The Final Boss

Happy (Creepy) Friday the 13^th everyone!

Welcome back to the 5 Minute Refresh – and please, watch out for black cats, decline to walk beneath ladders, and treat any hockey mask wearing axe wielding flesh decay smelling person with an appropriate amount of suspicion.

Oh, and also smash out your 5 Minute Refresh response for the week! It’ll bring you good luck ;)

Short on time? Skip the warmup, and jump straight to the question at the end.

The Final Boss

When I finally got to throwdown with Bowser in the final level of Super Mario World, I froze up.

Hands shaking.

Hot and cold – clamminess personified.

On the one hand, this is my moment!

Smashed through 95 levels to get to this, the final one!

But now I’m here…

…what if he kills me?

What if I run out of lives, have to do it all again?

Luigi might disown me.

Princess Peach’ll kick me to the curb.

(Side note – writing this out is making me realise how gendered Mario Bros was…)

My school besty Will clocked Super Mario last week… do I just lie and tell him I did too?

Or own up?

Will he stop being my friend because I couldn’t smash as hell in King Koopa’s grill?

Will the whole school learn of my Super Nintendo incompetence and banish me from being their friend, or being allowed to speak?

Destined to eat my lunch alone in the toilets, sat cross-legged in the ever growing ever deepening puddle of urine that splashed underfoot.

Old pissy bum, they’ll call me.

A moniker sure to grace my driver’s licence in 10 years time.

I’ll deserve it.

Cos I’ll never beat this guy, no matter how many times I try.

This entire sequence of thought coursed through my head in approx 10 seconds.

Guess what happened?

Lost, obvs.

At 9 years old, I’d not only talked myself out of beating the final boss…

…I’d talked myself INTO insane, beyond-worst-case-scenario-into-sheer-Dante’s-Inferno beliefs about what beating Bowser meant…

…going as far as to tie it into my self-worth and value, life and future prospects.

Yeah, 9 year old me was sure a festy dumb dumb.

Oh, but wait.

I still do this, all the time.

And I’ll bet you do too.

Like before you jump up to give a speech or a presentation –already convinced you’re going to be pelted with rotten tomatoes within seconds of opening your mouth.

(Side note: Raw tomatoes – even ones that aren’t rotten –are f**king gross. It’s the tomato snot. So slimy. Disgusting.)

Like when you decide your boss hates you, and you’ll never progress…

,,,and you’ll never get a good referee check from them…

…in fact they’ll actively crush you on LinkedIn…

…and you’ll need to start applying for jobs removing gum from beneath park benches…

…but even that might be a stretch by the time they’re done bagging you out.

Like when you push your quarter-finished novel back into the drawer for good, because everyone will definitely hate it.

So much so you’ll be banned from use of the English language for life.

Pen licence retrospectively removed.

Banished to complete Grade 2 level creative writing with a pencil for all eternity.

Or maybe it’s time to try thinking differently.

Time to start expect to achieve something awesome when you stare down your ‘Final Boss’.

To talk yourself into performing at your best, or finishing the project, or backing yourself.

You don’t need other people to do this.

And you don’t need to be a ‘high achiever’.

You can just put in maximum positive effort.

Silence that nasty troll in your brain with a smile and a wink.

And learn from whatever your best effort result is – and feel proud that you really went for it, regardless of outcome.

The 5 Minute Refresh

If you're new, here's the drill – this is your 5 Minute masterclass in YOU.

Set a timer on your phone or computer. This week, you have EXACTLY 5 minutes to answer the following question.

Smash out your response, hit send (if you want), then have a marvellous weekend. I'll write back to you in the next few days 😊

Question: ‍

Where in your work or life is negative self talk holding you back – and what’s a new positive narrative you can tell yourself instead?

‍

Have a lovely weekend everyone!

Nick

PS: If you find Five Minute Refresh useful, please feel freeto forward onto your colleagues, friends or family members – I’ll reply to anyone, once per week 😊