Pick a Number | Shorts

There once was an Indian medicine man who made hunting maps for his tribe. Whenever the game go sparse, he’d put a piece of fresh leather in the sun to dry. Then he’d fold and twist it in his hands, say a few prayers over it, and then smooth it out. The rawhide was now etched with lines. He then marked some reference points on the rawhide, and – BOOM! – a new game map was created. When the hunters followed the map’s newly defined trails, they usually discovered abundant game.

HOW? It’s random made up lines he created on this map. By letting the rawhide’s random folds represent trails, he pointed the hunters to places they had not looked. The result? Fresh untouched areas of new game.

We have a knack as a human race to use the same overused solutions to our problems over and over again expecting a different outcome. Only to become frustrated when that result doesn’t change, but stays the same. We need to take the medicine man’s approach using random information (maybe not prefabricating like he did) to force us to look at our problems in new ways.

It takes practice to open your mind to new things and expose it. In fact, your mind will fight you on it. It’s a skill that needs to be a practiced and that has nothing to do with your current situation.

• Pick out the 13th word of page 147 of a big book you’ve been wanting to read. How does it relate to what you’re doing?
• Look out your window and find the first thing that has blue in it. How would it help solve your problem?
• Listen to a podcast that you would never listen to. How can you use it and apply it to your current focus?

Practice. Make your mind still and then make it uncomfortable with something it’s never come into contact with. Don’t get caught in the endless loop of insanity. Here’s the definition just so you can keep it front of mind:

Insanity: Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

Are you insane yet?

Thanks for reading and have a great day.

Shawn