by Tim Parkins | Nov 23, 2025
The Lie Beneath Your Hustle When your motion becomes your mask. How your hustle became your hiding place. You’re addicted to tactics because strategy requires something far scarier: honesty about what you actually want. I know because I was a tactics junkie too. Had my morning routine locked by 5:47am. Read every negotiation book, and got so good at managing up my boss thought I was magic. I got the promotion. Senior executive. The title I’d chased for years. Six months later I was in the…
by Tim Parkins | Nov 16, 2025
Driving Blind: Why Your Career Feels Like a Snow Squall When you can’t see where you’re going, someone else’s taillights become your plan. Last week I hit a wall of snow on the highway. It was one of those classic Ontario squalls where visibility drops to fifty feet and every driver becomes a white-knuckled philosopher questioning their life choices. In that moment, I wasn’t “making decisions.” I was reacting. Slow down. Follow the taillights. Hope nothing suddenly materializes out of the…
by Tim Parkins | Nov 9, 2025
The Subtraction Myth: Why Less Isn’t Always More Meaning isn’t found in what you remove, but what you build. You can’t subtract your way to a positive — only to zero. You’ve read Essentialism. Deep Work. Maybe even Four Thousand Weeks if you were feeling existential. You tried their tactics. Said no to meetings, batched your emails, and protected your calendar like it’s a castle under siege. You subtracted the bullshit, set boundaries, focused on “what matters most.” And yet – you’re still…
by Tim Parkins | Nov 2, 2025
Work vs Job: The Distinction That Changes Everything Your job pays the bills. You work changes the world. Know the difference. Your job is the blueprint. Your work is what grows through it. What’s your work? NOT your job title. NOT “what do you do.” Your work. As in, the change you’re trying to bring to the world. Can’t answer? That’s because you think your job and your work are the same thing. (They’re not.) Your Job: What someone pays you to do. You execute someone else’s vision. You do…
by Tim Parkins | Oct 26, 2025
Stop Choosing Between Options. Start Choosing Between Futures. Every choice is a doorway to a different version of you. You’re not picking between offers. You’re choosing who you’ll become next. I was standing in my living room in Northern Ontario, staring at a job offer that made absolutely no sense to take. On paper, it was a bad deal. The pay for the government role in Ottawa was low. It would mean selling our house, leaving a small community where we had friends, roots, and a life we’d…
