Good morning, friends!

As many of you know, I did an “integrity cleanse” last week. I learned a few things.

I deceive others not by lying outright but by going along with things I disagree with out of a fear that I will offend the other person. As Martha Beck said, I do it to smooth social interactions.

For instance, if someone asks me for feedback, I have a hard time saying what I really think because I’m trying to be polite. So I nod along and claim I like something that I don’t. I also noticed that it’s harder for me to be honest with people I don’t know as well or with people I deem more sensitive. (For some reason, it’s easier for me to state my true opinion in professional situations than in social ones.)

But this week, I began catching myself doing this. When someone asked me for feedback on something, I would’ve said, “Wow, this looks amazing!” But instead, I said, “At first glance, I imagine this is what nightmares are made of.” Then, I added context and it didn’t sound as harsh as it might reading it here now.

I was responding to an email, and I wrote, “I am probably unable to do X.” I changed it to, “I am unable to do X.” I do a lot of hedging — especially when it’s around something I don’t want to do. There is a lot of, “probably,” “kind of,” “sorry,” “maybe,” and a whole lot of unnecessary exclamation points. I cut that stuff out and also replaced many of the exclamation points with periods or no punctuation.

The week was an interesting experiment because it forced me to think and be intentional about the way I communicate with people. What messages am I sending? What do those messages say about me as a person? And, most importantly, why am I scared to say what I actually mean?

That final question is the trickiest to answer.

I’ve written about this before about the dangers of worshipping at the altar of conformity and conventional wisdom. As a kid who immigrated to the U.S, I was always different, and I was tired of being different. So I over-corrected and began being over-the-top nice, never having an opinion, and just agreeing with what I thought the other person wanted to hear.

By the time I graduated college, I had friends, I was well-liked, and I was never alone. But now, not only did I still feel like an outsider, I also felt like a fraud. This is referred to as “normative social influence,” a type of conformity in which a person publicly accepts the views of a group but privately rejects them. It’s a pretty lonely way to live.

I am 32 years old now, and I still battle with this internal push-and-pull. Do I say what I think or do I just let this one go? Do I give them accurate feedback or will they think I’m a jerk? Do I say the truth or do I dress it up with apologies until it’s unrecognizable as the truth?

Here’s the reason many of us avoid saying what we really mean: We think we’ll become insufferable jerks. As evidenced in the Esquire article, "I Think You're Fat," you can pretty much destroy every relationship in your life when you walk around the world with no filter.

But it doesn’t have to be so black and white.

Radical candor isn’t what most of us have to do to live in more alignment with our true selves. We don’t have to be rude, mean, or cruel to get our point across. It’s just being more intentional with our words because those words shape our thoughts and behaviors. Martha Beck says, "Consider if what you have to say is an improvement upon silence."

There’s very few things that would be an improvement upon silence. If you don’t agree, stay silent. If you have nothing constructive or useful to say, stay silent. It’s hard but necessary.

Before answering, Beck says she asks herself if her response is 1) true, 2) kind, and 3) useful. Rarely is something all three.

Now, let me just go teach this framework to my 2-year-old who told me that I look like a goat. (Should out to Profile reader Brent who said she meant G.O.A.T. 🤣)

Have a wonderful (truthful) week ahead!

— Polina

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PS: Every single one of the profiles below is excellent. You can’t go wrong.

PROFILES.

— The mass shooter’s mom [**HIGHLY RECOMMEND**]
— The wildly successful author who stopped writing
— The actress who built a literary empire
— The women finding sperm donors on Facebook
— The airline giant that keeps breaking down

PEOPLE TO KNOW.

The mass shooter’s mom: Chin Rodger collapsed and felt like she was plummeting when she found out that her son Elliot had perpetrated a horrific massacre, one that still stands apart in America’s epidemic of mass shootings. The case would be documented extensively by investigators and play a unique role: Its unusual range of evidence would show experts more about what leads to such attacks and help advance a growing field of violence prevention. And eventually, Chin herself would join that effort. Here’s why therapy, social counseling, and various other efforts over the years to help her son connect with people had failed. (Mother Jones)

“It’s not just the pain of losing my son but the horrible suffering his actions caused for so many. I will carry this pain for the rest of my life.”

The wildly successful author who stopped writing: Colleen Hoover is a novel hit machine. Her books have sold more than 50 million copies globally, and some have been translated into 45 languages. Of the 24 titles she has published in the past twelve years, 17 have been New York Times best-sellers. In 2022 alone she sold 14.3 million copies. And now, it’s been over a year since Hoover wrote a single word. Why? The haters on the internet got to her. (Texas Monthly; if you can’t access this article, try this link)

“I wish I didn’t let that get in my head, but I do. Because at this point I’m like: It doesn’t sound fun anymore. Release days don’t sound fun. So I’ve been dragging my feet.”

The actress who built a literary empire: Actress Reese Witherspoon has now been a presence in the book world for a decade. Her productions of novels like Big Little Lies, Little Fires Everywhere, and The Last Thing He Told me are foundations of the binge-watching canon. Her book club picks reliably land on the best-seller list for weeks, months or, in the case of Where the Crawdads Sing, years. In 2023, print sales for the club’s selections outpaced those of Oprah’s Book Club and Read With Jenna, adding up to 2.3 million copies sold. So how did an actor who dropped out of college (fine, Stanford) become one of the most influential people in an industry known for being intractable and slightly tweedy? (The New York Times; if you can’t access the article, try this link)

“The unexpected piece of it all was the economic impact on these authors’ lives.”

The women finding sperm donors on Facebook: Sperm donations to traditional banks slumped during lockdown, and the banks themselves have weathered a plethora of problems. Post-pandemic, a growing number of women are turning to unregulated Facebook groups that connect prospective mothers with willing donors. Meet the women logging on for fresh semen and the men who are eager to provide it. (New York Magazine; if you can’t access the article, try this link)

“These Facebook groups have exploded. I’m just making contacts left and right. I’m donating basically nonstop.”

COMPANIES TO WATCH.

The airline giant that keeps breaking down: Boeing’s story is one of the most significant business dramas of this millennium. This is the 108-year-old company that launched the jet age; created the world’s first wide-body in its fabled 747; ranks as America’s third biggest defense contractor behind Lockheed Martin and RTX, and has long reigned as America’s largest exporter. Plagued by leadership failures and safety issues, Boeing is now stumbling just when it should be capitalizing on the boom. (FORTUNE; if you can’t access the article, try this link)

“The seeds of these quality problems were planted a long time ago. These problems were hidden for years, then they exploded.”

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