I was all set to really think about my superpower (my short handed way of saying the thing about me that give me an advantage when it comes to one on one combat), but the more I thought about it the more I realized that there really wasn't any value in spending much time on this topic. I don't need to figure out what I can do to take advantage of my strengths. I'm pretty much already doing it. Some personality test I took for some leadership training told me that I'm a Coordinating Observer and gave me some insights into what that meant. Based on what a Coordinating Observer is good at, I'm already doing things that take advantage of my strengths. (I'm a chemist after all. If I was in sales or some other more people centered thing, my responsibilities may not be aligned with my preferences.)
The bigger challenge is to accept what makes me me. Over the last few years I've written plenty of posts about bashing myself. I seem to come here to unload my self-loathing on a pretty regular basis. This post is a pretty good example of me being hard on myself. There is a pretty clear sense that I am in some way insufficient and that I am not measuring up to some external standard of what a man should be. That personality test I took describes people like me as accommodating. Accommodating is just another way of being the nice guy, which is what I'm ripping about myself in that post that I linked to.
Nice guys leave a trail of fading impressions is what I said in that post. Is that really what I think about myself? I leave a trail of fading impressions? That's all people take away from meeting me? Surely I'm not that insignificant, but clearly some part of me thinks that I am. Why do I have such a hard time accepting myself? I essentially rejected that personality test because I didn't think it described me. I'm not a perfectionist who always has to do things the right way and know the right answer. That's what I told myself as I read the report for the first time. Then I gave it to the wife and she said it was 85% accurate. How can I just reject it when the person in the world who knows me best says that it's a pretty accurate description of who I am?
So after much reflection, I can admit that, yes, I can be a bit of a perfectionist. I know that my MBA GPA will have a minimal impact on my career prospects, but I put tremendous effort into my classes to get good grades. I had to make my papers the best that I could make them. That's perfectionism. I spent months preparing for a test and applying to schools that I know I would never attend. That's me showing that I can get the right answers and do things the right way. I have guilt over how I used that time. Granted, it definitely wasn't the healthiest way for me to be me, but I shouldn't beat myself up for wanting to be demonstrate my competence and getting recognition for my efforts. The means do not automatically impugn the ends.
I do have a deep seated need to have the right answer. So many of the social shortcomings that I berate myself over are rooted in my uncertainty in how to act in certain situations and my reluctance to do something that might be perceived as wrong. I'm so rooted in the objective, it's hard for me to see that many people are perfectly happy making judgments based on their subjective point of view. I don't have to constantly meet some ideal. People just have to find me pleasing in some way. That's the scale that matters. That external other thing that I'm always worrying about isn't such a big deal to many people. The people closest to me have already told me in many ways that they like me and find me appealing in so many ways. Why should I question their opinion?
It's okay for me to be accommodating. That just means that I'm not a jerk. I don't have a inherent need to prove my dominance at every opportunity. My tactic is not to challenge everyone and dare them to knock me down. I'm happy to work with the people to around me to achieve our common goals. You get what you want and I get what I want. What's wrong with that?
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