What is your Hidden Genius?
Learning from the genius of others whilst trying to find my own.
I’ve been on my own ‘journey to freedom’ for about 3 months now.
I have a pipeline of freelance clients, and just made my first $1000 with my children’s AI book workshop (yay!).
Somedays it feels like a thrilling joyride. Other days it feels like a car crash waiting to happen.
I have mega productive days, and ultra procrastinating days.
I have super healthy days, and days full of snacks I could do with out.
I have days full of gratitude and peace. And days full of scurry and scatter.
I’m constantly playing tug of war between securing work that pays, making time for my own projects, and ensuring I spend quality time with my kids - which is the core reason behind taking this leap.
When I take a step back to reflect, and ask myself, what am I looking for exactly in this new life I have chosen to embark upon, I seem to come back to the heart of Polina Pompliano’s book: What is my hidden genius?
Polina is a writer and the founder of The Profile, who I have been following for a while now. When she became a mum, I did an interview with her for my Working Mum Wisdom series, do check it out when you can!
She also quit her job at Forbes to run her newsletter full-time. Her newsletter now has over 100,000 subscribers and profiles the world’s most interesting and successful people, and draws lessons we can learn from them.
The way she presents them is unique because each profile is researched in-depth, written with precision, and full of actionable takeaways.
And her first book, Hidden Genius, is a beautiful compilation of the learnings from hundreds of people she has studied.
The book is divided by chapters on topics like creativity, mental toughness, relationships and leadership that you can reference depending on how you are feeling and what you need guidance on.
You can read it from start to finish, or pick a chapter and just read that.
Open the book on any page, and you will find so many lessons from so many incredible people that Polina has compiled so wonderfully, as if they were written for you.
The book is genius. I wanted to underline every sentence of it!
A few lessons from the book:
Creativity is a skill that can be learnt. (Grant Achatz, a revolutionary chef who lost his sense of taste and yet was still able to build some of the world’s best restaurants)
Pay attention to the world around you, the next great idea may be hiding in plain sight.(Dominque Crenn, chef and owner of Atelier Crenn)
You can break the rules only when you know them. (Aaron Sorkin, screenwriter, director and playwright)
The big, juicy failures are where true, groundbreaking originality lies. (Ed Catmull, co-founder of Pixar)
You need to fail at least 40 times in the pursuit of a goal before you even get close to success. (Christina Tosi, founder of Milk Bar)
When your mind is telling you that you’re done, you’re exhausted, that you cannot possibly go any further, you’re probably only 40% done. (David Goggins, an accomplished endurance athlete)
We are all ordinary people with the power to tell extraordinary stories, all that’s required is a genuine curiosity for fellow humans. (Brandon Stanton, Humans of New York)
There is someone somewhere who is looking at you and learning from you. You can be extraordinary in the most normal occasions and settings. (Kyle Carpenter, military officer and Medal of Honour recipient.)
Make reversible decisions quickly, and irreversible ones deliberately. (Matt Mullenweg, CEO of Automattic, and founder of Wordpress.)
I think you are a master when you realise you know nothing. (Garrett McNamara, professional big wave surfer best known for setting the world record for largest wave ever surfed)
This is a tiny fraction of all the wisdom in the book. I have it on my work desk and refer to it often.
I still don’t know what my Hidden Genius is, but for the moment I’m happy to be learning from the genius of others.
Do you know what your Hidden Genius is?
In other news….
The ‘28 day no yelling’ challenge
I am doing a ‘28 day no yelling challenge’ so that I learn to deal differently with my kids when I am frustrated with them.
The challenge is eye opening and smart. I am 10 days in, and have shouted only 3 times. Once done, will update you with my learnings.
Self-paced Children’s AI Book Creation workshop
I’m just putting the final touches on my self-paced, on demand Children’s AI Book Creation workshop.
So if you are interested in accelerating your AI skills by learning to write, illustrate, design and publish a children’s book using AI in 90-minutes, hit reply and say ‘yes’!
Once it’s out, I’ll make sure you get the link to it!
Thanks all for now,
Have a great end of week and enjoy your weekend x