the road to peace.

i have a confession.

i am a chronic maximizer.

in everything that i do, i’m constantly aiming for the best possible choice, action, and outcome.

i spend sometimes days researching possibilities, analyzing potentialities, and gathering information and resources before i finally commit to a decision. it’s become a personal brand, to some degree.

you should by now recognize this as “perfectionism” rather than a realistic strategy to approach life with. and you’d be right. mostly.

for most of my life, i’ve been an anxiety-riddled mess. i am, historically, quite insecure, prone to imposter syndrome and even self-sabotage. a self-fulfilling prophecy. but being a perfectionist has had one significant upside: through years of doubting myself and constantly working to improve: i actually have.

eventually, a few years ago, a flip switched in my brain:

i am good at things.

and from that point on, i became unstoppable.

kinda.

sorta.

sometimes.

but really, the biggest factor in this change was some very simple advice. when i was first getting started in tree care, i was going from “zero” straight to “managing the arboriculture division,” because the company knew me, and trusted that i would do everything i could to help them be successful.

and they were right. i maximized. i spent every waking hour for a month straight learning everything that i could about rigging, hardware, plant physiology, bids and estimate, and my local competition.

but beyond that, they put me in touch with a mentor, and during one of our first days together he said “never bullshit the customer. they can smell it. if they have a question, you tell ‘em straight up, and you either know it—or you don’t.”

and i knew this. i’ve worked customer service and technical support enough to know what i sound like when i’m making it up.

but he said something else, which really drove it home:

an expert doesn’t have all the answers.

but an expert knows they can FIND the answers.

i’ve spent yeeeears of my life optimizing every decision, evaluating and re-evaluating every scenario. my casual obsessions have given me a lot of in-depth understanding, across countless topics and domains.

what i mean is: there is no doubt in my mind that i can find the answers.

and that knowledge helps me sleep at night.