Life is Not A Game of Chess

A Note that John Mayer, Mark Cuban, Dan Lanning, and Dirk could maybe all agree on

In our careers, and life too for that matter, it seems it can just be one big, constant waiting game. A constant wait for things to be over. You wait for one thing to be over to do the next thing and the next thing and then, the next thing. It’s hard. Most of us are young, determined individuals who are always seeking out or planning the next thing because it is just part of our human nature. There’s certainly a level of ambition to it, it’s natural. 

I certainly fall victim to this because I have plans and aspirations for my career. Well articulated thoughts, plans, and goals for where I want to go. It’s right but it should not be everything. If you are forever waiting for those plans to be realized, you will wake up one day and have a sobering realization that you never lived in the present moment and never enjoyed the work you were currently doing. The days, weeks, and months are blurred together because all that matters is the next job, promotion, raise, or level change. Not being the best at who you currently were or the work you currently did.

Is the best advice to always be planning and plotting with your ambitious goals to advance in your career? Or is it to be the best you can be where you are at and be the best at what lies six feet in front of you? I think it might be the latter. 

Ironically, I think one of the best ways to answer these questions came from John Mayer on his solo tour. He was talking about always waiting for the next thing and I think he unintentionally gave some great career advice. 

“Everything you love and hate leaves at the same speed: Done. Done. Done. The thing you hate that you have to do tomorrow will be over before you know it, and the thing you’re looking forward to tomorrow will be over before you know it. 

So I have a new rule in my life, and the rule is: Never wish for less time. Waiting for things to be over is just wishing for less time. Waiting for this to be over to get to the next thing—that’s just wishing for less time.”

If we are forever waiting for the next raise, next promotion, or next level change, we are just wishing for less time. Time is already the scarcest resource on the planet and we wake up each day with a finite amount. To wish for less time is to wish our life away but instead of waiting for our next move or promotion what should we do?

“So wherever you go, just make a home right there and do that thing…Wherever you are, go, ‘this is where it’s all at right now.’ I’ve been having the time of my life because I figured that out…”

This is all in our control. We can be the best at where we are in that current moment, not what lies six months or a year down the road. Every moment spent worrying about reaching the future goal or plan is a feeling of being short and a feeling of not being enough. It is a feeling of continuously feeling like a failure that you hope will only be temporary. Everybody has goals and aspirations but the way to get them is to not strategize but to be the best you can be at who you are right now.

This is something that I have certainly struggled with. It is human nature to chase down goals but how exactly do we be the best we can be? How exactly do we make a home right here and do that thing?

I was texting my sister about career advice and trying to understand the best way to have the belief that everything will work out if you are not constantly planning for the future. Something I think can be especially hard since she works for herself. Texts were exchanged but she said something that I found to be great advice, 

“Life is not a game of chess, it doesn’t reward strategy – it rewards repetition and effort.”

Of course, you begin to internalize and think of the way life has rewarded you through your repetitions and effort. Sure, there are examples in the gym, investing, school, and a bunch of other areas of life but I was trying to think how I have seen this in my career.

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When you start your career, you are giddy to put it lightly. You have finally graduated college and the hard work has paid off. You are rewarded for all your work by landing your first job. The returns are finally realized. Naturally, you progress through the job and at some point, you wish for more. For me, I wanted to leave my current position and instead, be a part of a financial rotational program. It seemed perfect for me. 

I received an invitation to interview for the program and after receiving the invitation, it meant it was time to get to work. After work every single day, I would study. I made myself a study guide that I treated like a bible and read religiously. I would write all over it and write definitions and examples again, and again, and again. In the end, the work paid off and I was afforded the position.

I am still young in my career, and I guess young in life for that matter, but it has been the clearest example of life rewarding repetition and effort. Every day, months in advance of that interview, I would show up and work. There was nothing special about it or any strategy to it, it was just work. This was part of the first step of me realizing how true that notion is. What you put in is in fact what you get out. Hard work is work and life rewards it.

There was very little strategy to it. I just talked to people I knew who had experience with the program and position, researched relevant topics, found relevant work from the departments to understand the roles better, and a few other things to prepare myself. Through talking to others, studying, and researching, I was just getting in continual reps. There was nothing fancy to it.

By studying so much and continuing to work, learn, and partly memorize these definitions I was becoming who I wanted to be. I was learning what I needed to learn. Sure, being an analyst in a rotational program isn’t the sexiest name or the sexiest person to be, but it was me being the best person I could be in that present moment. That is not the end goal but it was what was six inches in front of my face. It was being the best I could be in that present moment. It was clear as day that life, and my career, were rewarding repetition and effort.

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Dan Lanning, the football coach for the University of Oregon, put this notion really well when delivering a talk to his team,

“Everyone has goals and aspirations, you know how you get those? You be the best where you are at. It’s not worrying about the next thing, it’s about worrying what’s right in front of you, six inches in front of your face.”

It is about putting a disproportionate amount of energy into what you can control. You can strategize and plot but much of the results of that strategy you can’t control. However, you can control the reps and effort you put into the work that lies in front of you or the job you show up to each day.

I often view sports as a metaphor for life. There is something to be said about some of the best career advice coming from the University of Oregon football coach giving a speech to his team. Sports are also a very clear example of careers rewarding repetitions and effort and being the best at what is in front of you. 

Dirk Nowitzki is maybe the best foreign-born basketball player to ever play in the NBA. Part of the reason he was so good was he had a one-legged fadeaway that was proven to be unblockable.

Dirk’s Signature shot. Image courtesy of Bleacher Report.

He wasn’t particularly athletic, flashy, or part of a lineage of basketball greats, he just worked day in and day out. His tendencies for getting shots up in the gym were “maniacal”, he had “the craziest preparation ever”, and his warm up routine took double to that of an average NBA player. It is what allowed him to be great. The volume of shots and practice he did is what allowed him to have one of the most infamous shots in the game of basketball. It was a career that was built on repetition and effort and life rewarded him for it.

Now the man who owned the team Dirk Nowitzki played for, Mark Cuban, helps to take us home, 

“People come to me all the time and tell me they're stuck. They're stuck in a job they don't like. They're stuck working for a boss they don't like. They're stuck on a team they don't like.

I just tell them, 'Be great.'

The reality of life is that you can't just always quit your job. You can't just always go to your boss and say, 'Give me the promotion, or I'm out of here.' You can't just always go to your coach and say, 'Give me more reps, or I'm transferring.' So when you're stuck, you've gotta find it within yourself to say, 'Ok, this is where I am. And if I'm going to be here, I'm going to be great.' 

Because if you're great at your job, typically other people and companies find out, so it creates opportunities.”

Great achievements are just what a long series of unremarkable tasks looks like from far away. It is being great at where you are each and every day.

This is not to say don’t have long-term goals for your career. I think it is important to have long-term goals. I certainly have them. I probably couldn’t function without them. It helps with the process of everything. It is to say there is a degree of being present in being great at what lies in front of you that will help you achieve those goals. It is what makes your long-term career plans more achievable because it's a singular focus on something that inevitably allows you to progress.

It is an unremarkable, boring task that you build on. It allows the present to build and compound towards a better long term goal. It is not a complex, strategic plan. It is not a game of chess. It is work. It is repetition. It is effort. Be the best at what lies six inches in front of you so you can be the best version of yourself in the future.

Appreciate you reading.

-Scantron