When Your Strength Is Your Weakness

There is no lesson in this issue. No wisdom to share. Instead, I am inviting you to come on a journey with me over the next ten days or so, as reality forces me to choose between chilling out vs. going into hyper-vigilant mode. Along the way, perhaps you will learn a bit about your own strengths and weaknesses.

My superpower is pattern recognition.

My Achilles Heel is pattern recognition.

Your strengths are also your weaknesses.

I tend to pay attention to developing trends and events, largely so I can be prepared in the event that any of them becomes a big deal.

This summer (yes, it's still summer), the water off the East Coast is ridiculously warm. A tropical storm (Lee) is heading towards those waters; it's still a long distance away, but by this weekend, it's going to be a huge storm. By the following weekend, it's either going to be a huge storm bearing down on New York and/or New England... or out to sea.

Hurricanes take a long time for the actual pattern to play out.

Did I mention that the weekend after next, I'll be in that NY/New England area?

For the past year, I've been pushing back against my pattern recognition habit. I'm trying to surrender to the flow of the universe, which means to relax a bit and see how things unfold.

Have you ever tried to relax a bit and see how things unfold? It is very hard.

The last time I was in New England and a far-away hurricane entered my consciousness, that storm turned out to be Hurricane Irene in 2011. It caused us to cut short a vacation in Martha's Vineyard, rush back to our house just outside New York City, be told by police that we should evacuate, and then drive to Vermont, which I perceived as a safe distance away.

Vermont turned out to be a very bad choice. Hurricane Irene flooded almost every river and stream in Vermont. The flood level of the Deerfield River east branch reportedly exceeded levels measured during the 1938 New England hurricane, the only other tropical cyclone to make a direct hit on Vermont in the state's recorded history (these details are from Wikipedia).

BTW, during my time on Martha's Vineyard, I coincidentally read a book on the 1938 hurricane. That's the reason we left the Vineyard early; my pattern recognition skills kicked in and I refused to believe the predictions that this storm wasn't going to impact New England.

Over the next ten days or so, I'll have the opportunity to figure how to strike a better balance between my strengths and weaknesses. If you like, you can also look over my shoulder... I'll be posting occasional updates on LinkedIn as events unfold.

Until then, I welcome your ideas and suggestions. Does surrendering to the flow of life require ignoring the storm that seems to be headed in your direction?

***

Bruce Kasanoff is a social media ghostwriter for entrepreneurs.