Rowan Spazzoli

One of the downsides to being an achiever is the constant need to please people around you. In a professional environment, you go through great lengths to make sure everyone in your team is happy. At home you try to appease your parents at every turn. And you’ll force yourself to go to social occasions, even if you are tired, just to make sure you don’t let someone down.

This does make you reliable and dependable. People know they can always count on you.

The problem is that this is at a massive cost to your own well being.

At every one of these events you are placing the needs of others above your own.

Constantly trying to please others.

At the detriment to yourself.

The obvious solution is to prioritize yourself. Turn people away when you need to. Protect your own interests first. But this is difficult for someone who is used to basing their personality on positive feedback from others.

It’s tough, but we need to protect ourselves by saying no.

Image was from one of my happiest varsity memories, a trip with Lauren, Jess and Caito to Babylonstoren

Blog: 185/365

Song of the day: Want you back – HAIM

Over the past four years I’ve been fortunate to experience a variety of fine dining experiences. A close friend of mine brings me along on his escapades, and I get to participate in some incredible adventures. And the thing that stands out for me is how delicate they are.

It’s easy to over emphasise stuff. A massive steak, a big glass of wine, an extravagant ice cream. But the thing that has stood out on these adventures is restraint. The ability for the chefs to make phenomenal experiences with few ingredients.

This speaks to more than just food. Being outrageous and loud is one way to attract attention. But there’s something much more special in making a craft out of the delicate and the subtle. The noise may bring the people, but the gentle craft is what keeps them there.

Image was taken today at Wolfgat, the restaurant we were at. If you’d like to follow my friend you can find his instagram account here

Song of the day: Taylor Swift - Delicate

Blog 162/365. Read more about my #365of25 journey here

An important part of personal development is the concept of play. It provides a practice ground to learn social concepts and experiment with different ways of doing things.

As kids we learn through playing in safe environments, with a classic case of this being the playground. Although there is room to hurt yourself, there are no real consequences. If you lose or win, you’re still able to return to the classroom when you’re done.

Playing as grown ups

As we grow up, there are less and less safe environments to play in. University is a temporary safe environment, in that there is some room to fail some tests. But definitely not as much as when you were a child.

And as we leave the tertiary education environment, our actions have an even more significant impact on us and the world around us.

With this in mind, we have less room to play and experiment as adults.

To get around this, we have a choice spectrum, somewhere between “stop playing” and “find ways of building a safe environment for yourself“.

Either extreme is not ideal. We don’t want to stop playing entirely but we also can’t have a perfectly safe environment (unless we move home and go back to preschool… which would be weird).

So the solution is finding the right mix for what you’re trying to do. Find room to play, to experiment. Create the safe environment, whatever that looks like for you. And as you continue to play, you’ll continue to learn and grow.

Image is of a Murano glass penguin that I got in Venice in 2008. 

Song of the day: Beyoncé - Halo

Blog 157/365. Read more about my #365of25 journey here

When I was in grade 7 I looked at high school kids and wondered how the hell they did it. Their world was so vast, so scary, yet they still managed it.

The same applied at the end of high school. I saw the students at university and wondered how they coped. Their lives seemed unbelievably complex, and they didn’t have parents around to help them navigate that.

In both cases, the move across from junior school to high school and high school to university were terrifying. It was a whole new playing field. It was a big deal.

But in reality it was only a big deal for the first few weeks. After that, I got into the rhythm of things and it was manageable. Suddenly, the most complicated looking environment was my natural habitat.

Not that big a deal

This pattern repeats itself throughout our lives. Every next step seems unsurmountable until we get there. And once we’re there we adjust to it and it becomes the new normal.

At the moment, things like marriage, owning my own place and having a job with significant responsibility seem incomprehensible. But I know that one day I will potentially have all of these. And I’ll realise that they’re not that big a deal.

Image was taken on Friday at the Waterfront 🙂

Song of the day: Walmart Yodelling Kid

Blog 155/365. Read more about my #365of25 journey here

Sunflowers: people that actively try reach for something better. They look after everyone and make life more enjoyable.

Cactuses: people that are prickly and abrasive. They only take for themselves.

We all know people in both groups. We’ve all been one or the other at some point. But some people are overwhelmingly sunflowers, and some are unashamedly cactuses.

When the sunflowers are together, they flourish. They’re constantly giving and looking out for each other. But a single cactus can ruin all the sunflowers.

And so the sunflowers must protect themselves from the cactuses. They need to learn to shine in the presence of other sunflowers, and to fight for their space when the cactuses are around.

And as much as the sunflowers need to look after everyone else, they need to look after themselves when the cactuses are around.

A Floral Metaphor

This little metaphor is based on a bunch of conversations I had today with Massimo, Jared and Torie. And it was inspired by the garden (as seen in the picture) at Babylonstoren in Franshoek.

Although the analogy is quite fluffy, the message is simply about givers and takers. People who give, our sunflowers, thrive when they’re with other givers. But a person who is a taker will exhaust them, eventually leaving them with nothing left to give

As much as it’s difficult for the giver, there are times when they need to protect themselves from this. And make sure they’re okay before trying to fix the world around them

So be a sunflower. Just make sure to protect yourself from the cactuses.

Image was taken at Babylonstoren today. Had a wonderful outing with family from overseas and my uncle Maxi 🙂

Song of the day: Elvis Presley - Jailhouse Rock

Blog 144/365. Read more about my #365of25 journey here