Hi Reader,

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Welcome to this week's Rev Up for the Week. You know the drill by now - Sunday. 4.05pm UK time. Something useful to lift you in the days ahead.

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I've mentioned before that I always write these emails during the week they go out. Mostly, I write them on Weds or Thurs, but sometimes, like today, I'm sailing a little close to the wind, and you join me writing this lunchtime on Sunday. I think there's something comforting about me sharing this - after all, lots of folks who've read How to be a Productivity Ninja or come across my productivity work have this notion that I must somehow be someone who never procrastinates, or that I must have a bullet-proof process which means I never get to Friday without a good idea. Hopefully it's useful to know that perfection doesn't exist, even for the people who make a living by sharing the rules for it. You see, the richness of life doesn't come from everything being smooth. And smooth is so boring it's unmemorable. Often, the key to a successful life is to embrace the wonky.

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I've been thinking about 'wonky' a lot this week:

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I've just spent a glorious weekend with most of the team I worked with in my very first full-time job, overseeing the student volunteering programmes at the University of Birmingham. We caught up with each others' lives, and told stories and shared gossip about some of the other people we'd worked with. It struck me that most of the best stories were about wonky moments - we learn so much more when things don't go to plan than when they do. And most of the memorable people we talked about were the ones who had something unique or interesting about them - the wonky ones had passion, saw the world in a slightly wonky way, or made contributions that felt remarkable.

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I spent the week learning more about using AI to write Linkedin posts. I've talked before about how important it is to me that this email is written by me, not AI. Even when it's impossible for you to tell, I still want to write these for me. It's my writing practice, and that's not up for debate for me. But for LinkedIn, wouldn't I prefer to have 5 posts a week written and scheduled effortlessly in 10 minutes in a way that suits the LinkedIn algorithm, rather than struggling to write three myself that are all less effective, and always feeling the gnawing sense of obligation to spend my time writing more? It would certainly be more efficient if I could make those AI-generated posts sound like me. But it also strikes me that if everyone did that, we'd end up where there's no point anyone reading Linkedin anymore, as everything there is created by their own little robots trying to impress Linkedin's bigger robot, and that ultimately it becomes - in terms of learning or usefulness, at least - a race to the bottom. Because LinkedIn, like everything else, is a community. And community is about humanity. And humanity is wonky. The wonky bits are where the richness is. The issue I have with most AI writing is that it's so formulaic that nothing stands out. This week, I've even read advice that I should "tell my AI tool to leave spelling mistakes in, to make it seem more human". It turns out 'wonky' really matters here.

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Also this week, my friend Lauren Currie, founder of UPFRONT, shared a brilliant post on her mailing list about the idea of 'intentionally oversharing'—when she shares with her team that she's on her period, or that she needs to keep some time free to decompress after therapy, or that a certain time is unavailable because she's on the school run; then it normalises the idea that leaders have periods, go to therapy, and do school runs. And if it helps to normalise this further, two out of three apply to me, too.

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Too often, we try to deny the experiences or quirks that make us stand out. We try to smooth out or hide away the wonky bits to fit the mould or suit the assumed narrative.

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So here are five questions to help you embrace your wonky this week:

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• What difficult challenges or painful experiences have you had that others could learn from? How can you bring some of that safely out into the open, so that you can share the learning?
• What values do you hold dear? Is there an issue where you feel you're out of step with the mainstream opinion of your peers? What's the hill you'd die on? How can you share that with the world?
• Do you have an idea that could change the world? Do you think it seems crazy? Have you considered it's probably no crazier than if you'd talked to Thomas Edison and he'd shown you sketches of a light bulb before one had been invented?
• Is there something you're secretly struggling with that, dare I suggest, others might also be struggling with too? And might a problem shared be a problem halved (and perhaps it'll provide some relief all round).
• What will you do differently, knowing that imperfection is more highly cherished than perfection? What can you let go of?

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Stay wonky. Have a great week,

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Graham

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