by Damola Morenikeji
Maybe you’ve heard those lies too, and believed them.
“Women can multitask better than men. As a man, you should learn how to multitask.”
“Fish stink from the head downward.”
“One of the hallmarks of a responsible person is achieving work-life balance.”
“Everything is equally important.”
One other classic one is about the frog in boiling water. “Put a frog into a pot of hot water and it will jump out,” they said. “But if you place the frog in a warm water and slowly increase the temperature, it will boil to death,” they concluded. I first heard this from a teacher in my primary school. I’ve heard same from senior executives that I respect too. I fear that I might have told someone else once about this.
The problem wasn’t those lies. The problem wasn’t those that told them – some told them in good faith, to motivate good behavior, and to put me “in check.”
The problem was that I based important decisions on those lies. And that didn’t stop until I knew better.
Joy, Inc. is a teaching and media company mainstreaming the research and evidence on human flourishing and positive emotions to transform the culture and build a new generation of Africans focused on the greatest happiness for the greatest many.
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