Nature strikes again

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Lifestyle Design

I just got back from a refreshing trip to Seattle.

Typically, I am equally excited to come home after a great trip, but this time was different.

My fiancée and I had a wonderful time visiting my sister on the West Coast.

We did a fairly comprehensive tour of the area — Olympic National Park, Tacoma, and various neighborhoods throughout downtown Seattle.

Every time I go out there I’m reminded of my love for the Pacific Northwest.

While spending time with loved ones was precious, one aspect of our trip stood out above all:

Nature.

Despite a weather forecast that had us giddy for clear skies, only to deliver mostly cloud coverage for 5 days, the natural world was a source of joy.

It’s refreshing to spend time in a city like that, with such easy access to the unadulterated outdoors — rainforests, mountains, and beaches… a trifecta that is hard to beat.

The experience reaffirmed the importance of nature in my living environment, something I often find lacking in NYC.

Part of that, I realize, is my responsibility.

Vacation and travel are a perfect incentive to see as much as possible, while living at home often yields a similar routine repeated day in and day out.

With intention, that can change.

So, while I continue to wrestle with what's next, I'm focusing on getting more out of my here and now. The PNW is beautiful, but so is NYC. It's on me to find and appreciate nature here at home.

This trip has inspired me to make that happen.

Weekly Write-up

Sales gets a bad rap.

And deservedly so — no one likes being sold to. Even worse is that sinking feeling of having been taken advantage of.

Some have tried to rebrand sales as the art of persuasion, selling it (ironic, I know) as an ever-present part of everyday life. But these attempts miss the core issue.

The negative connotation of “sales” is an issue of bad actors.

Let me make an important distinction: I’m not talking about the salespeople who are bad at selling. I’m referring to those who are good at selling but have bad intentions.

Here’s an example:

About a year ago, I flew into my company’s headquarters for a two-day intensive training. The training leader — let’s call him John — took advantage of an opportunity between sessions to share a story from his early days on the job.

The company had just launched a new product. The internal sentiment around the product was not positive, but John was determined to sell it.

I don’t remember how he did it, but I do remember the gleeful look on his face after telling the group that he sold the product to his customer only for it to sit untouched on the shelf.

He knew it wouldn’t move when he sold it, but he did it anyway. And to make it worse, here he was 20 years later bragging about it.

That kind of selling just doesn’t sit right with me.

I get it. Companies have to make money. To do that, they have to convince customers to buy their product or service. That’s where salespeople come in.

Some companies have honest products and selling those products can have a net positive on society. Win-win.

But, everyone likes to think they sell an honest product. And the people selling those products are often the least qualified to discern the honesty of those products.

As a salesperson, I won’t hold the moral high ground either. We are all guilty of pushing a product on an uninterested party at some point. It could be a result of greed, laziness, blindness, or plain old following orders.

Is sales inherently bad? Maybe, but I don't think so.

Sales at its best involves genuinely relating to people and trying to help them, not just pushing products. That means selling what is in the customer's interests, not the seller's.

Let's call it selling with standards (oh, and it's better for business anyway).

What I’m Learning

Same as Ever by Morgan Housel

Morgan Housel is one of my favorite writers. He typically writes about finance, but what I love most about him is he’s not a prediction pundit. He’s a historian. Rather than trying to predict the future from an overwhelming basket of unpredictability, he focuses on things we can count on: themes over time that don’t change. That’s what this book is about.

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