Dear Family, Friends, Co-workers, Teachers, and Mentors,
I recently finished Ray Dalio's book, Principles. As I was typing up my notes and highlights there were several key quotes that stuck out to me and reminded me of a book I had read a little over a year ago called The Miracle Morning by Hal Elrod. In it, there was a very short chapter on what he called "The Most Important Email of Your Life." The gist of the chapter is that Hal was up late last night and sent an email to 23 people on his contacts list, and the email basically said (I'm paraphrasing):
"Please share with me your perspective on where I am struggling. Each of you knows me in a very different way and I value each of your opinions. Don't be afraid to share your honest thoughts; it won't offend me. In fact, the only offensive thing would be holding yourself back as I would not be growing as quickly as I could have!"
Hal recognized that he couldn't evaluate himself in an entirely objective manner so he relied on the perspective of those around him to have the tough love he needed and say to him, "Hal, buddy, you're a great friend but if I'm being honest the way you do ____ or the fact that you're oblivious to ____ is holding you back from success (or just really annoying 😂). Hal then took everyone's input and compiled it into a notepad and used it as a reference for where he needed to improve in life. When I finished Ray Dalio's book I recognized that he essentially said the same thing - that leaning into pain and embracing tough love and reality is the quickest way to success. Speaking of which, allow me to share a few key quotes from Dalio's book that I particularly liked.
"Because it is difficult to see oneself objectively, you need to rely on the input of others and the whole body of evidence."
"Go to the pain rather than avoid it. If you don't let up on yourself and instead become comfortable always operating with some level of pain, you will evolve at a faster pace. That's just the way it is."
"It's important not to let our biases stand in the way of our objectivity. To get good results, we need to be analytical rather than emotional."
"Pain + Reflection = Progress. There is no avoiding pain, especially if you're going after ambitious goals. Believe it or not, you are lucky to feel that kind of pain if you approach it correctly, because it is a signal that you need to find solutions so you can progress. If you can develop a reflexive reaction to psychic pain that causes you to reflect on it rather than avoid it, it will lead to your rapid learning/evolving.
...If you can reflect deeply about your problems, they almost always shrink or disappear, because you almost always find a better way of dealing with them than if you don't face them head-on."
"Embrace tough love. In my own life, what I want to give to people, most importantly to people I love, is the power to deal with reality to get what they want. In pursuit of my goal to give them strength, I will often deny them what they "want" because that will give them the opportunity to struggle so that they can develop the strength to get what they want on their own. This can be difficult for people emotionally, even if they understand intellectually that having difficulties is the exercise they need to grow strong and that just giving them what they want will weaken them and ultimately lead to them needing more help."
All of you know me to a varying degree and in different capacities. Some of you have known me my whole life, while others have only interacted with me for a short period of time. I chose you for this email because I value your opinion!
The ask: Would you mind sharing your honest feedback on what my main 2-3 strengths or weaknesses are? (aka "areas of improvement")
The main point is that even the simplest, honest, evaluation from another person is incredibly important because humans are pretty bad at judging themselves objectively. Granted, I understand that even this is probably super uncomfortable for you, but that's why your response means even more to me. I know I would be pretty scared about sharing my honest thoughts about someone else if they sent me an email like this. 😆
I'm attaching the chapter from Hal's book about this email if you would like to read it for more context. (I encourage you to, it's a good chapter!) Regardless of whether you respond or not, thank you so much for taking the time to read this and giving me your time. I look forward to interacting with you again at some point in the near future!
Sincerely,
Terry Turner III
P.S. As I'm sure you can imagine, this wasn't an easy email for me to send. I almost chickened out and shrugged it off, but then I remembered I had made a bet with a friend that I would send it... so here it is! Shout-out to you Jacob for your awesome accountability! :)