June 18, 2025 • 30 mins
In this episode of The Messy Middle Matters, Indra and Amanda unpack the difference between scarcity and abundance mindsets—starting with a “zero-sum game” pizza analogy (yes, pizza 🍕). They explore how our beliefs about resources, success, and competition shape how we lead, collaborate, and show up in the world.
Drawing on The Infinite Game by Simon Sinek, Indra shares how this framework helps leaders break out of short-term, win-or-lose thinking and into a more sustainable, collective approach. Amanda adds insights on how abundance isn’t about being naïve—it’s about being curious, strategic, and generous, even in high-pressure environments.
Whether you're navigating workplace dynamics, managing a team, or just trying to break free of zero-sum thinking, this episode offers real tools for shifting your mindset—and helping others shift theirs.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Indra Klavins (00:06):
I'm Indra,
Unknown (00:08):
and I'm Amanda,
Indra Klavins (00:10):
and we'd like to welcome you to the messy middle
matters. Hey, Amanda, how areyou today? I'm good. How are you
Indra? I'm good. I'm good. I wasjust thinking about, you know,
have you ever come across thatperson who's having FOMO because
they didn't get to go to theconference, and they start
having a fit, and they startlosing their mind, only to
(00:30):
realize and someone says, Holdon, the whole thing was
recorded. You can watch it onyour own, on your own schedule.
Amanda Jane Lee (00:36):
Yes, more than once. Actually, the FOMO is
Indra Klavins (00:39):
real. The FOMO is real. And like the FOMO, to me,
comes from the fact that, likeour society is so often geared
towards like a zero sum game,right? Let me define that so
that everyone understands whatthat is, because some people may
not have heard that term before.So a zero sum game has lots of
different fancy definitions, butI prefer the pizza analogy. So
(01:03):
when you think of a slight pizzapie, there's only eight slices
in a standard pizza, and there'sonly so many slices to go
around, and you have to figureout who's getting which slices,
or if you're cutting slices inhalf, because you only have so
much pizza, right? It's, it's,you know, when you're talking
about something like a zero sumgame, you're in this like,
scarcity mindset, not enough togo around. What if we have nine
(01:24):
people? What happens? Oh mygosh, right. Like an
Amanda Jane Lee (01:27):
Indra gets four slices and Amanda gets four
slices. That means Sally gets00,
Indra Klavins (01:31):
slices. Too? Sad. Sally, yeah. But an abundance
mindset is the belief that thereare ample resources and
opportunities for everyone,like, we can always order
another pizza. Like, we'reprivileged enough to have the
money to order another pizza,it'll be okay. Or maybe even
Sally doesn't want these. Hey,Sally, I know you don't love
(01:52):
pizza. I'm buying cookiestomorrow. You want four of them
and Amanda, and I will only getone each, because I'm gonna buy
six of them. Like, you can finda way out of it, right? When you
have that abundance mindset,
Amanda Jane Lee (02:05):
yeah, that's such a good analogy. I don't
know that I can top that one.It's so visual, too, right,
Indra Klavins (02:12):
right? And I Well, it's also the one that
agile uses so much, which iswhy, and it's so relatable. I
mean, a pizza is like anAmerican staple food, so
everyone can relate to that.But, you know, I've thought
about, I've been thinking aboutthis abundance mindset and
cultivating it in myself foryears. But recently, I revisited
a book that I recommended it toa friend, and she's like, Oh my
(02:33):
gosh. It's really, really usefulin this moment in time. I
started rereading it with SimonSinek, the infinite game came
out in 2019 right before thepandemic. But it it's a slight
different reframing of thescarcity and abundance mindset
like in his book. Let me definesome of the terms that are in
his book. So finite games aredefined by played by known
(02:56):
players. They have fixed rules,and there's agreed and agreed
upon objective that when reachand reached ends the game. So
football has four quarters withI don't know how many minutes in
it. Baseball has nine innings.Golf has 18 holes. Like sports
are really good example offinite games. Like everyone
knows the rules, there arereferees who make sure the rules
get followed. You understand theconstraints of a finite game. So
(03:22):
there can be this scarcitymindset, because you need to
accomplish what you want toaccomplish within that, within
that that the given parameters,but infinite games have infinite
time horizons, and becausethere's no finish line, no
practical end to the game,there's no such thing as winning
an infinite game. In an infinitegame, the primary object
(03:42):
objective is to keep playing, toperpetuate the game. And in the
book, he talks about infinitegames, our business is an
infinite game, like no matterhow many times somebody says
we're the best at blah, blah,blah, you're you're the number
one company at that thingagainst the parameters that you
decided to choose at this exactmoment in time, you can't win
(04:03):
the stock market. You can't win,believe it or not, you can't win
politics either. Because, youknow what? That's an infinite
game. It goes on as long as, aslong as we need a political
system. Politics keeps on going.There might be, you know,
milestones throughout all ofthis, but there is no end to
that game. So you need to have adifferent kind of mindset when
you're playing an infinite gameversus a finite one,
Amanda Jane Lee (04:25):
right? We're we're all stuck. Yeah, we're all
stuck in this game, right? We'replaying a game. We don't know
when the game is going to end.Is the game ever going to end?
And and, yeah, you're right. Ithink, you know, there are
milestones. There are like, endsto chapters,
Indra Klavins (04:41):
ends to chapters, ends to chapters. I think is a
great way to think of it,because it's, you know, if I
think about business like, a lotof publicly traded companies
need to publish their quarterlyearnings, so you could think of,
you might be thinking of likeeach quarterly milestone of
announcing to to the analysts,what. Your earnings were for
that quarter. That's amilestone. It's not the end of
(05:03):
the game,
Amanda Jane Lee (05:04):
right? He's like, like, mini games. It's
mini games within the infinitegame, right?
Indra Klavins (05:09):
I mean, I think of I had a Gosh, when I was at
Verizon. They gave me acorporate career coach and but
she gave me a wonderful, like,visual. I love a good metaphor.
I know, Amanda, you love a goodmetaphor and a love. Love, good
visualization. She's, she gaveme the metaphor of, like,
marathons, right? Because I wasin an environment where a lot of
(05:29):
people were trying to win thething. And I'm like, but the
finish line isn't the finishline. We have to work the next
day too. Like, it just keeps ongoing. She's like, think of it
as a marathon, and try and getthem to start thinking of it as
a marathon where you hit thewater station, you hit the mile
mark. You hit the this, you hitthe that you know the finish
line is way, way off in thesunset, because even when your
(05:49):
project is over, you launch thething the next day. You need to
keep working. And so you needto, you need to keep going. So
infinite gains,
Amanda Jane Lee (05:57):
yeah. And I was thinking about how well a
marathon, you do know where thefinish line is, but I do know a
lot of marathon runners, andit's like, well, you finished
the marathon and you're trainingfor the next marathon.
Indra Klavins (06:08):
Oh, they are. They are. What is it? There's
that joke. How do you know amarathoner? They'll tell you
that they are because it's partof their blood. It's part of
their DNA. It's part of it'spart of what they how they walk
in this world. And I love, Ilove when people have passions
around things, right? So it isthe next race. It's like, oh, I
finished New York, but I want todo Boston, right? Tokyo. I want
(06:29):
to do, I did New York, but Iwant to do New York better.
Like, there's always for most ofthem, or many of them, the
people who, who are repeatoffenders, so to speak, yeah,
it's the next thing you know. Oryou know, there are some
marathons. There's like, thoseultra marathons where the people
don't know the core, I don'tremember the name of it. There's
the ultra marathons where thepeople don't know the course,
and they don't know the ending,and you need to finish each like
(06:52):
you don't know. There'sdifferent kinds of games. And
the game of life, the game ofbusiness, are infinite games,
full stop period. No one's goingto convince me,
Amanda Jane Lee (07:02):
right, right? And the point of the infinite
game is to continue the game. Tocontinue
Indra Klavins (07:08):
the game. You don't want to demolish your
comp. Just to give people someof the tidbits from the book,
the book is great. You don'twant to demolish your
competition. Your goal isn't tolike Apple didn't try and pummel
IBM or Microsoft, you know, theywanted to advance the game like
they Steve Jobs understood thatthe goal was to keep the game
going. You know, when peoplestart trying to obliterate the
(07:30):
competition, that's often a veryshort sighted way, and they
stop, they start applying infinite tactics to an infinite
game, and that is usually theirdownfall. Like the classic
example that shows up in so manybusiness books and so many, so
many different things, is theKodak example, right? It didn't
(07:51):
end the company right away whenthey got that finite mindset and
said, No, we're not going topivot to digital, even though we
were the first ones to invent adigital camera. It took a long
time for it was a slow decline.But they, they the ends because
they applied finite tactics,created a scarcity mindset
around things. That was thedecline of their organization.
(08:13):
So,
Amanda Jane Lee (08:13):
yeah, when you said Kodak, my brain went to
Blockbuster.
Indra Klavins (08:17):
Ah, another finite game. Yeah,
Amanda Jane Lee (08:20):
they didn't think that Netflix would would
be Netflix, right?
Indra Klavins (08:26):
No, they just, they were stuck in their game
versus understanding the game isconstantly being reinvented,
right, right? Because it's aninfinite game,
Amanda Jane Lee (08:34):
right? It was, it's an infinite game. It's not.
They were stuck in their theirmini game of, you know the
stores where you rent physicalcopies of of DVDs, but you know,
back in the day, VHS, and theydidn't understand that the game
was being reinvented by theNetflix's of the world where we
(08:55):
streaming, is the thing,
Indra Klavins (08:57):
right? They, they, they were, they were
winning at VHS, and God blesshim, there's now what? There's
one blockbuster left in Alaska.Yeah, yeah. And that's out of
necessity, like, that's purelyout of necessity and the
conditions in Alaska. But Ithink that in in the daily life,
like we're talking about, like,really big things, and I don't
(09:18):
think most, most of ourlisteners are probably not the
people operating at this macrolevel. They might be watching
that macro view of things, butthey're not on the day to day.
And you know, one of the thingsthat was in the book, and that
really is around scarcity versusabundance mindsets, is, how do
you operate in organizations?Because we are so entrenched and
(09:42):
ingrained, like, again, we'vebeen conditioned to think of a
lot of things as a scarcitymindset. In our culture, when
your leaders are thinking ofthings in a scarcity mindset,
how do you apply an infinitemindset? And where can you apply
that infinite mindset? Like,where can you apply that
abundance mindset to? Situation,even if you're a leader, isn't a
scarcity thing. And recognizingthe difference, I think part of
(10:05):
that is recognizing thedifference between what is a
finite game in in the work worldand what is an infinite game,
because there are, there aresome very clear finite games out
there,
Amanda Jane Lee (10:16):
right? Like finite game that comes to mind
is budget, right? Budgetallocation. You have this much
money for the year, the quarter,the whatever, whatever your time
is, right? It that is a finiteresource. It's
Indra Klavins (10:30):
a finite resource. It applies to
projects, it applies tosalaries, it applies to bonuses,
it applies to promotions. Thatapplies to a lot of things,
Amanda Jane Lee (10:38):
right? It's, it's the pizza metaphor, right?
Like, think of your budget as apizza. It's like, if you give
part of this budget to thisdepartment, that means another
department isn't getting thatpart of the pizza
Indra Klavins (10:50):
right. I saw, I saw fun. I was going to digress
until about, talk about a Tiktokvideo I saw about, like,
different departments andperspectives on budgets. But
we're going to stay on topic.Shiny Object. Shiny Object.
Another example
Amanda Jane Lee (11:04):
that comes to mind is I worked at a company
where review time, likeperformance review time, was
very much like The Hunger Games.There were strict rules about
how many promotions per cycleper department were allowed. So
that was definitely a scarcitymindset where, you know, I
wasn't a manager at the time,but I had heard that, like all
(11:27):
the managers in the department,were in all of these calibration
sessions and all the meetingsaround performance reviews, and
they had to go to bat for thepeople on their team who they
thought, you know, was deservingof a promotion and fight with
other managers for the limitednumber of promotions that were
allowed for the department, forthat that cycle, I
Indra Klavins (11:50):
think that's a perfect example of a game that
is a finite game period fullstop, because, like you said,
there's money, there's moneyinvolved. There's at the end of
the day, money is involved. And,you know, organizations create
restrictions on how many peoplecan be at which tiers of the
organization, so they don'tbecome top heavy. So their
budgets stay aligned, so thattheir, their, their, their, all
(12:14):
the different things stayaligned. And it I've been, I
think I've been in those rooms.I think I've heard about those,
those those rooms are not fun atall, like but what I will say is
that you can start applying.There's lots of tools and
techniques to make those roomsless stressful. Maybe that's
another episode for another day.But when you're thinking about,
(12:37):
how do you your your leadershipis playing a finite game of this
Promotions and these fixednumber promotions, and there is
scarcity of this. How can youstart applying infinite tactics
and abundance tactics in yourcommunications with your team?
Because there is a decent chancethat, let's say you went through
(12:59):
all the exercises yourself as aleader, and you identified you
had to pick one, one person thatyou're going to throw into for
the running, for the winning,The Hunger Games here, right?
And there's a decent there's,there are decent odds at that
one person is not going to bethe one that's selected across
all the different departments inthe organization. How do you
(13:21):
make your team in that scenario?How do you make your team still
feel valued, still feelincentivized, still feel
important, still feel seen byother departments like that's a
whole different skill set, andthat requires you to draw on
those abundance mindset toolsand techniques and sharing those
with your team members, becauseotherwise it just that, that
(13:44):
that can become the toxicity ofa Hunger Games like environment
will cascade if you don't, ifyou don't stop that from
happening, it will cascade at
Amanda Jane Lee (13:54):
that title simulation, right? That's a
morale killer, for sure. And youknow it, it permeates through
the organization, right? It likethat kind of thinking, that
scarcity mindset, thinking of,oh, like I need a piece of I
need a part of that pizza, leadsto what I think is unnecessary
(14:14):
competition amongst peers, andit's just like we all have to
remember that we're one teamhere, it's
Indra Klavins (14:21):
unhealthy. It's really unhealthy, and it's just
it's it it festers. It canfester if you don't get ahead of
it. I think for me, like for meas a people leader in those
scenarios, I usually try andprep my team well before we
enter the Hunger Games, so theyknow and they get a little bit
of a glimpse, the tiniest littleglimpse. Like, it's not
(14:41):
appropriate to share everything,but you can share just enough to
give them a sense of like,what's at stake, what the
various parameters are, howthings are going to be going.
And this is just the realitythat we live in. It. It makes me
think of my favorite quote Ilive by. This quote by a
gentleman named Michael corda tosucceed. It's necessary to
accept the world as it is andrise above it. It's I live by
(15:05):
that quote, and so just helpingthem understand the reality, not
scare them, not overwhelm them.But then when it comes back and
you didn't, your nominee was notselected. You're in district 12.
I don't remember all mydistricts from The Hunger Games,
but whatever you know, you'renot, you're not, you're not in
the favorite district this thistime. And how do you manage that
(15:28):
for your team? I think it'spointing out all the things that
you do have, right? You know, ifyou're part of a team that
allows for more education andtraining than other teams do, if
you're a team that literallyallows, like, literally buys
multicolored post its. I wish Iwas kidding. For their team, you
might be the envy of the entirecompany, and that might and post
(15:51):
its might be multicolored. Postits might be a very important
thing for your team. It may notbe if you're in an accounting
department. I don't know. I'venever worked in accounting
department, but like, you haveto just start pointing out,
like, all the things that you dohave, all the things that are
possible, all the things that domatter, and how, how your team
is actually advancing the theJust Cause is another term that
(16:15):
Simon's got in his book, andI'll talk, we can talk a little
bit about that. I'll define itin a second. But you're helping
to advance the team's justcause, right? You know an
example of a just cause when Iwas at WeWork, when I joined,
the mission statement changedpartway through while I was
there, but the Just Cause when Ijoined was called helping people
to make a life, not just aliving. That's a just cause,
(16:35):
right? You can see like, oh mygosh, I want to make that
possible, because so many of usspend our work day or our days
of the week at work. Wouldn't itbe awesome if we're helping
people, you know, make thatportion of their life a little
bit better, right? That's a justcause. So an example of one,
yeah, I
Amanda Jane Lee (16:53):
think you touched on a really important
point of seeing, seeing what'spossible, great seeing what's
possible outside of the thingdirectly in front of you,
outside of the one pizza you seeon the conference room table,
yes,
Indra Klavins (17:09):
there might be a salad in the corner. There's
bread sticks over there, likethere's options, there's
options,
Amanda Jane Lee (17:14):
there's options to order another pizza, like you
said, right? Absolutely. Andthere are times, you know,
especially when it comes tobudgets and money, right? There
are times where no like this isall you have. But there are,
there are other options thatare, that are not money, that
are not monetary,
Indra Klavins (17:36):
spending time with a what there's intrinsic
and extrinsic. Like you can youcan you can do you can offer,
like, coffee chats with a seniorleader. Like that matters to
some people, like having thechance to be in a coffee chat
with a senior leader of thecompany that doesn't cost that
costs time, doesn't cost money.That's an easy way to say, hey
(17:59):
guys, you know, I know you know,I know you guys didn't get
included on this promotion cyclebecause we had constraints, but
I wanted to talk to you and sayhow valuable you are, and have a
chance for you to ask me anyquestions you might have,
Amanda Jane Lee (18:09):
right? Or, you know, understanding the what,
what makes your team happy,right? What, maybe what they
need or want is moreflexibility, right? Like, say,
hey, you know, summer Fridays,of course, you know, according
to company policies andwhatever, right? But if that is
an option, why? Why not? Why notoffer that to your team and, you
(18:32):
know, keep them happy in thatway, if not a monetary or
promotion kind of way, in this,this, this, in this finite game,
yeah,
Indra Klavins (18:43):
I was part of a team. I was, you're talking, I
was remembering. I was part of ateam. We were one of the handful
of, maybe the only one team thatwas allowed to wear jeans to
work. Because in that craft, inthe broader industry, wearing
jeans to work was a, just anit's a baseline, yeah, right.
(19:05):
It's like a baseline better ifwe wouldn't let people wear
jeans to work, we could not getthem to join our company. And
so, like, that was our thing,right? That was our thing. And
we were very much taught to notflaunt it in front of others,
like they could see that we werewearing jeans, but you can't be
walking around like, look at myjeans I got.
Amanda Jane Lee (19:25):
That's like, everyone Indra, let us all wear
jeans today.
Indra Klavins (19:32):
But that's, that's, that's like, you know,
you don't want those finitethinking, scarcity thinking
tactics to show up in yourinfinite thinking, of your
benefits of you as you're tryingto work through things. But
yeah,
Amanda Jane Lee (19:42):
right, yeah. And you know that last part, I
think, is just seeing, notseeing the dress code as a
limitation, right, like seeingit as a potential opportunity to
to fulfill some. Need for yourteam, right?
Indra Klavins (20:02):
I mean, the I love that, it's, you know,
letting would be have. The otherthing that I've done as a leader
whenever I could is, beforeholiday weekends, you know,
early dismissal, workloadpermitting. Please do everything
you can to make sure workloadpermits, right? Don't just, just
(20:22):
sneak out. Just sneak out soonas you're done with your work,
sneak out. Like, don't make abig deal. Check your, check
your, you know, phone every oncein a while to make sure
something hasn't blown up. Butlike, go
Amanda Jane Lee (20:33):
same. Like, hey, you know it, it's
Halloween. Block off yourcalendar so that people don't,
people don't schedule meetingsfor that afternoon. But if
you've got to go to like, go toyour kids Halloween,
Indra Klavins (20:48):
Halloween parade, go those Halloween parades.
Sneak up on you at work. But Ithink that it's also, you know,
important to when we're thinkingabout abundance and scarcity
mindsets, like the one thingthat you want to keep in the
back of your mind, the abilityto have an abundance and
(21:11):
scarcity mindset may shift andchange depending on what type of
privilege you have. Andprivilege comes in lots of
different ways and shapes andforms, you know, but
understanding like, yeah,understanding that and being,
being very conscious of it is,is really important. It's,
there's a straight but I've,there's a strange little
(21:33):
paradox. I find that people whohave less privilege sometimes
have an easier time tapping intoan abundance mindset.
Amanda Jane Lee (21:42):
I think, yeah, I think, what do they say? You
know about art, right? Like, ifyou have a blank piece of paper
and you're allowed to dowhatever you want, sometimes you
get in a mental block, like youare, you're just, you're
somehow, like you said, it's aparadox. You're somehow limited
by the infinite possibilities,yeah, where as like, if there
(22:05):
are some constraints of like,here's a piece of paper, but you
only have these three colors towork with, yeah? Sometimes the
best art comes out of that.Like, it just gets your creative
juices flowing in a differentway.
Indra Klavins (22:17):
Yeah. And if you're the team who's always had
all the perks and all theeverything, and that becomes
your baseline of expectationwhen you lose one of you have
and part of those perks here,let's say three free lunches a
week, and you lose one of thosefree lunches because of
budgetary cuts, it can feel likethe sky is falling, like Dude,
no one else is getting freelunch across the entire company,
(22:40):
you've gone from three to two.Calm down. May not use that
language with them, but my innermonolog would definitely be
saying
Amanda Jane Lee (22:47):
that yeah. I think it's just yeah that I
don't know any other synonym tolike abundance mindset, right,
other than you know thedefinition of an abundance
mindset, it's seeing thepossibilities for what they are,
yeah. And just like opening yourmind and being curious to what
else, what else is possible,what else is out there, it's not
(23:09):
just you know what you see infront of you, or what you've
been trained to think is, is thestructure, is, the reward is, is
everything?
Indra Klavins (23:20):
Yeah, I think that's a great way to really
evaluate, like, is, because partof this is understanding, like,
what's finite and what'sinfinite? I think money we're
clear on that's finite, time isfinite. Like, there are certain
things that are just either,either laws of the universe or
laws of of capitalist societies,right? Those are two, right? But
(23:43):
like, I think that you walkthrough some really good ways
of, you know, taking a look at asituation and saying, is this,
is this truly finite, or arethere other possibilities? So I
think understanding that is thefirst step. And when you're in a
finite game, sometimes you justgot to play those rules and play
those rules for as long as youcan, like, that's that's that's
just gonna be what it's gonnabe, it's gonna be what it's
gonna be,
Amanda Jane Lee (24:03):
yeah, and something that just came to mind
about abundance mindset, it's, Imean, it is a mindset, right?
Sometimes the limiting thing is,you,
Indra Klavins (24:15):
it's so funny, like 100% like you and I have
talked recently around aroundsoft skills and talking about
soft skills and how, you know,building those up is like it's a
practice. It's a practice thatyou have to exercise every
single day. An abundancemindset, to me, is also
(24:35):
something you need to practiceevery single darn day. It's a
way of walking through thisworld. It's not a tactic. It's a
way of walking through thisworld. And so finding even in
your in your everyday life,like, is this a scarcity thing,
or is this an abundance thing? Idon't know. Like, let's take a
look at, let's talk about. Let'ssee what's possible. It's a
lower stakes. Maybe it mightfeel a little lower stakes for
(24:57):
you to really practice yourevaluation. Skills, right? Like,
going
Amanda Jane Lee (25:01):
back to the soft skills example, like, Am I
just accepting that I'm not thebest at soft skills, or do I
have an abundance mindset aboutit, and can I learn and grow and
prove to myself that this isn'ta limiting belief,
Indra Klavins (25:21):
right? I mean, and there might be a person
might have, like, legitimatechallenges towards developing
soft skills, and, you know, butin most cases, there's something
that they might be able to do,right? And we're just using soft
skills as one example. Like, howcan I? How can I, I love that,
like, I'm thinking of, like ayour Bring, bring to mind, like
a vision of, like a horse. Like,how do you open the blinders a
(25:43):
little bit? Sometimes theblinders are really good,
because they keep you focused,right then, that's the beauty
of, like, having that during afinite game. But is it finite?
Like, how do I open that up justa little bit to see things, see
the possibilities. See thepossibility.
Amanda Jane Lee (25:56):
I mean, I It's been a while since I've talked
about pottery on on thispodcast, but I'm still doing
pottery classes and just seeingthe progress between, you know,
my very first piece and, like,what I'm making now, like, I'm
actually, I don't have anythingon my desk right now, but I, I
recently made a mug that is bigenough to be useful, right?
Indra Klavins (26:19):
Your first mug. I loved your first mug, but I can
see the value of having that,like just seeing that growth,
seeing that right, but, but
Amanda Jane Lee (26:27):
it was, it was an abundance mindset thing. It
was a what is possible, like, Iactually can do this.
Indra Klavins (26:34):
Yeah, it's, it's funny. I didn't think my brain
would go. Here I was at a wewere having an off site, and it
was one of these things whereeverybody had to come together.
And one of the activities thatthey had for like team building,
was paint and sip so. And itwas, it was really funny. And
half of the people I that werepart of this activity were,
(26:55):
quote, creatives, and half thepeople were not. I land
somewhere in the middle. I don'tknow what I am, but it was
really funny between thecreatives and the non creative
how many people were paralyzedbecause they had this vision of
what their painting was supposedto look like based on the
example that the teacher gaveus. And they got stuck. They got
(27:16):
stuck in finite thinking. Theygot stuck in like in it was more
finite thinking, let's sayscarcity thinking. But they're
very, very similar. They're veryclosely related to each other.
And then people who succeededwere like, Let's see what
happens. Let's, let's, let's dosome stuff. Let's create
something, right? Yeah, so
Amanda Jane Lee (27:35):
I could totally see this playing out right,
yeah. Have this visual in myhead of the teacher, you know,
painting this thing and showingit to the class and being like,
Okay, this is what we're gonnapaint today. And the creatives,
or the people who were limitedby this finite mindset, were
like, I have to make my paintinglook exactly like that one.
(27:57):
Whereas you for example, werejust like, Yeah, I'm gonna try
my
Indra Klavins (28:03):
I loved my painting because the background
color reminded me of the colorof the hallways in my in my
elementary school, right? Andthat were, I'm sure
Amanda Jane Lee (28:13):
there was someone in your class who
painted something altogetherdifferent. They're just like, I
don't want to paint that treetoday. They did,
Indra Klavins (28:21):
and they had much more fun. Life is much more fun
in an abundance mindset. It getsus out of like, someone's got to
win, and into like, how do weall win? How do we all win? How
do we keep this game going? Howdo we how do the most of us win
in all of this? And that's whatI personally love and why? For
me, abundance mindset is verymuch part of my practice. Like,
(28:44):
you can go into gratitudejournaling or like, oh Adam
Grant had a good one recently.It wasn't gratitude that he was
counting. He was countingimpact. Oh, right. Like, what
impact did I have today? Notwhat am I grateful for, but what
impact did I have? Like, that'sactually a fun little way to to
exercise some of the musclesthat are related to this. Yeah,
Amanda Jane Lee (29:05):
what impact did I have? As opposed to, like,
what did I accomplish? Yes,exactly.
Indra Klavins (29:10):
Yeah, exactly. Like, I made the cashier's day a
little bit hap I made her laugh.Like, okay, great, that's that
was an impact. I don't know howthat trickled through the rest
of her day, but I know that thatwas one of the positive things
in her life. Yeah,
Amanda Jane Lee (29:24):
yeah. I think it's just, you know, it's just
being able to be open minded. Ithink open minded, as I think,
is a good synonym. I did it.
Indra Klavins (29:35):
We got there, yes, yeah. I got there.
Amanda Jane Lee (29:38):
Open mindedness, right? An open
mindedness mindset, an openmindedness attitude, yeah,
toward toward life, toward work,figuring out, like what, what
actually is a finite versus aninfinite game 100%
Indra Klavins (29:51):
I think it's a lovely place for us to end.
Thank you. Amanda, for anotherrich conversation, conversation
and Thank. You to everyone who'slistening. We hope that you join
us next time when we coveranother topic for the
Unknown (30:04):
messy middle, bye, bye.
Indra Klavins (30:08):
If today's episode hit home or just made
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Thanks for making the messymiddle matter. You.
I'm Indra,
Unknown (00:08):
and I'm Amanda,
Indra Klavins (00:10):
and we'd like to welcome you to the messy middle
matters. Hey, Amanda, how areyou today? I'm good. How are you
Indra? I'm good. I'm good. I wasjust thinking about, you know,
have you ever come across thatperson who's having FOMO because
they didn't get to go to theconference, and they start
having a fit, and they startlosing their mind, only to
(00:30):
realize and someone says, Holdon, the whole thing was
recorded. You can watch it onyour own, on your own schedule.
Amanda Jane Lee (00:36):
Yes, more than once. Actually, the FOMO is
Indra Klavins (00:39):
real. The FOMO is real. And like the FOMO, to me,
comes from the fact that, likeour society is so often geared
towards like a zero sum game,right? Let me define that so
that everyone understands whatthat is, because some people may
not have heard that term before.So a zero sum game has lots of
different fancy definitions, butI prefer the pizza analogy. So
(01:03):
when you think of a slight pizzapie, there's only eight slices
in a standard pizza, and there'sonly so many slices to go
around, and you have to figureout who's getting which slices,
or if you're cutting slices inhalf, because you only have so
much pizza, right? It's, it's,you know, when you're talking
about something like a zero sumgame, you're in this like,
scarcity mindset, not enough togo around. What if we have nine
(01:24):
people? What happens? Oh mygosh, right. Like an
Amanda Jane Lee (01:27):
Indra gets four slices and Amanda gets four
slices. That means Sally gets00,
Indra Klavins (01:31):
slices. Too? Sad. Sally, yeah. But an abundance
mindset is the belief that thereare ample resources and
opportunities for everyone,like, we can always order
another pizza. Like, we'reprivileged enough to have the
money to order another pizza,it'll be okay. Or maybe even
Sally doesn't want these. Hey,Sally, I know you don't love
(01:52):
pizza. I'm buying cookiestomorrow. You want four of them
and Amanda, and I will only getone each, because I'm gonna buy
six of them. Like, you can finda way out of it, right? When you
have that abundance mindset,
Amanda Jane Lee (02:05):
yeah, that's such a good analogy. I don't
know that I can top that one.It's so visual, too, right,
Indra Klavins (02:12):
right? And I Well, it's also the one that
agile uses so much, which iswhy, and it's so relatable. I
mean, a pizza is like anAmerican staple food, so
everyone can relate to that.But, you know, I've thought
about, I've been thinking aboutthis abundance mindset and
cultivating it in myself foryears. But recently, I revisited
a book that I recommended it toa friend, and she's like, Oh my
(02:33):
gosh. It's really, really usefulin this moment in time. I
started rereading it with SimonSinek, the infinite game came
out in 2019 right before thepandemic. But it it's a slight
different reframing of thescarcity and abundance mindset
like in his book. Let me definesome of the terms that are in
his book. So finite games aredefined by played by known
(02:56):
players. They have fixed rules,and there's agreed and agreed
upon objective that when reachand reached ends the game. So
football has four quarters withI don't know how many minutes in
it. Baseball has nine innings.Golf has 18 holes. Like sports
are really good example offinite games. Like everyone
knows the rules, there arereferees who make sure the rules
get followed. You understand theconstraints of a finite game. So
(03:22):
there can be this scarcitymindset, because you need to
accomplish what you want toaccomplish within that, within
that that the given parameters,but infinite games have infinite
time horizons, and becausethere's no finish line, no
practical end to the game,there's no such thing as winning
an infinite game. In an infinitegame, the primary object
(03:42):
objective is to keep playing, toperpetuate the game. And in the
book, he talks about infinitegames, our business is an
infinite game, like no matterhow many times somebody says
we're the best at blah, blah,blah, you're you're the number
one company at that thingagainst the parameters that you
decided to choose at this exactmoment in time, you can't win
(04:03):
the stock market. You can't win,believe it or not, you can't win
politics either. Because, youknow what? That's an infinite
game. It goes on as long as, aslong as we need a political
system. Politics keeps on going.There might be, you know,
milestones throughout all ofthis, but there is no end to
that game. So you need to have adifferent kind of mindset when
you're playing an infinite gameversus a finite one,
Amanda Jane Lee (04:25):
right? We're we're all stuck. Yeah, we're all
stuck in this game, right? We'replaying a game. We don't know
when the game is going to end.Is the game ever going to end?
And and, yeah, you're right. Ithink, you know, there are
milestones. There are like, endsto chapters,
Indra Klavins (04:41):
ends to chapters, ends to chapters. I think is a
great way to think of it,because it's, you know, if I
think about business like, a lotof publicly traded companies
need to publish their quarterlyearnings, so you could think of,
you might be thinking of likeeach quarterly milestone of
announcing to to the analysts,what. Your earnings were for
that quarter. That's amilestone. It's not the end of
(05:03):
the game,
Amanda Jane Lee (05:04):
right? He's like, like, mini games. It's
mini games within the infinitegame, right?
Indra Klavins (05:09):
I mean, I think of I had a Gosh, when I was at
Verizon. They gave me acorporate career coach and but
she gave me a wonderful, like,visual. I love a good metaphor.
I know, Amanda, you love a goodmetaphor and a love. Love, good
visualization. She's, she gaveme the metaphor of, like,
marathons, right? Because I wasin an environment where a lot of
(05:29):
people were trying to win thething. And I'm like, but the
finish line isn't the finishline. We have to work the next
day too. Like, it just keeps ongoing. She's like, think of it
as a marathon, and try and getthem to start thinking of it as
a marathon where you hit thewater station, you hit the mile
mark. You hit the this, you hitthe that you know the finish
line is way, way off in thesunset, because even when your
(05:49):
project is over, you launch thething the next day. You need to
keep working. And so you needto, you need to keep going. So
infinite gains,
Amanda Jane Lee (05:57):
yeah. And I was thinking about how well a
marathon, you do know where thefinish line is, but I do know a
lot of marathon runners, andit's like, well, you finished
the marathon and you're trainingfor the next marathon.
Indra Klavins (06:08):
Oh, they are. They are. What is it? There's
that joke. How do you know amarathoner? They'll tell you
that they are because it's partof their blood. It's part of
their DNA. It's part of it'spart of what they how they walk
in this world. And I love, Ilove when people have passions
around things, right? So it isthe next race. It's like, oh, I
finished New York, but I want todo Boston, right? Tokyo. I want
(06:29):
to do, I did New York, but Iwant to do New York better.
Like, there's always for most ofthem, or many of them, the
people who, who are repeatoffenders, so to speak, yeah,
it's the next thing you know. Oryou know, there are some
marathons. There's like, thoseultra marathons where the people
don't know the core, I don'tremember the name of it. There's
the ultra marathons where thepeople don't know the course,
and they don't know the ending,and you need to finish each like
(06:52):
you don't know. There'sdifferent kinds of games. And
the game of life, the game ofbusiness, are infinite games,
full stop period. No one's goingto convince me,
Amanda Jane Lee (07:02):
right, right? And the point of the infinite
game is to continue the game. Tocontinue
Indra Klavins (07:08):
the game. You don't want to demolish your
comp. Just to give people someof the tidbits from the book,
the book is great. You don'twant to demolish your
competition. Your goal isn't tolike Apple didn't try and pummel
IBM or Microsoft, you know, theywanted to advance the game like
they Steve Jobs understood thatthe goal was to keep the game
going. You know, when peoplestart trying to obliterate the
(07:30):
competition, that's often a veryshort sighted way, and they
stop, they start applying infinite tactics to an infinite
game, and that is usually theirdownfall. Like the classic
example that shows up in so manybusiness books and so many, so
many different things, is theKodak example, right? It didn't
(07:51):
end the company right away whenthey got that finite mindset and
said, No, we're not going topivot to digital, even though we
were the first ones to invent adigital camera. It took a long
time for it was a slow decline.But they, they the ends because
they applied finite tactics,created a scarcity mindset
around things. That was thedecline of their organization.
(08:13):
So,
Amanda Jane Lee (08:13):
yeah, when you said Kodak, my brain went to
Blockbuster.
Indra Klavins (08:17):
Ah, another finite game. Yeah,
Amanda Jane Lee (08:20):
they didn't think that Netflix would would
be Netflix, right?
Indra Klavins (08:26):
No, they just, they were stuck in their game
versus understanding the game isconstantly being reinvented,
right, right? Because it's aninfinite game,
Amanda Jane Lee (08:34):
right? It was, it's an infinite game. It's not.
They were stuck in their theirmini game of, you know the
stores where you rent physicalcopies of of DVDs, but you know,
back in the day, VHS, and theydidn't understand that the game
was being reinvented by theNetflix's of the world where we
(08:55):
streaming, is the thing,
Indra Klavins (08:57):
right? They, they, they were, they were
winning at VHS, and God blesshim, there's now what? There's
one blockbuster left in Alaska.Yeah, yeah. And that's out of
necessity, like, that's purelyout of necessity and the
conditions in Alaska. But Ithink that in in the daily life,
like we're talking about, like,really big things, and I don't
(09:18):
think most, most of ourlisteners are probably not the
people operating at this macrolevel. They might be watching
that macro view of things, butthey're not on the day to day.
And you know, one of the thingsthat was in the book, and that
really is around scarcity versusabundance mindsets, is, how do
you operate in organizations?Because we are so entrenched and
(09:42):
ingrained, like, again, we'vebeen conditioned to think of a
lot of things as a scarcitymindset. In our culture, when
your leaders are thinking ofthings in a scarcity mindset,
how do you apply an infinitemindset? And where can you apply
that infinite mindset? Like,where can you apply that
abundance mindset to? Situation,even if you're a leader, isn't a
scarcity thing. And recognizingthe difference, I think part of
(10:05):
that is recognizing thedifference between what is a
finite game in in the work worldand what is an infinite game,
because there are, there aresome very clear finite games out
there,
Amanda Jane Lee (10:16):
right? Like finite game that comes to mind
is budget, right? Budgetallocation. You have this much
money for the year, the quarter,the whatever, whatever your time
is, right? It that is a finiteresource. It's
Indra Klavins (10:30):
a finite resource. It applies to
projects, it applies tosalaries, it applies to bonuses,
it applies to promotions. Thatapplies to a lot of things,
Amanda Jane Lee (10:38):
right? It's, it's the pizza metaphor, right?
Like, think of your budget as apizza. It's like, if you give
part of this budget to thisdepartment, that means another
department isn't getting thatpart of the pizza
Indra Klavins (10:50):
right. I saw, I saw fun. I was going to digress
until about, talk about a Tiktokvideo I saw about, like,
different departments andperspectives on budgets. But
we're going to stay on topic.Shiny Object. Shiny Object.
Another example
Amanda Jane Lee (11:04):
that comes to mind is I worked at a company
where review time, likeperformance review time, was
very much like The Hunger Games.There were strict rules about
how many promotions per cycleper department were allowed. So
that was definitely a scarcitymindset where, you know, I
wasn't a manager at the time,but I had heard that, like all
(11:27):
the managers in the department,were in all of these calibration
sessions and all the meetingsaround performance reviews, and
they had to go to bat for thepeople on their team who they
thought, you know, was deservingof a promotion and fight with
other managers for the limitednumber of promotions that were
allowed for the department, forthat that cycle, I
Indra Klavins (11:50):
think that's a perfect example of a game that
is a finite game period fullstop, because, like you said,
there's money, there's moneyinvolved. There's at the end of
the day, money is involved. And,you know, organizations create
restrictions on how many peoplecan be at which tiers of the
organization, so they don'tbecome top heavy. So their
budgets stay aligned, so thattheir, their, their, their, all
(12:14):
the different things stayaligned. And it I've been, I
think I've been in those rooms.I think I've heard about those,
those those rooms are not fun atall, like but what I will say is
that you can start applying.There's lots of tools and
techniques to make those roomsless stressful. Maybe that's
another episode for another day.But when you're thinking about,
(12:37):
how do you your your leadershipis playing a finite game of this
Promotions and these fixednumber promotions, and there is
scarcity of this. How can youstart applying infinite tactics
and abundance tactics in yourcommunications with your team?
Because there is a decent chancethat, let's say you went through
(12:59):
all the exercises yourself as aleader, and you identified you
had to pick one, one person thatyou're going to throw into for
the running, for the winning,The Hunger Games here, right?
And there's a decent there's,there are decent odds at that
one person is not going to bethe one that's selected across
all the different departments inthe organization. How do you
(13:21):
make your team in that scenario?How do you make your team still
feel valued, still feelincentivized, still feel
important, still feel seen byother departments like that's a
whole different skill set, andthat requires you to draw on
those abundance mindset toolsand techniques and sharing those
with your team members, becauseotherwise it just that, that
(13:44):
that can become the toxicity ofa Hunger Games like environment
will cascade if you don't, ifyou don't stop that from
happening, it will cascade at
Amanda Jane Lee (13:54):
that title simulation, right? That's a
morale killer, for sure. And youknow it, it permeates through
the organization, right? It likethat kind of thinking, that
scarcity mindset, thinking of,oh, like I need a piece of I
need a part of that pizza, leadsto what I think is unnecessary
(14:14):
competition amongst peers, andit's just like we all have to
remember that we're one teamhere, it's
Indra Klavins (14:21):
unhealthy. It's really unhealthy, and it's just
it's it it festers. It canfester if you don't get ahead of
it. I think for me, like for meas a people leader in those
scenarios, I usually try andprep my team well before we
enter the Hunger Games, so theyknow and they get a little bit
of a glimpse, the tiniest littleglimpse. Like, it's not
(14:41):
appropriate to share everything,but you can share just enough to
give them a sense of like,what's at stake, what the
various parameters are, howthings are going to be going.
And this is just the realitythat we live in. It. It makes me
think of my favorite quote Ilive by. This quote by a
gentleman named Michael corda tosucceed. It's necessary to
accept the world as it is andrise above it. It's I live by
(15:05):
that quote, and so just helpingthem understand the reality, not
scare them, not overwhelm them.But then when it comes back and
you didn't, your nominee was notselected. You're in district 12.
I don't remember all mydistricts from The Hunger Games,
but whatever you know, you'renot, you're not, you're not in
the favorite district this thistime. And how do you manage that
(15:28):
for your team? I think it'spointing out all the things that
you do have, right? You know, ifyou're part of a team that
allows for more education andtraining than other teams do, if
you're a team that literallyallows, like, literally buys
multicolored post its. I wish Iwas kidding. For their team, you
might be the envy of the entirecompany, and that might and post
(15:51):
its might be multicolored. Postits might be a very important
thing for your team. It may notbe if you're in an accounting
department. I don't know. I'venever worked in accounting
department, but like, you haveto just start pointing out,
like, all the things that you dohave, all the things that are
possible, all the things that domatter, and how, how your team
is actually advancing the theJust Cause is another term that
(16:15):
Simon's got in his book, andI'll talk, we can talk a little
bit about that. I'll define itin a second. But you're helping
to advance the team's justcause, right? You know an
example of a just cause when Iwas at WeWork, when I joined,
the mission statement changedpartway through while I was
there, but the Just Cause when Ijoined was called helping people
to make a life, not just aliving. That's a just cause,
(16:35):
right? You can see like, oh mygosh, I want to make that
possible, because so many of usspend our work day or our days
of the week at work. Wouldn't itbe awesome if we're helping
people, you know, make thatportion of their life a little
bit better, right? That's a justcause. So an example of one,
yeah, I
Amanda Jane Lee (16:53):
think you touched on a really important
point of seeing, seeing what'spossible, great seeing what's
possible outside of the thingdirectly in front of you,
outside of the one pizza you seeon the conference room table,
yes,
Indra Klavins (17:09):
there might be a salad in the corner. There's
bread sticks over there, likethere's options, there's
options,
Amanda Jane Lee (17:14):
there's options to order another pizza, like you
said, right? Absolutely. Andthere are times, you know,
especially when it comes tobudgets and money, right? There
are times where no like this isall you have. But there are,
there are other options thatare, that are not money, that
are not monetary,
Indra Klavins (17:36):
spending time with a what there's intrinsic
and extrinsic. Like you can youcan you can do you can offer,
like, coffee chats with a seniorleader. Like that matters to
some people, like having thechance to be in a coffee chat
with a senior leader of thecompany that doesn't cost that
costs time, doesn't cost money.That's an easy way to say, hey
(17:59):
guys, you know, I know you know,I know you guys didn't get
included on this promotion cyclebecause we had constraints, but
I wanted to talk to you and sayhow valuable you are, and have a
chance for you to ask me anyquestions you might have,
Amanda Jane Lee (18:09):
right? Or, you know, understanding the what,
what makes your team happy,right? What, maybe what they
need or want is moreflexibility, right? Like, say,
hey, you know, summer Fridays,of course, you know, according
to company policies andwhatever, right? But if that is
an option, why? Why not? Why notoffer that to your team and, you
(18:32):
know, keep them happy in thatway, if not a monetary or
promotion kind of way, in this,this, this, in this finite game,
yeah,
Indra Klavins (18:43):
I was part of a team. I was, you're talking, I
was remembering. I was part of ateam. We were one of the handful
of, maybe the only one team thatwas allowed to wear jeans to
work. Because in that craft, inthe broader industry, wearing
jeans to work was a, just anit's a baseline, yeah, right.
(19:05):
It's like a baseline better ifwe wouldn't let people wear
jeans to work, we could not getthem to join our company. And
so, like, that was our thing,right? That was our thing. And
we were very much taught to notflaunt it in front of others,
like they could see that we werewearing jeans, but you can't be
walking around like, look at myjeans I got.
Amanda Jane Lee (19:25):
That's like, everyone Indra, let us all wear
jeans today.
Indra Klavins (19:32):
But that's, that's, that's like, you know,
you don't want those finitethinking, scarcity thinking
tactics to show up in yourinfinite thinking, of your
benefits of you as you're tryingto work through things. But
yeah,
Amanda Jane Lee (19:42):
right, yeah. And you know that last part, I
think, is just seeing, notseeing the dress code as a
limitation, right, like seeingit as a potential opportunity to
to fulfill some. Need for yourteam, right?
Indra Klavins (20:02):
I mean, the I love that, it's, you know,
letting would be have. The otherthing that I've done as a leader
whenever I could is, beforeholiday weekends, you know,
early dismissal, workloadpermitting. Please do everything
you can to make sure workloadpermits, right? Don't just, just
(20:22):
sneak out. Just sneak out soonas you're done with your work,
sneak out. Like, don't make abig deal. Check your, check
your, you know, phone every oncein a while to make sure
something hasn't blown up. Butlike, go
Amanda Jane Lee (20:33):
same. Like, hey, you know it, it's
Halloween. Block off yourcalendar so that people don't,
people don't schedule meetingsfor that afternoon. But if
you've got to go to like, go toyour kids Halloween,
Indra Klavins (20:48):
Halloween parade, go those Halloween parades.
Sneak up on you at work. But Ithink that it's also, you know,
important to when we're thinkingabout abundance and scarcity
mindsets, like the one thingthat you want to keep in the
back of your mind, the abilityto have an abundance and
(21:11):
scarcity mindset may shift andchange depending on what type of
privilege you have. Andprivilege comes in lots of
different ways and shapes andforms, you know, but
understanding like, yeah,understanding that and being,
being very conscious of it is,is really important. It's,
there's a straight but I've,there's a strange little
(21:33):
paradox. I find that people whohave less privilege sometimes
have an easier time tapping intoan abundance mindset.
Amanda Jane Lee (21:42):
I think, yeah, I think, what do they say? You
know about art, right? Like, ifyou have a blank piece of paper
and you're allowed to dowhatever you want, sometimes you
get in a mental block, like youare, you're just, you're
somehow, like you said, it's aparadox. You're somehow limited
by the infinite possibilities,yeah, where as like, if there
(22:05):
are some constraints of like,here's a piece of paper, but you
only have these three colors towork with, yeah? Sometimes the
best art comes out of that.Like, it just gets your creative
juices flowing in a differentway.
Indra Klavins (22:17):
Yeah. And if you're the team who's always had
all the perks and all theeverything, and that becomes
your baseline of expectationwhen you lose one of you have
and part of those perks here,let's say three free lunches a
week, and you lose one of thosefree lunches because of
budgetary cuts, it can feel likethe sky is falling, like Dude,
no one else is getting freelunch across the entire company,
(22:40):
you've gone from three to two.Calm down. May not use that
language with them, but my innermonolog would definitely be
saying
Amanda Jane Lee (22:47):
that yeah. I think it's just yeah that I
don't know any other synonym tolike abundance mindset, right,
other than you know thedefinition of an abundance
mindset, it's seeing thepossibilities for what they are,
yeah. And just like opening yourmind and being curious to what
else, what else is possible,what else is out there, it's not
(23:09):
just you know what you see infront of you, or what you've
been trained to think is, is thestructure, is, the reward is, is
everything?
Indra Klavins (23:20):
Yeah, I think that's a great way to really
evaluate, like, is, because partof this is understanding, like,
what's finite and what'sinfinite? I think money we're
clear on that's finite, time isfinite. Like, there are certain
things that are just either,either laws of the universe or
laws of of capitalist societies,right? Those are two, right? But
(23:43):
like, I think that you walkthrough some really good ways
of, you know, taking a look at asituation and saying, is this,
is this truly finite, or arethere other possibilities? So I
think understanding that is thefirst step. And when you're in a
finite game, sometimes you justgot to play those rules and play
those rules for as long as youcan, like, that's that's that's
just gonna be what it's gonnabe, it's gonna be what it's
gonna be,
Amanda Jane Lee (24:03):
yeah, and something that just came to mind
about abundance mindset, it's, Imean, it is a mindset, right?
Sometimes the limiting thing is,you,
Indra Klavins (24:15):
it's so funny, like 100% like you and I have
talked recently around aroundsoft skills and talking about
soft skills and how, you know,building those up is like it's a
practice. It's a practice thatyou have to exercise every
single day. An abundancemindset, to me, is also
(24:35):
something you need to practiceevery single darn day. It's a
way of walking through thisworld. It's not a tactic. It's a
way of walking through thisworld. And so finding even in
your in your everyday life,like, is this a scarcity thing,
or is this an abundance thing? Idon't know. Like, let's take a
look at, let's talk about. Let'ssee what's possible. It's a
lower stakes. Maybe it mightfeel a little lower stakes for
(24:57):
you to really practice yourevaluation. Skills, right? Like,
going
Amanda Jane Lee (25:01):
back to the soft skills example, like, Am I
just accepting that I'm not thebest at soft skills, or do I
have an abundance mindset aboutit, and can I learn and grow and
prove to myself that this isn'ta limiting belief,
Indra Klavins (25:21):
right? I mean, and there might be a person
might have, like, legitimatechallenges towards developing
soft skills, and, you know, butin most cases, there's something
that they might be able to do,right? And we're just using soft
skills as one example. Like, howcan I? How can I, I love that,
like, I'm thinking of, like ayour Bring, bring to mind, like
a vision of, like a horse. Like,how do you open the blinders a
(25:43):
little bit? Sometimes theblinders are really good,
because they keep you focused,right then, that's the beauty
of, like, having that during afinite game. But is it finite?
Like, how do I open that up justa little bit to see things, see
the possibilities. See thepossibility.
Amanda Jane Lee (25:56):
I mean, I It's been a while since I've talked
about pottery on on thispodcast, but I'm still doing
pottery classes and just seeingthe progress between, you know,
my very first piece and, like,what I'm making now, like, I'm
actually, I don't have anythingon my desk right now, but I, I
recently made a mug that is bigenough to be useful, right?
Indra Klavins (26:19):
Your first mug. I loved your first mug, but I can
see the value of having that,like just seeing that growth,
seeing that right, but, but
Amanda Jane Lee (26:27):
it was, it was an abundance mindset thing. It
was a what is possible, like, Iactually can do this.
Indra Klavins (26:34):
Yeah, it's, it's funny. I didn't think my brain
would go. Here I was at a wewere having an off site, and it
was one of these things whereeverybody had to come together.
And one of the activities thatthey had for like team building,
was paint and sip so. And itwas, it was really funny. And
half of the people I that werepart of this activity were,
(26:55):
quote, creatives, and half thepeople were not. I land
somewhere in the middle. I don'tknow what I am, but it was
really funny between thecreatives and the non creative
how many people were paralyzedbecause they had this vision of
what their painting was supposedto look like based on the
example that the teacher gaveus. And they got stuck. They got
(27:16):
stuck in finite thinking. Theygot stuck in like in it was more
finite thinking, let's sayscarcity thinking. But they're
very, very similar. They're veryclosely related to each other.
And then people who succeededwere like, Let's see what
happens. Let's, let's, let's dosome stuff. Let's create
something, right? Yeah, so
Amanda Jane Lee (27:35):
I could totally see this playing out right,
yeah. Have this visual in myhead of the teacher, you know,
painting this thing and showingit to the class and being like,
Okay, this is what we're gonnapaint today. And the creatives,
or the people who were limitedby this finite mindset, were
like, I have to make my paintinglook exactly like that one.
(27:57):
Whereas you for example, werejust like, Yeah, I'm gonna try
my
Indra Klavins (28:03):
I loved my painting because the background
color reminded me of the colorof the hallways in my in my
elementary school, right? Andthat were, I'm sure
Amanda Jane Lee (28:13):
there was someone in your class who
painted something altogetherdifferent. They're just like, I
don't want to paint that treetoday. They did,
Indra Klavins (28:21):
and they had much more fun. Life is much more fun
in an abundance mindset. It getsus out of like, someone's got to
win, and into like, how do weall win? How do we all win? How
do we keep this game going? Howdo we how do the most of us win
in all of this? And that's whatI personally love and why? For
me, abundance mindset is verymuch part of my practice. Like,
(28:44):
you can go into gratitudejournaling or like, oh Adam
Grant had a good one recently.It wasn't gratitude that he was
counting. He was countingimpact. Oh, right. Like, what
impact did I have today? Notwhat am I grateful for, but what
impact did I have? Like, that'sactually a fun little way to to
exercise some of the musclesthat are related to this. Yeah,
Amanda Jane Lee (29:05):
what impact did I have? As opposed to, like,
what did I accomplish? Yes,exactly.
Indra Klavins (29:10):
Yeah, exactly. Like, I made the cashier's day a
little bit hap I made her laugh.Like, okay, great, that's that
was an impact. I don't know howthat trickled through the rest
of her day, but I know that thatwas one of the positive things
in her life. Yeah,
Amanda Jane Lee (29:24):
yeah. I think it's just, you know, it's just
being able to be open minded. Ithink open minded, as I think,
is a good synonym. I did it.
Indra Klavins (29:35):
We got there, yes, yeah. I got there.
Amanda Jane Lee (29:38):
Open mindedness, right? An open
mindedness mindset, an openmindedness attitude, yeah,
toward toward life, toward work,figuring out, like what, what
actually is a finite versus aninfinite game 100%
Indra Klavins (29:51):
I think it's a lovely place for us to end.
Thank you. Amanda, for anotherrich conversation, conversation
and Thank. You to everyone who'slistening. We hope that you join
us next time when we coveranother topic for the
Unknown (30:04):
messy middle, bye, bye.
Indra Klavins (30:08):
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