November 27, 2023 • 23 mins
Have you ever decided just to go rogue and things actually turned out better than you could have planned for? Well this week, Kat is talking about a recent last minute (really last second) decision to change plans that worked out in everyone's favor. In this episode you will hear Kat talk about the importance of being flexible with plans and a small mindset change that has started to make a BIG difference in her life. In his book, The Infinite Game, Simon Sinek details the importance in playing to stay in the game versus to beat an opponent. And being that our current culture is obsessed with competition and comparison- Kat thought it may be helpful to talk about some of the brilliance she gathered from Simon's book and viral motivational talks.
Get The Infinite Game by Simon Sinek
Follow Kat on Instagram: @Kat.Defatta
Follow the podcast Instagram: @YouNeedTherapyPodcast
Have a question, concern, guest idea, something else? Reach Kat at: Kathryn@youneedtherapypodcast.com
Heard about Three Cords Therapy but don’t know what it is? Click here!
Produced by: @HoustonTilley
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
I started to realize that not being an expert isn't
a liability, it's a real gift. If we don't know
something about ourselves at this point in our life, it's
probably because it's uncomfortable to know. If you can die
before you die, then you can really live. There's a
wisdom at death's door. I thought I was insane. Yeah,
(00:31):
and I didn't know what to do because there was
no internet. I don't know, man, I'm like, I feel
like everything is hard. Hey, y'all, my name is Kat.
I'm a human first and a licensed therapist second. And
right now I'm inviting you into conversations that I hope
encourage you to become more curious and less judgmental about yourself, others,
(00:54):
and the world around you. Welcome to You Need Therapy.
Hi guys, and welcome to a new episode of You
Need Therapy podcast. My name is Kat. I am the host,
and if you are new here, I like to start
every episode off with a quick reminder that although I
am a therapist, and although this podcast is called You
(01:14):
Need Therapy, it does not serve as a replacement or
a substitute for any actual mental health services. However, we
always hope that it can help you in some way
on whatever journey life finds you on. So today we
are going to do a solo episode. It's just me
and I'm going to talk about something that recently happened
(01:38):
to me, and I'm going to share something with you
that I recently learned because it has really made a
big difference in how I am looking at certain things
in my life, and I think that it could be
really helpful for you guys as well. So two weeks ago,
I was getting ready to host a Mastermind meeting with
(01:59):
all of the women that are involved in the podcast
network that I am a part of. The podcast network
is the Amy Brown Network, which is a part of
iHeart Media, and it's just a really great group of
women who all have different gifts and talents, but also
have a really thirsty and excited heart for helping other people.
(02:22):
A really good group of people like minded with a
lot of differences as well, and a group of people
that can be very open with people that are different
from them. So I was in charge of this specific
meeting and I had planned an entire hour out over
a specific topic, and that topic was going to be
(02:43):
the seven Primal Questions. So if you are unfamiliar with
what that is, it is a system and personality type
test that Mike Foster came out with, who was on
this podcast a couple of months ago, to talk about
this new it's a book too, this new thing that
he created, and I was going to bring this to
(03:03):
the group because I love all of the content that
Mike has created around this and it has been very
fruitful and helpful in my own life. If you are
not familiar with it, I highly recommend go listen to
that episode with Mike Foster, the Seven Primal Questions. So
I had planned a whole hour of content around going
over some of this and then some activities that I
(03:25):
wanted to do around the content that I was bringing
that I was teaching. Then something happened. I was scrolling TikTok,
as one does when they have a random ten minutes
to spare, and I came across this video of Simon Sinek,
which I could be saying his name wrong, because I
(03:45):
don't know that I've ever heard anybody say his name.
I think that's how you say it. But I came
around this video of his and I had seen some
of his videos before, and I've saved some of his
quotes and stuff, but I actually didn't really know anything
about him other than he talks about business a lot,
and he talks about leadership a lot, and he seems
really smart. So I got stucked into this video and
(04:08):
I had this knee jerk reaction, which was to first
send it to Amy, who was going to be a
part of this Mastermind. But really I was sending it
to her as an idea for a conversation on the
fifth thing. So I sent it to her, and then
I sat there for a second, and then I hopped
on this zoom call and went completely rogue, which I
(04:31):
want to say is out of the ordinary for me,
but I think that I actually go rogue more often
than I realize. And there was this sensation inside of
me that said, this feels more important right now. And
I want to start this episode off by talking about
(04:52):
the permission we need to give ourselves more often to
change the plan. When we focus on the plan way
too much out when we do what we are supposed
to do in quotes versus allow ourselves to take inventory
of what would actually be the best in any given situation,
we really miss out and following the plan for the
(05:15):
simple sake of following the plan can be very problematic.
When we gain new information or when we have a
new experience. I want us to start asking ourselves questions like, Okay,
what might this change? Does this experience call for any edits,
any lane shifts, any course adjustments or corrections. Following a
plan may give us a false sense of safety, but
(05:39):
safety doesn't always feel comfortable. Even though we get this confused,
following a plan might feel very comfortable, but being comfortable
doesn't always mean we are safe. Think about it in sports.
I'm a big sports girl these days because the red
zone plays for eight hours in my home every single Sunday.
So imagine that you have this plan of attack. It's
(06:02):
football game. If this plan of attack, maybe your strategy
is to run the ball versus throw it a lot
because the team that you're playing historically is I don't know,
really great at interceptions. I should have used a different sport,
but anyway, you get the point. So then you get
into the game and you realize that the team has
advanced their ability to let's say tackle or run through
(06:29):
the line to sack the quarterback. I don't know what
the actual strategies would be in football. But the point
is you aren't able to run the ball because what
you thought this team's advantage was actually they're really great
at this other thing. Maybe they worked at this on
this other thing. And so do you still end up
(06:50):
running the ball because that's what the plants? Well, we're
still going to run these specific plays even though they're
not working. We're still going to do this because we
said that we're going to do this. Or do you
call a timeout and reassess us the next play and
switch it up a little bit. Another example of this
that might make a little bit more sense because that
was me trying to really be more footballly than I am.
(07:12):
If that sentence does even clue you in, then I'm
not anyway. So another example would be, let's say you
are dating and you're preparing to go on a date
with a new guy that you met on a dating app.
And let's say you're talking about this date with a
friend and you show him a picture and you like, oh,
this is him, I'm so excited, And your friend says
that she actually knows that guy and he's in a active
(07:37):
relationship with somebody publicly. Do you still go out with
him because that was the plan. Or do you call
off the date and spend the evening with a friend
or doing something you love, or actually, you know what,
you just end up doing nothing that night and relax
knowing that you just save yourself a lot of chaos,
(07:58):
or do you go on that date anyway, you see
what I'm saying, Like, when we get more information, it's
really important for us to be able to be flexible.
Plans are great, and we need to create some space
to be flexible when it's necessary. So I want to
go back to me going rogue on this call. So
what I'm going to do today is share with you
(08:18):
the idea that sparked a really, really beautiful conversation with
our group on this mastermind. And to be fair, this
could have totally flopped and they could have all been like, yeah,
I've heard this before, or I think this is dumb,
or not have been open to answering some of the
questions that I had. But that didn't happen, and it
actually created such a wonderful space that I don't know
(08:40):
would have been created if I would have gone with
the original plan. So I'm giving you a testament of
sometimes switching it up really does work out, and this
is an example of when it did. Sometimes we just
need that data that we're going to be okay. Right,
we can go Rogan, We'll be okay. So what I'm
going to do is I'm going to actually also put
the video that I watched in the show notes because
I going to skip over some stuff. If you want
(09:01):
to go back and follow Simon, or follow the creator
that put this video out, or just listen to this
and have us in your back pocket, maybe share with
your friends, create conversations around that, you can do that.
So this was a short video about nine ten minutes
and it was of Simon Sinek giving a talk on
(09:22):
a book he actually wrote called The Infinite Game. So
in this talk he describes that in game theory, there
are two types of games that people play. So this
was a short video about nine ten minutes and it
was of Simon Sinek giving a talk on a book
(09:44):
he actually wrote called The Infinite Game. So in this
talk he describes that in game theory, there are two
types of games that people play. There are infinite games
and there are finite games. So finite games are defined
by having known players fixed rules and an agreed upon objective.
(10:05):
So Simon used baseball as a way to describe what
a finite game looks like. There is a mutual agreeance
on the rules of baseball, and at the end of
the game, which from what I know is nine innings,
whoever has more runs wins. There's nobody coming back around
being like, well, no, we're going to play a couple
more because we think we can beat them. Like after
(10:25):
the nine innings, there's a winner and there's a loser.
Finite games have winners and losers. Infinite games, on the
other hand, are defined as having known and unknown players,
so you know some of them, you don't know some
of the other ones. The rules are changeable, and the
goal is not to win, it's to perpetuate the game.
The goal is just to make the game last. Now,
(10:46):
since there are no winners and losers in an infinite game,
what happens a lot of times is eventually players will
drop out when they run out of resources or energy,
and then another player will come and replace them and
the game continues to keep going. It's not like I
dropped out, so you one I drop out, somebody replaces me.
(11:08):
So when there are two finite players against each other,
the system of the game is stable, and when there
are two infinite players against each other, the stability of
that game also exists. However, when you put a finite
player against an infinite player, some friction happens. So both
of these games can operate independently and run fine in
(11:31):
their own sectors. But when you cross the paths of
an infinite player and a finite player, friction happens. And
what that friction looks like is a lot of frustration
for the finite player, because the finite player is going
to play to win, and the infinite player is going
to play to keep the game going, which is the
literal opposite of what the finite player is trying to do,
(11:53):
and so you can see how that might create some frustration.
He then takes this idea of these two games and
he uses them to describe the game of business, which
we all are somewhat a part of, right, and is
an infinite game. The game of business. Business has existed forever,
and it's going to exist after we're gone. It's nobody's
gonna win business. He said that if you listen to
(12:16):
the words of a lot of companies, most companies. If
you listen to the words that they use to describe
themselves and to promote themselves, it looks and sounds like
they actually don't know what game they are playing. So
these things that you would hear are things like we
are number one and we outdd our competition and stuff
like that. So they're in an infinite game, but those
(12:38):
words sound like they are playing a finite game. How
can you be number one an infinite game? You can't.
In the game of business, there aren't any universally agreed
upon rules or metrics for establishing rankings and winners and losers,
and so you can't just call yourself number one because
(12:59):
it doesn't really mean anything, like what do you mean
you're number one? Like, what does that actually mean? What
metrics can I look at that actually help me make
sense of that? And there could be a bajillion different
types of metrics like how big your company is, how
much revenue you bring in, how much net income you
bring up, how much growth you have, how much product
(13:19):
you sell, how much retention, like there are so many
different things, and so you can see how that's very confusing.
So Simon then shares with us that apparently the great
businesses that we know and have known are not focused
on winning the game and or being number one. They
are focused on staying in the game that they're playing.
He postures that understanding what kind of game you're in
(13:42):
dramatically changes three things, the kinds of decisions you make,
how you see the world, and what your confidence looks like.
And I find this part really interesting because think about
the businesses or spaces that you've been in where you're
playing a finite game, but the game is actually infinite, right,
(14:03):
So I know when I'm playing a finite game, there
is a lot of hustle and bustle in my brain
to be paying attention to my competition, to be looking
at what they're doing, to be making sure I'm always
a step ahead and being worried if I'm a step behind.
There's a lot of energy in that that influences the
decisions I make. They're not so much made based on
(14:27):
just me and what I want for myself and my business.
They're based on what other people are doing. They're based
on how to get ahead versus how to be good,
how to be great, And they shape how I feel
about myself. They shape how I feel about what i'm doing.
They shape how I feel about my success, and that's
where that confidence part comes in. So if I'm playing
a finite game in an infinite game, my confidence is
(14:50):
going to continue to be punched and pushed at and
messed with for possibly no good reason. So it's really
important to remember that the one who's playing the finite
game when they're in an infinite game is the one
that gets frustrated, not the team that someone is trying
(15:10):
to beat. Your competition might not be frustrated because they
might not be paying attention to you, even if they
are ahead of you in whatever made up metric you've created.
You're the one that gets frustrated. The infinite player understands
that sometimes you're ahead, sometimes you're winning, sometimes you're behind,
sometimes you're losing. Because the goal isn't to be the best.
(15:31):
It's not to outdo the other people, their neighbors, their
old partners, their boss. They didn't like that at their
old company. They're not looking to outdo any of their
so called competition because their competition actually is themselves. Where
finite players play to beat the people around them. Infinite
(15:53):
players play to be better than themselves. They play to
beat the version of themselves that they were yesterday. And
this is where I was like, well, we are not
just talking about large corporations here. He is talking about me.
He is talking about you. He is talking about all
the little finite games we make up in our head
(16:14):
all of the time, the infinite games that we are
all in when we think that we're in finite games
are not about being better than other people. They are
about continuing to be a better version of ourselves. And
it's about how we make the work we're doing today
better than the work that we produced yesterday, which allows
ourselves to grow versus whin a fake competition we made
(16:37):
up in our head. And Simon touches on this, and
I agree with it wholeheartedly that humans love comparing. We
love competition, and we love ranking systems, even though most
of them are meaningless and arbitrary. And we know this,
knowing this, we still want to be on those lists.
(16:58):
And I'll be the first to admit that I know,
I know this feeling to my core. I know that
these kinds of awards and lists are somewhat meaningless, but
I would still rather be on them than not on them.
For example, there is this competition in Nashville called the
National Fit Awards. It's fitness magazine puts on this competition
every single year, and they actually just did the voting
(17:20):
for those and last year Uned Therapy won the competition
for best Podcast and I got second for best Mental
Health Professional. And I've actually been on that list as
like part of the top three mental health professionals. I've
been on that list since the creation of these awards,
and I know that that doesn't really matter. However, I'd
(17:42):
be lying if I said I wouldn't be bummed if
I wasn't on that list anymore, even though I know
the only reason that I'm really on those lists is
because there are enough people and there have been enough
people that know me, who are in the fitness world
who would vote for those awards because I worked in
the fitness industry, I'm a therapist, I have a podcast.
(18:03):
It's just like the perfect storm. Like if I was
just some random person who never worked in fitness or
it only knew a couple people in the fitness world,
I don't know that I would be consistently on in
those spaces. So I know that they're meaningless winning those
awards or winning that award does not mean I have
the best podcast or that I'm the best therapist, because
there's no way to rank or decide what that even means,
(18:25):
and I wouldn't even agree with it. I think this
podcast is wonderful. I don't know what it would mean
to say it's the best podcast in Nashville. There's too
much nuance in podcasts for that to be a thing.
Who gets decide to decide what best is? And the
same with therapists, like, what does that mean? How can
you be the best therapist? There's no way to measure
(18:47):
that except to have a random vote that really means nothing.
I bet a lot of the people that voted on
me for me didn't even know me, and they were
voting for their friend in a different category and they
had to pick somebody for this one, and I was
just a b or C, they said, seeing that happened
to be me. So while it can be really fun
to win these awards and win and be on these
(19:07):
lists and in these ranking systems, it actually doesn't really
mean anything if you win it or you don't win it.
But again, we as humans love to compare, even though
we know that joy definitely does not come from us
comparing ourselves to others. Nevertheless, we continue to act like
(19:29):
we don't know that. And here's another little antidote that
will help visualize this idea. So Simon talked about this
study where people were offered either a one million dollar
house on a street where other houses were four million
dollars and this is for free. You get this one
million dollar house for free, or a free four hundred
thousand dollar house on a street where the other houses
(19:50):
were one hundred thousand dollars. So you can have a
million dollar house on a street where all the houses
are bigger than yours, or you can have a four
hundred thousand dollar house on street where your house is
the biggest one, and most people chose the four hundred
thousand dollars house. The deduction here is that we as
human beings just love being better than each other. It
(20:15):
feels eggy to say that, and I have this experience
of not wanting that to be true, and in our
culture that is true. I don't even really know what
to say to that. We spend so much time worrying
about being better or prettier, or richer, or funnier or
cooler or whatever than others rather than being the best
versions of ourselves, And then we rob the world's ability
(20:39):
to see what the best version of ourselves really would be.
We rob ourselves the ability to see that. And I
know that as long as we are looking to other
people to see if we're good enough, or strong enough,
or successful enough, we are always, always, always going to
end up being dissatisfied. There will always be somebody or
something greater than us, whether we know who they are
(21:01):
and they're in our view or not. So my question
here is what would happen if we looked more towards
our growth, Like, what would it mean? What would happen
if it mattered more that we are here than if
we're the best one here? What if we look to
have a seat at the table versus the head seat
(21:23):
at the table? Because the ones who are worried about
being the best, the ones who are worried about being
at the head seat, are also the ones that will
end up being frustrated. So after I played this video
for everybody in this meeting, what I did is I
asked for everyone to share to the level that they
were comfortable with sharing where in their lives, both personally
(21:47):
and professionally, they were playing the finite game where they're
in an infinite game, and the conversation that ensued was
such a cool conversation. So I really want to leave
you with that challenge as well. So where in your
life are you playing a finite game when you're actually
(22:10):
in an infinite game? And can you look at what
you might need to do in order to switch your
mindset so you're not the one who's being frustrated all
the time and who's ending up frustrated. So that's what
I have for you today, short, sweet, and to the point.
Like I said, I'm also going to link this video
(22:31):
for you guys, so you can also watch it as
many times as you want and maybe get some more
goodness from him. I am in the process of getting
my hands on his book so I can read that
and gain some more insight myself. And I'm in the
process of shifting my mindset in a lot of areas.
So I hope that you guys have the day you
(22:52):
need to have. And if you have any questions, feedback, comments, anything,
remember you can always send those to me Catherine at
You Need Their podcast and you can follow me at
Kat dot Defada on Instagram and at You Need Therapy podcast.
I also hope you had the Thanksgiving you needed to
have last week and you continue to have the holiday
(23:13):
season that you need to have. I'll be back with
you guys on Wednesday for couch Talks. Until then, Bye bye,
I started to realize that not being an expert isn't
a liability, it's a real gift. If we don't know
something about ourselves at this point in our life, it's
probably because it's uncomfortable to know. If you can die
before you die, then you can really live. There's a
wisdom at death's door. I thought I was insane. Yeah,
(00:31):
and I didn't know what to do because there was
no internet. I don't know, man, I'm like, I feel
like everything is hard. Hey, y'all, my name is Kat.
I'm a human first and a licensed therapist second. And
right now I'm inviting you into conversations that I hope
encourage you to become more curious and less judgmental about yourself, others,
(00:54):
and the world around you. Welcome to You Need Therapy.
Hi guys, and welcome to a new episode of You
Need Therapy podcast. My name is Kat. I am the host,
and if you are new here, I like to start
every episode off with a quick reminder that although I
am a therapist, and although this podcast is called You
(01:14):
Need Therapy, it does not serve as a replacement or
a substitute for any actual mental health services. However, we
always hope that it can help you in some way
on whatever journey life finds you on. So today we
are going to do a solo episode. It's just me
and I'm going to talk about something that recently happened
(01:38):
to me, and I'm going to share something with you
that I recently learned because it has really made a
big difference in how I am looking at certain things
in my life, and I think that it could be
really helpful for you guys as well. So two weeks ago,
I was getting ready to host a Mastermind meeting with
(01:59):
all of the women that are involved in the podcast
network that I am a part of. The podcast network
is the Amy Brown Network, which is a part of
iHeart Media, and it's just a really great group of
women who all have different gifts and talents, but also
have a really thirsty and excited heart for helping other people.
(02:22):
A really good group of people like minded with a
lot of differences as well, and a group of people
that can be very open with people that are different
from them. So I was in charge of this specific
meeting and I had planned an entire hour out over
a specific topic, and that topic was going to be
(02:43):
the seven Primal Questions. So if you are unfamiliar with
what that is, it is a system and personality type
test that Mike Foster came out with, who was on
this podcast a couple of months ago, to talk about
this new it's a book too, this new thing that
he created, and I was going to bring this to
(03:03):
the group because I love all of the content that
Mike has created around this and it has been very
fruitful and helpful in my own life. If you are
not familiar with it, I highly recommend go listen to
that episode with Mike Foster, the Seven Primal Questions. So
I had planned a whole hour of content around going
over some of this and then some activities that I
(03:25):
wanted to do around the content that I was bringing
that I was teaching. Then something happened. I was scrolling TikTok,
as one does when they have a random ten minutes
to spare, and I came across this video of Simon Sinek,
which I could be saying his name wrong, because I
(03:45):
don't know that I've ever heard anybody say his name.
I think that's how you say it. But I came
around this video of his and I had seen some
of his videos before, and I've saved some of his
quotes and stuff, but I actually didn't really know anything
about him other than he talks about business a lot,
and he talks about leadership a lot, and he seems
really smart. So I got stucked into this video and
(04:08):
I had this knee jerk reaction, which was to first
send it to Amy, who was going to be a
part of this Mastermind. But really I was sending it
to her as an idea for a conversation on the
fifth thing. So I sent it to her, and then
I sat there for a second, and then I hopped
on this zoom call and went completely rogue, which I
(04:31):
want to say is out of the ordinary for me,
but I think that I actually go rogue more often
than I realize. And there was this sensation inside of
me that said, this feels more important right now. And
I want to start this episode off by talking about
(04:52):
the permission we need to give ourselves more often to
change the plan. When we focus on the plan way
too much out when we do what we are supposed
to do in quotes versus allow ourselves to take inventory
of what would actually be the best in any given situation,
we really miss out and following the plan for the
(05:15):
simple sake of following the plan can be very problematic.
When we gain new information or when we have a
new experience. I want us to start asking ourselves questions like, Okay,
what might this change? Does this experience call for any edits,
any lane shifts, any course adjustments or corrections. Following a
plan may give us a false sense of safety, but
(05:39):
safety doesn't always feel comfortable. Even though we get this confused,
following a plan might feel very comfortable, but being comfortable
doesn't always mean we are safe. Think about it in sports.
I'm a big sports girl these days because the red
zone plays for eight hours in my home every single Sunday.
So imagine that you have this plan of attack. It's
(06:02):
football game. If this plan of attack, maybe your strategy
is to run the ball versus throw it a lot
because the team that you're playing historically is I don't know,
really great at interceptions. I should have used a different sport,
but anyway, you get the point. So then you get
into the game and you realize that the team has
advanced their ability to let's say tackle or run through
(06:29):
the line to sack the quarterback. I don't know what
the actual strategies would be in football. But the point
is you aren't able to run the ball because what
you thought this team's advantage was actually they're really great
at this other thing. Maybe they worked at this on
this other thing. And so do you still end up
(06:50):
running the ball because that's what the plants? Well, we're
still going to run these specific plays even though they're
not working. We're still going to do this because we
said that we're going to do this. Or do you
call a timeout and reassess us the next play and
switch it up a little bit. Another example of this
that might make a little bit more sense because that
was me trying to really be more footballly than I am.
(07:12):
If that sentence does even clue you in, then I'm
not anyway. So another example would be, let's say you
are dating and you're preparing to go on a date
with a new guy that you met on a dating app.
And let's say you're talking about this date with a
friend and you show him a picture and you like, oh,
this is him, I'm so excited, And your friend says
that she actually knows that guy and he's in a active
(07:37):
relationship with somebody publicly. Do you still go out with
him because that was the plan. Or do you call
off the date and spend the evening with a friend
or doing something you love, or actually, you know what,
you just end up doing nothing that night and relax
knowing that you just save yourself a lot of chaos,
(07:58):
or do you go on that date anyway, you see
what I'm saying, Like, when we get more information, it's
really important for us to be able to be flexible.
Plans are great, and we need to create some space
to be flexible when it's necessary. So I want to
go back to me going rogue on this call. So
what I'm going to do today is share with you
(08:18):
the idea that sparked a really, really beautiful conversation with
our group on this mastermind. And to be fair, this
could have totally flopped and they could have all been like, yeah,
I've heard this before, or I think this is dumb,
or not have been open to answering some of the
questions that I had. But that didn't happen, and it
actually created such a wonderful space that I don't know
(08:40):
would have been created if I would have gone with
the original plan. So I'm giving you a testament of
sometimes switching it up really does work out, and this
is an example of when it did. Sometimes we just
need that data that we're going to be okay. Right,
we can go Rogan, We'll be okay. So what I'm
going to do is I'm going to actually also put
the video that I watched in the show notes because
I going to skip over some stuff. If you want
(09:01):
to go back and follow Simon, or follow the creator
that put this video out, or just listen to this
and have us in your back pocket, maybe share with
your friends, create conversations around that, you can do that.
So this was a short video about nine ten minutes
and it was of Simon Sinek giving a talk on
(09:22):
a book he actually wrote called The Infinite Game. So
in this talk he describes that in game theory, there
are two types of games that people play. So this
was a short video about nine ten minutes and it
was of Simon Sinek giving a talk on a book
(09:44):
he actually wrote called The Infinite Game. So in this
talk he describes that in game theory, there are two
types of games that people play. There are infinite games
and there are finite games. So finite games are defined
by having known players fixed rules and an agreed upon objective.
(10:05):
So Simon used baseball as a way to describe what
a finite game looks like. There is a mutual agreeance
on the rules of baseball, and at the end of
the game, which from what I know is nine innings,
whoever has more runs wins. There's nobody coming back around
being like, well, no, we're going to play a couple
more because we think we can beat them. Like after
(10:25):
the nine innings, there's a winner and there's a loser.
Finite games have winners and losers. Infinite games, on the
other hand, are defined as having known and unknown players,
so you know some of them, you don't know some
of the other ones. The rules are changeable, and the
goal is not to win, it's to perpetuate the game.
The goal is just to make the game last. Now,
(10:46):
since there are no winners and losers in an infinite game,
what happens a lot of times is eventually players will
drop out when they run out of resources or energy,
and then another player will come and replace them and
the game continues to keep going. It's not like I
dropped out, so you one I drop out, somebody replaces me.
(11:08):
So when there are two finite players against each other,
the system of the game is stable, and when there
are two infinite players against each other, the stability of
that game also exists. However, when you put a finite
player against an infinite player, some friction happens. So both
of these games can operate independently and run fine in
(11:31):
their own sectors. But when you cross the paths of
an infinite player and a finite player, friction happens. And
what that friction looks like is a lot of frustration
for the finite player, because the finite player is going
to play to win, and the infinite player is going
to play to keep the game going, which is the
literal opposite of what the finite player is trying to do,
(11:53):
and so you can see how that might create some frustration.
He then takes this idea of these two games and
he uses them to describe the game of business, which
we all are somewhat a part of, right, and is
an infinite game. The game of business. Business has existed forever,
and it's going to exist after we're gone. It's nobody's
gonna win business. He said that if you listen to
(12:16):
the words of a lot of companies, most companies. If
you listen to the words that they use to describe
themselves and to promote themselves, it looks and sounds like
they actually don't know what game they are playing. So
these things that you would hear are things like we
are number one and we outdd our competition and stuff
like that. So they're in an infinite game, but those
(12:38):
words sound like they are playing a finite game. How
can you be number one an infinite game? You can't.
In the game of business, there aren't any universally agreed
upon rules or metrics for establishing rankings and winners and losers,
and so you can't just call yourself number one because
(12:59):
it doesn't really mean anything, like what do you mean
you're number one? Like, what does that actually mean? What
metrics can I look at that actually help me make
sense of that? And there could be a bajillion different
types of metrics like how big your company is, how
much revenue you bring in, how much net income you
bring up, how much growth you have, how much product
(13:19):
you sell, how much retention, like there are so many
different things, and so you can see how that's very confusing.
So Simon then shares with us that apparently the great
businesses that we know and have known are not focused
on winning the game and or being number one. They
are focused on staying in the game that they're playing.
He postures that understanding what kind of game you're in
(13:42):
dramatically changes three things, the kinds of decisions you make,
how you see the world, and what your confidence looks like.
And I find this part really interesting because think about
the businesses or spaces that you've been in where you're
playing a finite game, but the game is actually infinite, right,
(14:03):
So I know when I'm playing a finite game, there
is a lot of hustle and bustle in my brain
to be paying attention to my competition, to be looking
at what they're doing, to be making sure I'm always
a step ahead and being worried if I'm a step behind.
There's a lot of energy in that that influences the
decisions I make. They're not so much made based on
(14:27):
just me and what I want for myself and my business.
They're based on what other people are doing. They're based
on how to get ahead versus how to be good,
how to be great, And they shape how I feel
about myself. They shape how I feel about what i'm doing.
They shape how I feel about my success, and that's
where that confidence part comes in. So if I'm playing
a finite game in an infinite game, my confidence is
(14:50):
going to continue to be punched and pushed at and
messed with for possibly no good reason. So it's really
important to remember that the one who's playing the finite
game when they're in an infinite game is the one
that gets frustrated, not the team that someone is trying
(15:10):
to beat. Your competition might not be frustrated because they
might not be paying attention to you, even if they
are ahead of you in whatever made up metric you've created.
You're the one that gets frustrated. The infinite player understands
that sometimes you're ahead, sometimes you're winning, sometimes you're behind,
sometimes you're losing. Because the goal isn't to be the best.
(15:31):
It's not to outdo the other people, their neighbors, their
old partners, their boss. They didn't like that at their
old company. They're not looking to outdo any of their
so called competition because their competition actually is themselves. Where
finite players play to beat the people around them. Infinite
(15:53):
players play to be better than themselves. They play to
beat the version of themselves that they were yesterday. And
this is where I was like, well, we are not
just talking about large corporations here. He is talking about me.
He is talking about you. He is talking about all
the little finite games we make up in our head
(16:14):
all of the time, the infinite games that we are
all in when we think that we're in finite games
are not about being better than other people. They are
about continuing to be a better version of ourselves. And
it's about how we make the work we're doing today
better than the work that we produced yesterday, which allows
ourselves to grow versus whin a fake competition we made
(16:37):
up in our head. And Simon touches on this, and
I agree with it wholeheartedly that humans love comparing. We
love competition, and we love ranking systems, even though most
of them are meaningless and arbitrary. And we know this,
knowing this, we still want to be on those lists.
(16:58):
And I'll be the first to admit that I know,
I know this feeling to my core. I know that
these kinds of awards and lists are somewhat meaningless, but
I would still rather be on them than not on them.
For example, there is this competition in Nashville called the
National Fit Awards. It's fitness magazine puts on this competition
every single year, and they actually just did the voting
(17:20):
for those and last year Uned Therapy won the competition
for best Podcast and I got second for best Mental
Health Professional. And I've actually been on that list as
like part of the top three mental health professionals. I've
been on that list since the creation of these awards,
and I know that that doesn't really matter. However, I'd
(17:42):
be lying if I said I wouldn't be bummed if
I wasn't on that list anymore, even though I know
the only reason that I'm really on those lists is
because there are enough people and there have been enough
people that know me, who are in the fitness world
who would vote for those awards because I worked in
the fitness industry, I'm a therapist, I have a podcast.
(18:03):
It's just like the perfect storm. Like if I was
just some random person who never worked in fitness or
it only knew a couple people in the fitness world,
I don't know that I would be consistently on in
those spaces. So I know that they're meaningless winning those
awards or winning that award does not mean I have
the best podcast or that I'm the best therapist, because
there's no way to rank or decide what that even means,
(18:25):
and I wouldn't even agree with it. I think this
podcast is wonderful. I don't know what it would mean
to say it's the best podcast in Nashville. There's too
much nuance in podcasts for that to be a thing.
Who gets decide to decide what best is? And the
same with therapists, like, what does that mean? How can
you be the best therapist? There's no way to measure
(18:47):
that except to have a random vote that really means nothing.
I bet a lot of the people that voted on
me for me didn't even know me, and they were
voting for their friend in a different category and they
had to pick somebody for this one, and I was
just a b or C, they said, seeing that happened
to be me. So while it can be really fun
to win these awards and win and be on these
(19:07):
lists and in these ranking systems, it actually doesn't really
mean anything if you win it or you don't win it.
But again, we as humans love to compare, even though
we know that joy definitely does not come from us
comparing ourselves to others. Nevertheless, we continue to act like
(19:29):
we don't know that. And here's another little antidote that
will help visualize this idea. So Simon talked about this
study where people were offered either a one million dollar
house on a street where other houses were four million
dollars and this is for free. You get this one
million dollar house for free, or a free four hundred
thousand dollar house on a street where the other houses
(19:50):
were one hundred thousand dollars. So you can have a
million dollar house on a street where all the houses
are bigger than yours, or you can have a four
hundred thousand dollar house on street where your house is
the biggest one, and most people chose the four hundred
thousand dollars house. The deduction here is that we as
human beings just love being better than each other. It
(20:15):
feels eggy to say that, and I have this experience
of not wanting that to be true, and in our
culture that is true. I don't even really know what
to say to that. We spend so much time worrying
about being better or prettier, or richer, or funnier or
cooler or whatever than others rather than being the best
versions of ourselves, And then we rob the world's ability
(20:39):
to see what the best version of ourselves really would be.
We rob ourselves the ability to see that. And I
know that as long as we are looking to other
people to see if we're good enough, or strong enough,
or successful enough, we are always, always, always going to
end up being dissatisfied. There will always be somebody or
something greater than us, whether we know who they are
(21:01):
and they're in our view or not. So my question
here is what would happen if we looked more towards
our growth, Like, what would it mean? What would happen
if it mattered more that we are here than if
we're the best one here? What if we look to
have a seat at the table versus the head seat
(21:23):
at the table? Because the ones who are worried about
being the best, the ones who are worried about being
at the head seat, are also the ones that will
end up being frustrated. So after I played this video
for everybody in this meeting, what I did is I
asked for everyone to share to the level that they
were comfortable with sharing where in their lives, both personally
(21:47):
and professionally, they were playing the finite game where they're
in an infinite game, and the conversation that ensued was
such a cool conversation. So I really want to leave
you with that challenge as well. So where in your
life are you playing a finite game when you're actually
(22:10):
in an infinite game? And can you look at what
you might need to do in order to switch your
mindset so you're not the one who's being frustrated all
the time and who's ending up frustrated. So that's what
I have for you today, short, sweet, and to the point.
Like I said, I'm also going to link this video
(22:31):
for you guys, so you can also watch it as
many times as you want and maybe get some more
goodness from him. I am in the process of getting
my hands on his book so I can read that
and gain some more insight myself. And I'm in the
process of shifting my mindset in a lot of areas.
So I hope that you guys have the day you
(22:52):
need to have. And if you have any questions, feedback, comments, anything,
remember you can always send those to me Catherine at
You Need Their podcast and you can follow me at
Kat dot Defada on Instagram and at You Need Therapy podcast.
I also hope you had the Thanksgiving you needed to
have last week and you continue to have the holiday
(23:13):
season that you need to have. I'll be back with
you guys on Wednesday for couch Talks. Until then, Bye bye,
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Therapy Gecko
An unlicensed lizard psychologist travels the universe talking to strangers about absolutely nothing. TO CALL THE GECKO: follow me on https://www.twitch.tv/lyleforever to get a notification for when I am taking calls. I am usually live Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays but lately a lot of other times too. I am a gecko.