Life Lessons from a House Plant

The other day I was attending some meetings in a hotel. I stepped out of the meeting to take a phone call, and entered the nearest empty meeting room. This room was sunny and had a collection of plants inside. As I looked at the plants, I realized something interesting about them. The plants were all growing directly towards the only window in the room. They were climbing, leaning, and even falling against that window. I thought about it and realized that those plants were fully dependent on that window, and the sunlight going through it. I realized that sometimes we do the same thing as people — we grow too dependent on one source of growth.

These plants reminded me of one of the most important lessons I have learned in my professional and personal life.

Don’t rely on just one source for your fulfillment.

Many of us go through our careers with one steady salaried job, and that feels good. What we don’t realize is that we are growing like those plants: we are leaning into a window, and if that window goes away, we might fall. However, if we seek out other sources of income, whether that be doing small consulting work on the side, starting a side business (also called side hustle), or investing our money well, we will be able to stand upright even if something happens to one of our sources of income.