Caroline Fleck – Inspired New Horizons

Build a Sophisticated Toolshed

Imagine my surprise to hear a male guest on a podcast sharing that he and his wife are now using more “sophisticated” tools to navigate life. Wow — I love that impactful word and could even feel myself leaning into it and embracing the full scope of what it feels like.

It is remarkable how one word can shift us quickly into the next level of our personal growth — and do so in a way that feels amazing.

I could see it in the body language of this middle-aged man – he was owning how empowered he felt by proactively choosing a “sophisticated” way to support his wife deal with an emotional situation. There was a sense of pride and accomplishment.

His personal story was a sliding door experience for him — one where he could see how he used to handle situations like this that usually only made things worse; and how he attended to his wife’s needs now in a more mature and skillful way. Not only did his wife get what she needed most, their personal connection deepened.

The stark contrast of how his old ways of dealing with relationship struggles pulled them further apart – and how his new and improved ways, strengthened their relationship was undeniably magical. The “before” and “after” results of using “sophisticated” tools was proof positive that he was growing in the right direction.

He had handled a common relationship issue with aplomb.

Admittedly, he shared that he used to match her emotions and they’d get in an emotional tug of war. This could lead to a stand off and for the next few hours, they’d avoid each other or poke at each other’s shortcomings. Not fun.

His new and improved approach of validating her feelings and her experience, of listening to understand and co-regulating her by remaining calm, felt surprisingly good to him too. A simple shift in his approach was the fast-acting remedy that produced incredible results. They were hugging and smiling in just a few minutes. For hours afterwards, they could still feel the strong intimate connection they’d made.

Build a Sophisticated Toolshed:

That young man inspired me to see what is possible as we reframe personal growth and self discovery. Yes, of course — we want to be using sophisticated tools in skillful ways to build the life we want. To become better versions of ourselves over time and to support those we love in ways that build trust, resilience and self-confidence.

We can become master craftsmen and craftswomen with some simple, impactful shifts in our language and our awareness. Who wouldn’t want to become confident enough to use “power tools” in our most treasured relationships?

In his book, Shift, author and psychologist, Ethan Kross, reveals just how easy it is to step into using the “power tools” that proactively shift our mindsets, perspectives, emotions and perceived limitations. In fact, the concepts he details in his book could be the Starter Kit for building your own sophisticated toolshed.

These power tools are really pretty straightforward but we frequently get hijacked by the stimulus of a situation and just reach for a hammer.

It’s our natural human tendency to rely on familiar methods or tools, even when they are not the most appropriate for a situation.

As Abraham Maslow reminded us: “If the only tool you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.”

It is precisely why Victor Frankl urges us to use the pause between stimulus and response to think about what is the best course of action in the long run.

Reminding ourselves that we want to be reaching for “sophisticated” power tools while we are taking that pivotal pause might be all that is needed to remind us to be more mature and intentional about our reactions. Drop the hammer and reach for the more contemporary, state of the art, power tools.

Instead of over-reacting, consider reframing a situation.

Rather than be singularly focused, take a broader perspective and consider how others are feeling or could be impacted.

Validate what you are experiencing instead of projecting your pain onto others.

Lower the temperature on your heated emotions and let them cool down before boiling over.

Ask for help rather than complaining or blaming.

Validate other’s experiences and emotions with respect and empathy rather than dismissing them.

Zoom out and ask yourself if what’s happening now will matter as much in a few hours, a few days or next week.

A Method and a Motto:

There is a method to stop the madness of using a hammer for everything that pops off in our lives and crops up in our relationships. It is recognizing that we human beings have a lot of variation in the way we show up day in and day out.

Some days we are far better resourced to handle blunders, mistakes and miscommunications. We can let things roll with grace and generosity.

Other days, not so much. We are irritable, easily distracted, have limited bandwidth and are running on fumes.

Even when we want to do our best, it may feel nearly impossible to pull that rabbit out of a hat.

Enter a colleague of Ethan Kross – author and neuroscientist Emily Falk to help us when we are feeling out of sorts and prone to knee jerk reactions, swinging a hammer with wild abandon.

In her book, What We Value, Dr. Falk shares how we rely too much on yet another human default system that is our biggest obstacle to changing how we show up under pressure.

Turns out, we unconsciously overweight and overrate what we can get in the short term. We make snap decisions and have knee jerk reactions to get satisfaction right away. We don’t like feeling uncomfortable, we want relief immediately. Winning a shouting match feels good.

But winning that shouting match only feels good for a hot minute.

That’s the unfortunate reality of overweighting what feels good in the heat of the moment. We unconsciously give too much weight to winning a fight or avoiding a conflict. We make a value calculation that is fleeting.

Dr. Falk reminds us that where we “place our attention” is the lever we can pull to override our tendency to overweight the value of a short term outcome. Play the long game. Turn attention to what matters most. Are you the kind of person who saves the day?

We aren’t little kids in a sandbox anymore. We are grown ups who calmly come in and help each other get along. We can clearly assess the situation and get back to having fun together.

In her book, What We Value, Dr. Emily Falk urges us to get intentional (especially in the heat of the moment) about shifting our attention to the long game. We will find it much easier to reach for our sophisticated relationship power tools when we focus on what we value most in the long term.

It may seem small and highly unlikely to be effective to “shift” to the long game – but it is an elevated form of delayed gratification. Do you want one marshmallow now or would you be willing to wait so that you get two marshmallows later?

Play the long game.

Turning our attention to think about what we are working towards in becoming a better person, in how we show up for others especially when it is challenging — that shifts our focus and puts more weight in the ‘value calculation” that drives our choices, behaviors and actions.

When we play the long game, we make the most of that pause between stimulus and response, by asking ourselves – “Wait a minute – let’s think about what I value most and make the better decision that aligns with my values.”

The method we can use to help us reach for power tools instead of a hammer is to shift our focus to playing the long game and matching our responses to our long term goals and core values.

The motto we create for ourselves becomes the lever we pull that opens our sophisticated tool shed. Something as simple as the golden rule can be a magical shifter in how we meet life’s moments.

Sophisticated Power Tools and Lots of Practice:

When our kids are little, we give them those brightly colored plastic replicas of lawn mowers, weed whackers and leaf blowers. Many times our kids love to store their pint-sized imitation power tools right next to the real thing in the backyard toolshed.

We would never give our kids the real deal power tools until they are old enough and mature enough to use them with great care and skill. But we do plant the seeds that they will be quite capable to use the real tools in the future.

What we know now that is backed by advances in science and psychology is that for far too long is that most of us were only taught to use a hammer to fix just about everything. But a hammer and duct tape do not build strong relationship foundations and deep connections.

As we begin to incorporate more advanced relationship tools into our daily lives, we reinforce the positive benefits we reap – and we also teach by osmosis how effective sophisticated power tools truly are – in the long run.

Think about using the mental image of a magical toolshed full of dynamic power tools that are fun to use and get the job done right the first time. We can all build that kind of toolshed, well equipped with sophisticated tools and skills easily accessed each and every day.

What motto would you put on the sign that hangs over the door of your sophisticated toolshed?

RECOMMENDED RESOURCES:

BREAK FREE FROM A VICTIM MINDSET: June 6th, 2025 episode with Scott Barry Kauffman. Prepare to be amazed at how often we get trapped in our own victim mindset. This dynamic conversation will shift you quickly to an “empowering mindset”

Digging in & Getting to Work

The compelling metaphors of spring being a time of rebirth, new beginnings and growth are not lost on me. Every time I go for a walk in nature, I marvel at the seemingly slow process of a tiny bud pushing with all its might at the very tip of a fragile naked branch. Just a few days later, I discover that the tight bud has swelled and softened. And then later in the warmth of afternoon sunshine, voila — the bud has now unfurled and I see tiny green leaves.

Now the process begins again. The fragile pale green leaflets will grow over time and one day later this summer, they will actually provide shade for the ground cover that is the understory of this forest. In the fall, the seeds will drift downward and nestle into the soft compost beneath the understory – and next spring, those seeds will pop up and start the process anew.

I find myself wondering what has taken us so long to reframe our own personal growth in the same transformational way that we view springtime.

It is precisely why I have been encouraging us all to consider self discovery and personal growth in a dynamic new way. We are not only works in progress at every stage of our life, we are ever-growing, adapting and changing throughout our lifetimes. Much like the image of a majestic oak tree used to symbolize strength, stability, endurance and longevity, we too are ever growing.

Taking ownership of our personal growth over the course of our life changes everything. We no longer have to view our past history and adversities as impediments that uprooted us. We can more accurately see how the stories we have told ourselves about our lived experiences have often had a far greater impact on shaping us than the event itself.

As human beings, we are designed to make meaning out of the experiences in our lives. The root cause of our stunted personal growth is that we were only budding young authors during our most profound developmental stages – early childhood and adolescence.

We’ve heard it said over and over again: “change the narrative and it will change the way you see yourself.” This is one of the foundational principles that should be guiding our personal growth throughout our lifetimes. We need to become better storytellers and discerning meaning makers.

Many of the stories we tell ourselves have long roots going back to the first drafts we wrote when we were young. When we go back and revisit these stories with the intention of editing, updating and rewriting them, it is in essence pulling up the weeds and tangled vines — and revealing to ourselves just how much we’ve grown over time.

With a fresh perspective and a growth mindset, we can really dig in and get to work. We can become master gardeners for our self discovery and personal growth.

Re-imagining how we can repurpose what we have learned and discovered about ourselves over the years, helps us dig a little deeper into our raw material and use it wisely and with good intention.

Best selling authors frequently share that they “wrote the book they needed to read” or a well-known psychologist will confess that their “research” was actually “me-search.”

Taking a cue from these folks, we can begin to write the stories that shape us in the most transformational ways. We should not stay stuck in those old narratives that limit our potential.

A Trowel and a Notebook:

When my kids were teenagers, I would often ask them “What have you learned from this experience?” They were not huge fans of this parenting tool, for it required them to stop and think about their choices and the subsequent outcomes. It felt like hard work and they much preferred to be grounded than breaking ground.

I didn’t realize it then — but what I was intuitively trying to do was get them to “think on their own” and be able to make better decisions in the future when faced with similar (but much more consequential) events.

What I knew from my own lived experiences as a 40 year old mom was that a lack of self-reflection usually led to breakdowns. What I wanted for my teenaged kids were more “break throughs” in their self awareness and sense of agency.

“What have you learned from this experience?” was a trowel; an invitation to dig a little deeper into what motivated them to make certain choices and to step back and see if the outcome matched their values. Did their choices and behaviors help them get where they wanted to go in life?

I have a confession – I did not see this simple question as the meaningful tool it truly is when I was a middle-aged mom of fast growing teenaged boys. I just knew they needed something from me that they could take into adulthood as a guidepost for building the life they wanted. The life I hoped they would have; one that was a little less bumpy than my own had been.

Finding our footing and being grounded in mid-life is a super power and not a punishment. But we can only be “grounded” in our values if we have in fact done some serious self-reflection.

For the record, grounding my teenaged boys would not have had the same impact as making them reflect on their own life lesson in real time – just ask Dr. Becky Kennedy.

Today, thanks to Arthur C. Brooks and his book “Build the Life You Want”, I now have a greater awareness of the incredible value of asking ourselves “what have we learned from this experience.” It is the trowel we need in our personal growth toolbox.

Arthur Brooks tells us that whenever something in your life has unraveled, pull out a journal and write down what’s happening and how you feel about it. Come back a week later and write down how you are feeling about it now after some time has passed. Are you able to see a silver lining yet? He tells us to revisit a breakdown in a month, in 6 months and even a year later. Was there a breakthrough?

That old adage “time will tell” rings very true when we take Arthur’s advice to heart. What have we learned from that one heartbreaking experience or major adversity that has enriched our life or opened our eyes in entirely new ways? How has it shaped us?

It is this self-reflection, done over time, that helps us with fundamental building blocks for building a life we truly want. We tell ourselves stories to make meaning of our experiences. But the first draft of our stories is often fraught with too many emotional cliff notes. These jagged first drafts keep us stuck in the painful parts of our stories.

We need time for each experience to fully develop, just like a photo taken with an instamatic camera. It is over time, with edits and re-writes that we grow into what life had to teach us through our experiences. Arthur’s simple journaling exercise is how we plot our changes and observe our development.

Personal growth and self discovery is a process. Of course the events in our life have impact and shape us in ways that we may not even realize. Some of our best lessons have a very long germination period. Getting curious about how we are growing is a fresh new perspective to adopt.

Anyone who loves gardening will tell you that patience is a virtue when it comes to planting seeds, nurturing them and providing the right environment for them to survive and then thrive. This organic growing process is the one we want to emulate for ourselves and our life experiences. We can be much more proactive and intentional about how life events impact our personal growth. It requires patience with ourselves as well as the process.

The beauty in this shift in how we approach our personal growth and self discovery is that we can begin at any time. We can start small and work our way deeper into our library of life experiences for more insight and enrichment later.

Choose just one recent event in your life that felt like you might be breaking ground for something new to emerge.

Did a friend offer you a reframing for a struggle you are having and suddenly you saw a whole new path forward?

Maybe you stopped to realize that the same old approach to a recurring problem just isn’t working and you decided to change how you react and respond.

Were you facing a very difficult decision having to choose between two appealing opportunities? Were you able to feel your way intuitively into making the best choice for you at the time?

We get these little nudges for growth spurts almost daily. Anytime we can stop and do a little check-in about the stories we are telling ourselves, we are acting like skillful gardeners attending to our personal growth and self discovery.

Give This Some Thought:

Take some time to think about how telling yourself a different story would have impacted your emotions and experience over time by reflecting on a meaningful event in your life.

Ethan Kross, author of Shift, encourages us to ask family members and friends to help us see ourselves through their eyes.

My younger brother does this often for me when we talk about our childhood experiences. Where I see myself as a frightened ten year old, he saw me as a strong and courageous big sister who protected him. This fresh perspective helps me go back and edit a childhood experience with more context and nuance than I had access to as a kid.

Over the years, with his help, I have been able to see the tender shoots of my strengths pushing hard through a few childhood experiences, just the that tight little bud on my favorite tree. I was emerging; I just didn’t see it.

RECOMMENDED RESOURCES: