What makes you weird is a core ingredient of your Genius
And why you shouldn’t dismiss it
“Please don’t hit the cow in the middle of the road.” I thought, in slow motion, through a haze of delirium that clouded my brain after 26 hours of travel.
“Shit, there are multiple cows.”
My taxi swerved, weaving across the dark, deserted road. It was 3am.
I couldn’t tell who was more delirious, me or the taxi driver.
He seemed to be nodding off, yet the moving blue dot on my offline google maps showed we were still about an hour away.
That’s when the he pulled over on the side of the road for no apparent reason.
There were no cows in the road, no flat tire, no explanation.
“Shit. This is going to be a problem.” I thought.
He wanted money.
I couldn’t go anywhere and there was no one I could call. He had me hostage.
I was so delirious I could barely argue.
“Why do I ALWAYS do this to myself?”
This situation felt familiar.
I am always on the edge of disaster, winging it, until things go wrong.
Why couldn’t I just stay in a hotel somewhere and drive in the morning?
A long negotiation ensued, and I pulled out my only weapon: Facebook. I convinced him he would escape the public humiliation of me filming him and posting on Facebook if he dropped me off. (Luckily he couldn’t tell I was offline)
When I woke up the next morning, I saw this sculpture on the beach near where I was staying in India.
“That’s how I want to be, like this guy”. I thought.
Just chill, easy, grounded and safe.
But, I know the reason I ALWAYS do this is because when things work, I’m bored. Even when uncertainty turns bad, I like it. It’s the type of shit storm I like.
I find that whenever I uncover a characteristic that is specific to me, I always sort of wish I didn’t have it. It’s always half good and half bad. A double-edged sword.
Yet, it’s far more useful to audit these moments and understand how we are distinct than wish we were different. Our Genius is hidden in those characteristics and behaviors that make us weird.
What makes you weird? What part of that characteristics might make up part of your Genius?
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This story was originally published on sillysapiens.com
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