Follow @ThisOldBrain on Twitter Subscribe to This Old Brain via RSS Email View Mike Kirkeberg LinkedIn Profile View Mike Kirkeberg

Our Brain – Dysfunctional Board of Directors

by Mike Kirkeberg

Hello there! If you are new here, you might want to subscribe to the RSS feed for updates on this topic.

photo credit: Jeff Youngstrom
A Dysfunctional Committee

Nightly, well, almost nightly, I go to bed determined to get up early in the morning and exercise. The good news – I get up early. Trouble begins when some other lazy person awakens in my body and decides to sit down, have some coffee, watch a little news.

Late rolls around way before it is due. Suddenly, it becomes 10 am. I’m still sitting in my ‘jamas. Amazing, huh? Then another part of my little brain gets pissed at me and can’t understand how I wasted a whole morning. Finally, I get dressed, eat something, and head out the door to walk. That’s usually between 11 and noon.

Who are these people who seem to run my life for me? It’s like they’re at war with each other. Has it ever seemed like this to you? You have great intentions at one point and then this other shadow you takes over and thwarts your plans.

Is it just me?

Most of us – by that I mean me – somehow get the stuff done that is imperative. Usually. It can be tiring though. There is a dysfunctional board of directors that runs the company of me, perhaps you as well. The board muddles through, managing by committee, but it often runs the company badly. There are different committee members, factions of brain function, habits of mind, and internal emotional nags, that are constantly vying for supremacy. The member of the committee that yells the loudest and most often wins at a given time.

The Energy Sucking Struggle

It is an energy sucking struggle. The struggle is less the effort that goes into accomplishment than it is getting enough of the committee to agree. So I struggle with the struggle. Struggling with life is not fun. It makes life seem much harder than it has to be.

On the other hand, giving in to the struggle is not an option. Life wouldn’t really be life without the struggle.

So, what to do?

What if we start to look at life through a wider lens. Maybe we can bypass the board and the committees altogether, to simply step out of the struggle.

But, how about we do that tomorrow. I have a board meeting.