Another reason that we are afraid to abandon a relationship, business venture or leave a job is that we are so worried about what everyone else will say, especially if you have friends or family waiting in the wings to say “I told you so”.
The reality is, that’s going to happen either way.
Sometimes, (frankly a lot if you’re really committed to learning who you are and what’s best for you) you’re going to be wrong.
And who cares?
Nothing will teach you faster about what you really want and what is really right for you than trying what isn’t.
In my case, letting go of caring about how many times I would publicly fail has led to work that I love and a marriage that is better than any dream I could have come up with.
Sometimes, It Leaves You
As for my Finance job, the day came that we were told they were outsourcing Finance to a team in another country. They would only keep on 2 people and those people would have to compete against their colleagues for the positions.
For many reasons, I saw this announcement as a huge boon.
The first of which was that I would have a “legitimate” reason for leaving.
At the time, hating my job didn’t seem like enough of a reason. I was always plagued by guilt about what a hardship my leaving would place on the company and my colleagues around me.
The fact that this announcement came with no warning and no concessions were made for the people who were less than a handful of years from retirement, removed that self-created feeling of guilt.
Corporations are not people and a publicly traded one of that size makes decisions primarily based on what is going to increase profitability, and often, outsourcing can fit that requirement.
The most important question to ask yourself when something that we think we wanted or need is “getting away” is where are the opportunities in this situation?
What am I supposed to learn from this?
In my situation, I was very excited to train a group of people from another country because I love teaching and I love learning. I saw this as a unique opportunity for both things.
Quit Blocking the Greatest Love Affair of Your Life
As of 2018, there are 4,416 cities with over 150,000 people in the world.
Let’s pretend that there is only 1 person in each city that would be great for you. We’ll even leave out people who live in smaller cities, towns, villages or out in the country.
That’s 4,416 potential amazing people passing you by because you’re too busy putting all your time and resources into something that’s not working.
In business, there are literally an infinite amount of jobs and an infinite amount of businesses that can be started.
Who ever thought Inventor of a Snuggie would be a thing?
The key is to find that juncture of 1) the problems your brain naturally gravitates to and enjoys solving every day 2) your rare skills/talents.
Rinse and Repeat
The truth is that the only person who knows what’s right for you is you.
The more you turn into that and allow the answers to come, the faster you’ll succeed.
When I gave up corporate finance for good, I took a job as an office manager at a local company. It paid well below what I wanted but I took it because I identified a gap in their marketing strategy and I saw it as an opportunity to use some of the marketing skills I had learned taking online courses.
A few promotions later, I had earned my way to a marketing executive position overseeing 4 departments.
Ultimately, that led to me realizing that what I really wanted to do was work for myself and I now own a profitable marketing business.
Leaving my ex was scary and my very next relationship was not the right one either.
Or the one after that.
But ultimately, I found the one that has felt good and easy for more than 10 years.
Our very first anniversary, we toasted the relationships that got away because in the end, nothing good does.