The Polar Bear: The Ugliness of Being Highly Adaptable
How much does a polar bear weigh? Enough to break the ice.
Hi, I’m Jeff and the following is a recreation of a Toastmasters speech I delivered about a year ago to highlight some of the downfalls of being highly adaptable. If you’re looking for concrete advice or instructions on how to become more adaptable, this piece may not be for you. But, if you prefer raw emotion and can read between the lines to find the instructions that apply to your own unique life, or want to enhance your ability to have empathy for others, then perhaps this is worth a read after all.
Over the last year, I’ve done a great deal of self-reflection and “radical self-inquiry” to borrow a phrase from legendary leadership coach, Jerry Colonna and the good folks at Reboot.io. The outcome has been an intentional decision to remove the proverbial mask I’ve been wearing for much of my life and begin sharing more about who I am, what I believe, and why my words matter. In other words, the impostor is dead to me and the authentic me is alive and well.
To get us started, I’ll begin with a few words about me and my background, so you have a bit of context. Why you ask? Because I believe the person responsible for the words written is a key component to better understand the perspective behind the written words.
I’m inherently curious and have tried a lot of things over the years. Some of my career detours have been with purpose while others without, some under my control and others not so much. Over the last fifteen years, I’ve freelanced for TV networks and commercial production houses, produced casts for reality TV shows, worked alongside talent agents and executives at a “big four” talent and literary agency, brokered commercial real estate transactions in midst of the 2007–2008 financial crisis, improvised with some of the most talented players on the planet, produced and directed sketch comedy revues, built a creative agency, built and conceptualized a variety of consumer apps and enterprise SaaS products, and have experienced many other industries over the course of my career including hospitality, healthcare, and ad tech.
Despite all of that, I have yet to find the professional hat that best fits my oddly shaped head, so I’ll save the career topics for another day.
So, let’s go back to the polar bear, shall we?
Did you know that polar bears are extremely adaptable creatures? Sure, common sense tells us so considering they live in the Arctic, but common sense really isn’t that common so allow me to elaborate for a moment. Yes, polar bears have many physical attributes that allow them to survive in such extreme ecological environments. They are flexible when it comes to their diets. Although seals are their preferred source of food, sometimes those slippery suckers aren’t around to chew on. Polar bears don’t mind, they’ll move on to berries, birds, plants, old carcasses, or even other polar bears. You name it, polar bears will eat it because they are survivors, able to adapt to whatever the situation may be.
Why is this relevant? Well, it’s safe to consider myself a polar bear of sorts, someone who perpetually adapts and survives. Maybe a chameleon since I prefer warm weather, but we’ll stick with the whole polar bear theme today.
Allow me to explain by taking a step back in time to my childhood upbringing. I was a scrawny little kid with a big mouth and zero filters, which made me an easy target for teasing and bullying. To protect myself and be liked or accepted by others, I formed a self-deprecating sense of humor as a defense mechanism. If I made fun of myself before anyone else had the chance to, I’d be fine and get some relief. And it worked, sort of. My self-deprecating sense of humor enabled me to adapt to all kinds of environments and personality types. It helped me gain acceptance from others and make friends wherever I went. Eventually, though, this form of humor caught up with me and adversely affected me in two ways.
For every negative comment I made about myself, the negativity began to expand internally and eventually caused emotional damage.
For me, being adaptable became an ugly truth built upon lies. When I was adapting to everyone else’s personality and every new environment I faced, I was being the person I thought others would like and accept. I wasn’t being me and that is kind of a big deal.
It wasn’t until I began training at The Second City and iO (formerly ImprovOlympic) in Chicago under teachers like Norm Holly, Spike Kunetz, and Susan Messing among others that I learned that comedy isn’t about being funny or telling a joke.
Comedy is about being vulnerable and embracing human imperfections.
In other words, speak the truth and share your personal experiences with the other players. The more awkward the topic, the funnier the scene. Because, well, let’s face the fact that reality is funnier than fiction and the best form of comedy is the unintentional kind. I think YouTube is the proven pudding here, or even that little show called “America’s Funniest Home Videos” with the host who I will always remember as Danny Tanner.
I’d love to dive into all the feedback I received throughout my training, and how they apply to far more than comedy performances (and likely will someday), but it’s time we get back to the ugly truth of adaptability.
As for the negativity, I’m still very much working on transforming my negative attitude into a positive one. This has proven to be a bit more complex than flipping a light switch on or off, at least for me. I have faced a lot of challenging life events over the last fifteen years as we all have. Regardless of these obstacles, there is absolutely no excuse for me to continue throwing countless pity parties for myself where I sing “I can’t” and “poor me” inside my selfish head rather than face life events with a growth mindset.
These life events have also taught me a great deal. Negativity is something we all experience. The trick is to be consciously aware of it, and fight negative thoughts as quickly as possible before they take root within us, causing permanent emotional damage.
I also learned that being vulnerable is not bad, and sharing our fragile thoughts allows us to connect with one another in special ways that we wouldn’t otherwise. Whether we publicly display them or not, we are all human and we all have soft spots.
Bottom line, bad things happen in life. I like to think that when I die, I’ll get a special director’s cut screening of my life, narrated by the almighty wizard behind the curtain. As I stare up at the magnificent screen that spans in all directions, I’m able to view the story of my life while I listen to the reasons why all those bad things happened. In doing so, I will gain understanding as well as closure to get the emotional healing that I had so desperately been seeking throughout my life.
So what is the point in me telling you all of this? Besides it being selfishly therapeutic for one, I think it’s important to note that there’s nothing wrong with us not having it all figured out, no matter how old you are, how many detours you’ve taken, or number of times you’ve failed. I tend to think of the Japanese proverb, “A wise man may fall seven times and stand up eight.” Eventually, we evolve from being unconsciously incompetent > consciously incompetent > consciously competent > unconsciously competent. To make improvements, we must first become conscious of our shortcomings and then understand why we have them in the first place. This allows us to hone in on what work we must put into our lives to ultimately be better in all that we do in work and life.
With far too many interests and even more ambitions, I’m working hard to narrow down these interests and find my passion while refining specific personal and professional goals for me to pursue. Meanwhile, I will continue to hang on to my belief that embracing the journey is far more important than the end destination.
Although I may not weigh 1,000 pounds like our friendly polar bear, I do hope that I was able to successfully break the ice with these words.
Whatever you do, do it with faith and fervor.
Onward — Jeff
