Do you ever find yourself accepting an opportunity that isn't quite what you want because you're afraid you might never get a better offer? Stop and listen to this episode. You're listening to The Academic Imperfectionist. I'm Dr Rebecca Roache. I'm a coach and a philosopher at the University of London, and week by week, I'll be drawing on philosophical analysis and coaching insights to help you dump perfectionism and flourish on your own terms.
Hello, imperfectionists. After the last podcast episode, where you had a background soundtrack of hammering rain, I've now got the window open, and you might hear birds singing and the occasional aircraft. So happy summer, if that's what this is.
Today, I want to talk to you about scarcity mindset, which is the belief that there's a limited amount of success, happiness, love, etc, to go round, which means that when others are successful, happy or loved, that means that there's less chance that you will be and vice versa. We can contrast this with an abundance mindset, which is the view that there's enough to go around for everyone, other people's success doesn't make it any less likely that you will be successful, and so on.
I want to talk to you about how having a scarcity mindset creates problems for academics. And I want to suggest some solutions to those problems. Now, academia itself is a masterclass in maintaining a scarcity mindset, simply because many of the things that we really want in our jobs and our professional lives in general are scarce. There are scarce resources for us to chase at every single career stage. So good academic jobs are hard to find. Competition for PhD funding and grant money is
really fierce. Academic publishers for both books and articles are picky. The system of ranking universities and departments means that competition is zero sum, your university and your department climbing the ranks comes at the expense of other universities and departments. It's really everywhere. And although I'm focusing on academia here, there are of course, analogies in
other lines of work, too. Now, while we do often have to compete for scarce resources if we want to succeed, having a scarcity mindset can lead us to make certain bad choices. It leads us to grab at what's on offer for us. And when we do that, we stop ourselves working towards what we really want. I started noticing this a while ago, when several of my clients were doing something puzzling.
Successful mid-career people were coming to me with an attitude of 'meh, I've got the job I thought I wanted, but it's not giving me what I thought it would give me', or just 'my career's just not turning out the way that I thought it would'. And in the course of our coaching sessions together, I would notice a pattern. I'd notice that they would have long been guided by some goal - work on project x, get a job at university y or whatever it
might be. But they would have spent their entire careers to date, not reaching that goal. And I don't mean that they tried to reach it and completely failed, but rather that they'd made choices that took them close to their goal without actually achieving it. So instead of working on project x, which was their goal, they ended up working on projects that were you know, like x in certain ways, in the same discipline as
x or in the same ballpark. Or instead of getting a job at university y, which is what they wanted, they ended up accepting a job at a roughly similar university that wasn't y. And these things would happen without ever really having tried to work on project x or at university y. And they made these choices quite early on in
their careers. It wasn't that they spent time trying to get to where they wanted to be, and then ended up taking the runner-up option after a period of time of not getting anywhere, or after realising that for whatever reason, getting to where they wanted to go just wasn't going to work out for them. Instead, they hadn't even really seriously tried to get where they wanted to go. And so career wise, it was as if their GPS settings were a bit off.
Like when you put a postcode into Google Maps, and it points to somewhere half a mile away from where you actually want to be. They were getting close to that goal, but without hitting it. And they weren't even trying to hit their goal. Because as soon as an okay opportunity came along to do something other than what they really wanted to do, they opted to do that instead. And that often closed off their options to move closer to where
they wanted to be. And by the time they came to me, people like this are disillusioned and frustrated. They're sometimes beating themselves up about being dissatisfied about not hitting their goal. They tell themselves to shut up and be grateful for getting as close as they had, when so many other people don't get anywhere near
that. If you've ever told yourself to shut up and feel grateful, you need to go and listen to Episode 1 of this podcast on toxic gratitude as soon as you finish listening to this. So the way that these people ended up thinking is that having got so close to their goal, they just shouldn't care that they hadn't actually
reached their goal. What was maybe most puzzling of all is that even though they hadn't tried very hard to get where they wanted to be, they'd come to believe that hitting the goal that they wanted wasn't possible, that it was an unrealistic pipe dream. Now, why were they doing this? Why aim at something close to what you want, but not quite what you want? Why not hold out for whatever it is you want? Well, every individual is different, of course. But here's a pattern
that I've noticed. I've noticed that often, people like this are afraid to hold out for their goal for reasons to do with scarcity. And what that meant for them is that when opportunities came along to do something other than work towards their goal, they were afraid to turn down those opportunities. They had a feeling of, if I pass this up, nothing this good will ever come my way again. Here's an example.
A couple of weeks ago, an academic friend of mine was approached by a publisher who asked her to write a book on a topic that she's not particularly enthusiastic about. She's already in the process of writing a book and taking on another one before finishing the first would mean taking on an unmanageable amount of work. But even so, she was seriously considering this offer. I mean, it was an offer from a publisher to write a book and it had just landed in her lap. What a stroke
of luck. Surely, she'd be mad to turn it down. I pointed out to her that she's viewing all of this through the lens of scarcity. She was taking a 'beggars can't be choosers' approach. But she's not a beggar. It wasn't a stroke of luck that this publisher had approached her. And it wasn't an act of charity or anything like that. They've approached her because of her reputation, because of her qualifications and her
experience. And that reputation, qualifications, and experience puts her in a strong position to publish a book on a topic she wants to write about and at a time that will work for her. She doesn't have to entertain this non ideal option. Now this 'beggars can't be choosers' attitude, I think, has a lot to do with imposter syndrome, which we covered in the previous episode of this podcast, Episode 11. When an opportunity comes our way, imposter syndrome makes us view it as a stroke of luck.
It's just fallen from the sky and landed in our lap. Wow. Lucky us. But in fact, it's not luck at all, or at least a large part of it isn't luck. My friend was approached by a publisher because the publisher decided she's someone whose research is worth publishing. If you've been offered a job, it's because that employer thinks you're worth employing. It's because of you that these opportunities are
coming your way. And whatever it is about you that has attracted opportunities in the past is going to keep attracting opportunities in the future. The problem is that when we have imposter syndrome, we overlook whatever it is about us that is bringing opportunities our way. And that means that making opportunities happen is not something that's within our control. It's all down to luck. So we can't afford to be
selective. If an opportunity comes our way, even if it's not quite what we want, we'd better grab it and be thankful because the chances of getting anything better ever again are vanishingly small. And the result of all this when we have a scarcity mindset is that our lives are shaped not by progress towards what we most want, but by what we're afraid to say no to. Because getting the life we want isn't just about working towards what we want, it's also about steering clear of what
isn't what we want. So what can we do about this? How can we stop ourselves being derailed by scarcity? I'm going to make a few suggestions to you about this. The first is that you get clear about exactly what it is that you do want. Now, that sounds obvious, but too often people don't do this, at least not in any detail. And sometimes people are even afraid to think seriously and clearly about what sort of life they want. They feel like they've got their head in the clouds that
they need to be realistic. Now, if you need help with working out what sort of life you want, check out Episode 5 of this po cast, 'Bitch, do you even d eam?' I've got a few tools and echniques there for you to try. ow, this is important, because f you're not clear about what ou want, then it's easy to get istracted. It's easy to look at pportunities that come your way nd think, 'Well, I suppose this isn't a million miles from what I want'. Because what you want i so vague and undefined, tha
almost anything fits it. On th other hand, knowing what yo want, having a clear vision o what your ideal life looks like feels like, sounds like, and so on - that all makes it easi r to see how and why n w opportunities that come alo g might not quite fit. And it al o makes it easy to carve out yo r own next steps proactively, o that you're not just sitti g back and waiting f r opportunities to come your wa
. Now, the next technique you c n use to protect yourself fr m being distracted by non ide l opportunities is when n opportunity comes your way a d you find yourself serious y considering taking it a k yourself, 'would I be tempted by this opportunity if I w s confident that a simil r opportunity would be available a month from now, or six mont s from now, or a year, or whatev r it might be?' If the answer to that is a clear no, then t's worth giving some ser ous consideration to how yo
're managing your choices. I m an, this is all context depend nt, of course, sometimes we re lly can't afford to risk tur ing something down. So if yo 're worried about paying the b lls next month, and a very non i eal job comes your way, the of course, you're going to wan to consider it. But of en, opportunities are not like t at. Often we overestimate how nce in a lifetime they really a e. And we underestimate how r sy things could be for us with
ut them. A related question to sk here is, 'is this the sor of opportunity that I could ake happen at a later date f I wanted to?' It's not withi our power to conjure any opport nity out of thin air, of course but we do have more control th
n we often realise. In the case f my friend who was approached by a publisher and was seri usly considering taking on a book that she really didn't have time to write, I pointed out t her that she could afford to f nish what she was currently wo king on, and then appro ch a publisher herself when sh was ready and when she had an dea for a new project. It se med that she really ha n't considered this opt
on. Sometimes when we're offere an opportunity, especially i it feels a bit flattering, we can react a little bit like pe ple react to those limited ime offers that you see on websi es, you know, the sort of thi g, 'This discounted deal ends i 15 hours, 42 minutes an
33 seconds'. Now mark ting professionals know that this gets people buying - that ura of scarcity means that t ey act before stopping to thin about whether they might be ble to get as good a deal l ter on, perhaps without even hinking about whether they ant the thing anyway. Be carefu not to do that to yourself. O ce in a lifetime opportuni ies, by definition, don't co
e around very often. Which means that the chances are hat this opportunity you're co sidering really isn't a nce in a lifetime opportunity There's really no rush. Finall , here's a really important qu stion to ask yourself, the ext time attempting opportun ty comes your way. And that's ' hat would I be giving up if I we e to take this opportunity?' No FOMO, fear of missing out, c n lead us to grab at opportuniti s that might on balance not be
ideal for us. But FOMO shouldn't just apply to what you might iss out on if you pass up that o portunity. It also applies o what you're going to miss ou on if you do take the opportu ity. So will accepting the opp rtunity take you further away fr m your goal? Will it slow you own? Will it mean that you t ke longer to reach your goal To help you think about all this, take a moment to zoom
out. So five years from now what do you think you're m re likely to regret, taking th s opportunity or not taking it? And while you're answering hat question, try reframing it. So instead of thinking in terms f taking this opportunity, when t's doesn't quite fit what you want, instead, try thinking in terms of settling for this opportunity. So are you sure you want to settle for it? Is now the time to consider that? Are you ready for it? Have you already given your primary goal
your absolute best shot? And if not, why is considering this opportunity even on your radar? Maybe you need to stop thinking of your goals as unrealistic pipe dreams and start thinking of them as ambitions. It's okay to hold out for you want. Thanks for listening. I'm Dr Rebecca Roache and y u've been listening to The A
ademic Imperfectionist. If yo enjoyed the episode, please su scribe on whatever podcast ap you like to use, and plea e consider leaving a review on A ple Podcasts and sharing the odcast with any friends who you
hink might find it useful. You an take a screenshot on your phone and send it over to them For more information and upda es about me, the podcast, or my coaching, or just to get in t uch and say hi, please visit t e website, academicimpe fectionist.com, or follow me o twitter @academicimp or on Face ook at Academic Iperfec ionist. Thank you for listen ng. I'll see you next time.