Probably the most common type of executive coaching clients I see are the ones who have achieved all they thought they wanted but don’t feel as content and satisfied as they thought they would. They’ve ticked the boxes of family, career, financial independence, and health, but their younger selves would have expected so much more in terms of fulfillment than they are feeling.
It always reminds me of a story that happened to me many years ago…
I got caught in the rain on my motorcycle with no wet weather gear. I’d reached that liberating point where I couldn’t get any wetter, so I just sat back and embraced the situation. As I was nearing home, I saw someone sitting on the side of the road next to his car. He seemed to be stunned. Cars passed by, seemingly oblivious of his situation, probably just target-focused on getting home and warm on this rainy Sunday afternoon.
I pulled over and asked him if he was okay. He suddenly came out of his daze and replied yes. However, he reported that his truck had broken down and his mobile phone battery had gone dead, and he just felt a little lost, so he was sitting there working out what to do.
We rang the road service on my phone and booked them to come out. They didn’t know how long it would take because of all the calls they had received due to the rain. I decided to stay around until they came in case we had to ring again.
I started asking him about his life, and he told me he was a racing greyhound trainer. I asked him to tell me some interesting stories about his job. He explained that for greyhound racing, the dogs chase a “fake plastic, robotic white rabbit” around the track. Obviously, it is set at a speed fast enough that the dogs can’t catch it but not too fast for them not to bother chasing at all. Every now and then, a power outage happens at the racetrack during the race. The fake rabbit grinds to a halt, and the dogs catch up to it and start attacking it. They quickly realise it is not a real rabbit and then start milling about aimlessly.
He said that none of those dogs can ever race competitively again and need to be retired. While they would still chase the “fake rabbit” in a race, their commitment would be less than 100%.
It immediately struck me that this story is analogous to many people’s lives. They spend a lot of their lives chasing a “white rabbit” and, if they catch it, are underwhelmed by what it gives them. They might for a time think that it is just that they should be chasing green or blue rabbits rather than white ones, but having caught one of those with the same result, they find themselves psychologically just “milling around.”
In fact, in many ways our society is structured this way. The majority of people don’t ever catch their “white rabbit” and think that their dissatisfaction or unfulfilled countenance would be alleviated once they did. The vast majority of people run out of runway and pass away before achieving that feat. However, a small minority do catch this “white rabbit” and find that the taste isn’t what they expected. They often feel shocked and lost, as it was the last thing they expected to discover.
Nothing is wrong with chasing white rabbits, even if they turn out not to be what you might expect. If you enjoy the chase rather than overinvest in the catch, you can’t lose. And maybe every now and then you catch a rabbit sitting at the end of the rainbow…
