Every morning, I check my HRV.
I know my sleep score. My resting heart rate. My training load.
But there’s one question I can’t answer.
Was I a better person this week than last?
In Bloom, we have a mantra: scorecards over stories. Yet when it comes to character, most of us run no scorecard at all.
I call this the Character Blind Spot: we measure what we’re proud of and narrate what we’re not.
My son is deep in university applications right now. Grades, scores, activities. All measurable. Then come the essays, where admissions officers try to learn what the numbers can’t tell them.
What kind of person is this?
It’s a question worth asking yourself before someone else does.
Ryan Holiday recently shared his ten habits for being a good person, drawn from his book Right Thing, Right Now. It got me thinking about my own list.
Here are the eight I come back to most.
Let’s dive in.
1. Let your values cost you something
Everyone has values. Until they get expensive.
In 1982, seven people died after taking Tylenol capsules that someone had laced with cyanide. Johnson & Johnson had done nothing wrong. CEO James Burke pulled 31 million bottles off the shelves anyway, at a cost of more than $100 million.
Tylenol came back. So did the public’s trust.
The Lesson: A value that has never cost you anything is just a preference.
Try this: Pick one small line and hold it for 30 days. Mine: 4 to 9 every morning belongs to deep work. No meetings, not for a good excuse and not for a good opportunity.
2. Slow down enough to be kind
In 1973, Princeton researchers ran a fascinating experiment on trainee ministers, the people you’d expect to be kindest in any room.
Each was sent across campus to give a talk, some on the Good Samaritan. On the way, they passed a man slumped in a doorway, groaning.
Of those told they were running late, only about one in ten stopped. Some literally stepped over him.
The Lesson: Hurry is the quiet enemy of kindness. Their values weren’t the problem. Their schedule was.
Try this: Flag your overload days. I watch for meetings before 9, three back to back, or days over five hours. I know who I become on those days.
3. Get competent. Intentions are cheap
Surgeon Atul Gawande became obsessed with something unglamorous: a checklist. Introduce the team by name. Confirm the patient. Confirm the site.
In a WHO trial across eight hospitals, complications fell by about a third. Deaths nearly halved.
Nobody started caring more. They just got better at the work.
I’ll admit my own blind spot here. With clients, I reach for the identity read because it feels like depth. Sometimes the real answer was a skill gap.
The Lesson: Caring about someone doesn’t qualify you to help them. Competence does.
4. Leave the room cleaner than you found it
After Japan lost to Belgium at the 2018 World Cup, the players left their dressing room spotless, with a note on the table that said thank you in Russian. In the stands, the fans picked up their own rubbish.
I’ve been thinking about this a lot. I’m applying to facilitate at EO’s global conference in Kyoto next year, and that dressing room is the standard I’d want to hold.
It reminds me of pool. The shot matters less than where you leave the cue ball.
The Lesson: Leave every room a little better for you and a little less dependent on you.
Try this: Ask one question about your work. Does it run better without me?
5. Watch how you treat the waiter
Former Raytheon CEO Bill Swanson had a simple rule: someone who is nice to you but rude to the waiter is not a nice person.
The Lesson: Respect you only show upward is strategy, not character.
I’m training my dog to bark less right now. Honestly, it’s mostly training me. Patience with something that can do nothing for you is the cleanest test there is.
6. Forgive faster than feels fair
This one asks the most of you.
In 2007, a drunk teenage driver hit Chris Williams’ car in Salt Lake City. His pregnant wife, his daughter and one of his sons were killed. That same night, Williams decided to forgive the driver.
The driver hadn’t earned it. Williams simply refused to let the crash take the rest of his life too.
Resentment feels like holding someone accountable. Mostly, it’s holding yourself hostage.
7. Choose a north star you’d be proud to be caught following
In 2022, Yvon Chouinard gave Patagonia away. The entire company went into a trust and a nonprofit. His line: “Earth is now our only shareholder.”
You probably won’t give away your company. But you are following something, whether you chose it or not.
I once gave a very successful client a one page assignment: define what “enough” looks like at 40, and name three things you’re done chasing.
It’s the hardest homework I’ve ever set.
The Lesson: Money, ego and approval are the default north stars. They’ll get you somewhere. Just not anywhere you’ll want to stand.
Try this: Do the assignment yourself. One page. Tonight.
8. Say the true thing early
When Alan Mulally took over Ford in 2006, the company was losing billions, yet every status chart in the weekly meeting was green.
Weeks later, one executive, Mark Fields, put up a red one. The room waited for him to be fired.
Mulally clapped.
Within weeks, the charts were full of red. And Ford started fixing things.
In my EO forum, we don’t report the 95% of life that’s going fine. We share the 5% we’d rather nobody saw. It’s uncomfortable every time. It’s also the only part that changes anyone.
The Lesson: Unsaid truths don’t disappear. They just run the meeting.
The Bottom Line
We track our health, our wealth and our output with incredible precision.
But the scorecard that matters most is the one nobody hands you.
Being great is optional. Being good is the job.
Here’s Some Inner Game Wisdom to Chew on This Week
1 question from me
If the people who can do nothing for you wrote your reference, what would it say?
2 questions (and answers from me)
Q: Isn’t “being good” a bit soft? I’m running a business.
A: It’s the opposite. Character is the cheapest trust you’ll ever buy. Every shortcut carries a tax. You pay it later, when people stop telling you the truth, or when they know they can take advantage of you.
Q: How do I know if I’m actually becoming a better person?
A: Don’t ask yourself. You’ll grade yourself on intent. Ask the people who see you at your worst. One question: am I easier to be around than I was a year ago?
3 insights
– Sleep is non-negotiable. Tired, wired, over-caffeinated you is not the patient version. Character is downstream of your nervous system.
– Your calendar is your character, written down. Look at who gets your best hours and who gets your leftovers. That’s your real values page.
– Survival mode made you sharp-edged. You’re not in survival mode anymore. Keeping the edge is a choice now, not a requirement.
Until next week:
Track your character.
Not just your output.
Ask someone who’d tell you the truth.
— Dhiren
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