The Rules I Try to Live By
The Rules I Try to Live By
- These are not commandments. They are forcing mechanisms — daily and weekly habits that I have found genuinely helpful at work and in life. I am nowhere near the end. I would argue I am at the very beginning.
- Come with a smile. Happiness is contagious. You cannot control most things in this universe, but you can control the energy you bring into a room.
- Kindness is free. When something bad happens, take it as an opportunity to do good ten times over. Good things compound in ways that are not always obvious.
- Be interested before trying to be interesting. People love to be heard. Curiosity is the best marketing and reputation you could ever have.
- Create urgency. Consider building external parameters that force you to show up — otherwise, it is too easy to let things pass by.
- Be bold and let the world say no. There are already enough forces out there that will try to dissuade you. Do not do that job yourself.
I am not perfect, and I do not have it figured out. I want to be upfront about that. What I am trying to do is the absolute best I can with the resources I have at this point in time.
Over the years — through startups, track and field, McKinsey, teaching at Concordia, and now building a business — I have landed on a few forcing mechanisms that have shaped how I show up. They are not theoretical. They are things I practice daily or weekly, at work and in my personal life. Some of them I learned from others. Some of them I arrived at through experience. All of them have been tested by real moments.
Take these with a grain of salt. This is not a prescription — just a few ideas that have worked for me. If something sticks, great. If you can take even one thing away from this, then it was worth writing.
There is a quote often attributed to Abraham Lincoln — and one that Les Brown has referenced in his speeches — that anyone above a certain age has control over their own face. They can choose whether they walk into a room with a frown or a smile. That is something entirely within our control. Despite the pain, the difficulties, or the ways that we feel — we get to choose the energy we bring.
This is something I try to carry everywhere, especially in the professional world. It is an incredible privilege to do the work that we get to do. So honour that privilege. Come with a smile. Ask people how they are doing. Put the energy bar high. Count your blessings.
At McKinsey, every time I walked by someone at the Montreal office and they asked me how I was doing, I gave the same answer: "I am living the dream." Same thing on virtual meetings. It is a bit cringy. Maybe slightly funny. But over time, the more people heard it, the more they started taking it as normal. It came to a point where I was literally recognized for it. Sometimes people would laugh it off. Sometimes they would ask why. But in a soft way, it sets the standard for the conversation. Instead of starting low, why not start high? Happiness is contagious. A colleague who knew I loved scents and candles once gave me a custom candle with a label that said "Living the Dream."
A partner at the Montreal office once asked me about it in a funny way. He said, "This is usually what people say when they are absolutely not living the dream." And I would answer, "Sure. Maybe times are rough. But this is my way of nudging things to a positive light." I cannot control a lot of things in this universe. But one thing that is entirely under my control is my ability to keep a smile, a positive perspective, and good energy. There are way too many things to be appreciative of that I simply cannot take for granted. And this does not mean I repress or avoid the hard things. I just see the positive framing as a way to equip me further and give me the perspective I need to tackle whatever I have been handed.
And whenever I ask someone how they are doing and they answer "okay" or "good" or "alright," I will always say something like, "Oh no, we have got to get that higher. The bar is excellent." It opens a door. It is a lighthearted way to check in on how someone is really doing. And then I explain why "excellent" is the bar: I woke up healthy. My family is healthy. I get to come to a job where I help incredible people break down bold and complex challenges. How can I complain? People have responded to that with genuine agreement more times than I can count. It has never been met with hostility. The worst case is someone brushes it off. That is a pretty good worst case.
Of course, there were hard days. Working at McKinsey is hard. Training to be one of the best athletes in the country and going to the world championships is hard. Starting a business is hard. All of these things require discipline and sacrifice. But I always try to see things from a "what can I learn" perspective.
There is a story that captures this well. Back in 2020, I was about 19 or 20 and had no clue what I wanted to do with my life — which is totally normal. I was also trying to figure out what to do with my track and field aspirations. I had been doing incredibly well when I was younger, but after a few injuries it became harder and harder to reach the floor of my previous performances. I was struggling with the notion of failure and defeat and did not know how to process it.
One random day, I saw my neighbor and his friend at a McDonald's parking lot. One of them had a Porsche GT3 RS. The other had a Genesis GV70. Being the classic 19-year-old impressed by shiny things, I walked up and started asking questions. "What do you do for a living?" "What would you attribute your success to?" The usual. But the most important part of that conversation was what his friend said at the very end, on his behalf: "The biggest differentiator for this guy is that he never saw problems as negative things. He saw problems as opportunities for better outcomes. That is why he drives the Porsche and I drive the Genesis."
That stuck with me. To this day. And funny enough, that same night, my car's engine stopped working and I had to push it down the road for about a kilometre to my house. I called a friend, put the car in neutral, and we pushed it home listening to music. I tried to enact what that man said. Do not complain about the issue. Try to make it a learning experience. For those who know the story, they can definitely identify a few talking points.
My mom was a single mother working two jobs to put me through private schools. Throughout some obvious moments of hardship — at least through the lens of an 8 or 10-year-old — one thing she would always come back to is this: when life gives you a punch, do not punch back. Find a way to help others ten times over.
That is how I look at life. It is a glass-half-full view and then some. Kindness and doing good things should not be a tough formula. It is absolutely free. More often than not, being kind and doing the right thing can be incredibly easy, free, and positive for others. So why not?
I think about the bad moments — whatever they are — as a healthy reminder. Because those are easy to notice. They snap you out of autopilot. And when they do, they become a cue to go and do something positive for someone else. A good deed is as simple as asking a colleague how they are feeling when they may have dealt with something difficult. A good deed is answering a long-unanswered email. A good deed is telling someone that you love what they are wearing. A good deed is telling someone that you were genuinely inspired by something they said or did.
It does not have to be herculean. Of course, it can also be community-based and philanthropic — starting a non-profit, donating, raising money through a run, helping someone in need. These take many different forms. And the practice evolves with time. For me, it went from being positive at the workplace, to helping those in need around me, to donating in my local communities, to raising money through runs, and beyond.
I really do believe that good things compound onto themselves in ways that are not always obvious. Ismahelps is an example. It started by wanting to share my notes with classmates. It has since evolved into something that has helped over 12,000 students. I never imagined that. And being a part of that story helped me develop skills that made me a more effective consultant, a better teacher, and a more thoughtful builder. I never looked at it as an equation where I needed to seek an outcome. I trusted that there would be natural dividends, but that is not what I was solving for.
There is a quote from Lavoisier that I think applies here, even though it has nothing to do with what we are talking about: "Nothing is lost, nothing is created, everything is transformed." I really feel the same way about good deeds. The goal is to lower self-orientation as much as we can so that we can maximize the trust and outcome for others. Kindness has a way of creating more kindness around you. Others learn through your actions — the people directly affected, those around them who witness it, and yourself.
It goes without saying that we are all unique and different in our own right. That is a fact. Quite literally. But I feel that we let that fact go over our heads more often than we should. Especially in a corporate setting — with our colleagues, clients, and partners. We are too busy. We have bigger fish to fry. We feel alienated. Whatever the reason.
A Senior Partner I encountered a few times at the firm would always come back to the same thing during townhalls and trainings: "You all have got to be interested." And he could not have been more right.
People love to be heard. People are incredible. And we have so much to learn. So why not lend an ear, show real interest, and remove ourselves from all the externalities for a moment? Interest is always met with rewards. When someone feels truly heard, they see you in a completely different light — as someone who is genuinely present and caring. That is the best marketing and reputation you could ever build. Beyond doing great work, of course. But in the real world, the hard skills and outcomes are increasingly considered table stakes. It is the soft skills that truly differentiate. It is a human game after all.
Speaking from personal experience, it is incredibly easy to defer things to the future. Outside of my professional obligations, I can have moments where I become a master procrastinator. And I have found that creating urgency through external commitments is one of the best ways to force yourself to act.
This is something I learned to lean into even further through my business partner, who is absolutely incredible when it comes to velocity and pushing the ball forward. Watching someone operate at that speed made me realize that urgency is not something you wait for. It is something you create.
This matters even when nothing feels urgent. You must create parameters that force you to show up and be present. In the corporate world, that could mean setting a shared calendar hold with your counterpart where you need to send a specific document or provide an update by a certain time. In your personal life, it could mean booking a group workout every week for the next month. I literally do this — I will put a placeholder on someone else's calendar to force myself to deliver on something. I need outside urgency to push myself, especially when it is something new.
Without those parameters, it is too easy to let things pass by. The days become weeks. The weeks become months. And then you look back and wonder why something that mattered to you never got done. Build the structure. Let it hold you accountable.
External forces — and sometimes internal ones — will find ways to discourage you or to push your attention elsewhere. The outside world can be very good at that. And it is for this reason that I force myself, as best as I can, to never be the one to tell myself "no" or "this is impossible."
I remember expressing this to friends of mine whenever they would doubt their ideas or capabilities. Which is a fair sentiment — we all do it. But in some cases, I would know for a fact that they were the most equipped and incredible people to pursue what they were considering. Their peers knew it. Their mentors knew it. All the signs were there. So I would say something like: "The world will find ways to dissuade you. Trust me. Let the world take that job. Your job is to be committed and faithful that you can make this happen. You do not need to wear the doubtful hat — that one is already taken."
Now, being bold does not mean being reckless. It means that when you find yourself in a room where there is doubt, or where the precedents would suggest something has never been done before, you ask: well, why not? If the idea has merit, if you believe it can be impactful for others, and if you can reason through why it would be helpful — then go for it. If it turns out to be a bad idea, trust me, you are going to learn about that pretty fast. But tactically, this also means you need to seek the noise. Put your bold beliefs out there and let them get stress-tested. If they hold after that, it probably means you are onto something.
If any of this resonated — or if you want to talk through your own forcing mechanisms, career decisions, or just how to show up better at work and in life — book a free coffee chat. I am always happy to talk it through.
