A while ago, I read an interesting article about Spotify.
The article talked about how a bunch of Spotify users started whinging when Spotify’s random shuffle feature played three or four songs from the same artist in a row.
That’s not random, the users said.
As it turns out, a randomly shuffled playlist will sometimes still have clusters of songs. That’s part of the randomness (counterintuitive as that might sound).
But to stop the complaints rolling in, Spotify decided to re-code their random shuffle feature to deliberately remove these clusters.
This satisfied the Spotify users. But it also means that Spotify’s random shuffle isn't actually random any more.
Curious stuff and I daresay there’s a lesson here when it comes to handling life’s challenges.
See, I used to think that the path to a peaceful & happy life was to somehow engineer a life with as few problems as possible.
So I’d play it safe wherever I could in case taking a risk created a new problem.
I’d script work presentations word for word to try to control the presentation as much as possible. I wouldn't chat to the pretty girl standing by the bar. I'd refuse to make a decision until I was 100% sure I was making the right decision. And I’d distract myself from the pressure to get everything right with pints of beer and relentless trips to the gym.
I made avoiding what scared me more important than doing what I actually wanted to do.
As a result, my life became safe & predictable.
But what I’ve come to see is that the happiest and most fulfilled people still have problems turning up every week.
The difference isn't that they have fewer problems. It's that they don't see having problems as problematic.
It's no different to those Spotify users. We mistake life's natural turbulence for a sign that something's gone wrong and end up treating life's perfectly normal "clusters of songs" as evidence we're somehow broken when they're actually just evidence we're human.
So if we feel anxious before a presentation, something must be wrong. Maybe we've lost our confidence or perhaps we're suffering from imposter syndrome. And now we need to practice breathing techniques, rewire our mindset or try to visualise success.
Or maybe (just maybe) we're about to stand up in front of a room of 200 people.
Entire industries have grown up to help us solve “problems” like these. But problems don’t mean we’re failing or there’s something wrong. Having problems just means we’re alive and kicking.
If this way of looking at life resonates with you, this is exactly what my newsletter explores.
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