17th April 2023
It has been a little while since I cheered you all up with a dose of existentialism, so here's a lovely bit of Sartre that I have been pondering as I write my MA dissertation (on existential coaching).
It comes from his seminal novel Nausea (1938), where the protagonist, a misanthropic writer called Roquentin, is struggling to make sense of the disturbing and disorienting experience of being alive (hey - nobody said it would be a barrel of laughs!). He is watching a doctor talking to his friend in a café, and - appalled by the doctor's complacence and arrogance - worries for his friend.
"How I should like to tell him hat he’s being duped, that he’s playing into the hands of self-important people. Professionals in experience? They have dragged out their lives in stupor and somnolence, they have married in a hurry, out of impatience, and they have made children at random. They have met other men in cafés, at weddings, at funerals. Now and then, caught in a current, they have struggled without understanding what was happening to them. Everything that has happened around them has begun and ended out of their sight; long obscure shapes, events from afar, have brushed rapidly past them, and when they have tried to look at them, everything was already over. And then, about forty, they baptize their stubborn little ideas and a few proverbs with the name of Experience, they begin to imitate slot machines; put a coin in the slot on the left and out come anecdotes wrapped in silver paper; put a coin in the slot on the right and you get precious pieces of advice which stick to your teeth like soft caramels."
Apart from being mesmerised by the beauty of the writing, I also felt a little uneasy that I recognised something of myself in the description… Not the stupor and somnolence (I hope), nor indeed the haphazard approach to family life (thankfully). But rather the temptation that comes, with age, to rely too much on experience in your working life: to imply you have seen it all before; to share a personal anecdote; to dole out a platitude or two; to advise rather than to truly engage with the problem at hand, or the person in front of you. The working world is changing so quickly - it is different from when I entered the
workforce over 20 years ago, certainly different from pre-pandemic, and it is changing still. There's often no reason to assume that my experience is going to be relevant to someone else.
If I don't stay curious, listen, and treat every new challenge as unique and different, then I risk being left behind. My "career reboot" as a coach and trainer has helped me see the world with fresh eyes - and I am hugely grateful for it! What helps you to stay curious?
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