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Hello, everyone! My name is Carrie Olsen. I was named after both of my grandmothers, and I believe that if you aren’t learning, you aren’t living. In today’s episode of Stuff I Learned Yesterday I share a lesson I learned about recognizing your strengths and weaknesses, and what do about them.
Today’s Fun Fact: In medieval times, Animals were put on trial and routinely sentenced to death. Unfortunately, the deck was stacked against those poor animals every time. How could they ever defend themselves? I feel like the only recourse those poor animals had was to plead the fifth every time and hope for the best. Tragic and absurd, all at the same time.
What I Learned Yesterday
I met my husband, Derek, in 2009 when I moved in right next door to him. At the time, he drove a 1970s yellow VW pop top bus. He often pulled his coffee table outside in his front yard to have drinks with friends, and he always mowed his lawn wearing rain boots. Because these were the only things I knew about him, I figured he was a bit of a hippy, and I was cool with that. But as we started dating, and especially after we got married, I discovered that he wasn’t as carefree as I initially had him pegged for being. In fact, he was kind of a worrier, and I turned out to be the more carefree, risk taker in the relationship.
Now I’ll admit that at first, it was really hard for me to relate to Derek when he would hesitate to make decisions because he was worried. And I found myself thinking things like, “It’s not that big of a deal! Worrying isn’t going to help the situation anyway.” And even, “It’s wrong that you’re worrying this much. You should just try to be more laid back like me.” If you’re married or in a relationship, maybe those sentiments sound familiar to you. And if they do, then you know that invalidating your partner’s feelings is not a helpful way to make progress in decision-making, much less in a relationship.
So when Derek and I started toying around with the idea of him quitting his job to start a business, I just knew that I was going to be in for hours of conversations about how worried he was about moving forward with the idea. But as it turned out, his worry — or perhaps more accurately concern — manifested itself as a plan. A thorough, well thought-out plan that allowed us to make the leap in a responsible way. Throughout the process, I continually encouraged him to follow his dreams of having a business, and he made a point of it for us to have regular conversations about practical ways to do that. And that turned out to be a winning balance.
Here’s what I learned.
Derek and I are different in a lot of ways. But those differences have allowed us as a unit to be way more efficient, impactful, and effective than we ever could on our own. We found this to be true, not just in this decision, but as we later discussed starting family, as we dreamed about taking a long-term cross-country family road trip in a travel trailer, and even as we managed our schedules and budget. When we recognized each other’s strengths and started seeing them as such, our partnership grew exponentially stronger.
I’m Carrie Olsen, and this has been Stuff I’m Learning Everyday.
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