The One When Life Says Pivot (And You Didn’t See It Coming)

If you’ve ever watched Friends, you probably remember the famous “Pivot!” scene, if not, you can see it here. It’s funny because it’s chaotic, slightly desperate and completely relatable in a sense. On screen it’s just a couch stuck in a stairwell. In real life it’s usually a plan that suddenly stops working. 

The truth is, most of use move through life expecting some kind of manual. And it’s safe to say that there isn’t! There is no sequence to life, this is step one, step two, step three and here’s success. I saw the movie Forrest Gump again today. It reminded me that “life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you’re going to get.”

Unpredictability

And this unpredictability shows up everywhere… We do not know what is going to happen next, we do not have a crystal ball.

In business it’s the strategy that looked solid on paper but stalls in execution. It might also be that it once worked, but we didn’t pivot soon enough when the markets shifted or the team dynamics changed. Maybe priorities collided somewhere, or the market just isn’t ready. 

In personal life it’s often the carefully thought out plans that suddenly no longer fits who you are or what reality demands. When you’re single it doesn’t matter that much, but if you are in a relationship, or when you have a family to take care of, this can hurt multiple people.

A donkey stays stubborn, some people stagnate with hesitation, just waiting for a different outcome or analysing what is happening to them. We hope the original plan will somehow start to work again.

Pivot!

What’s really needed, and you’ve guessed it, is that we need to pivot.

Not the dramatic burn everything down kind. More often pivoting is quiet, noticing that friction is increasing, energy is dropping or that progress has slowed to a crawl. One important thing to remember is that these are not failures, these are just signals.

When we treat life and work as something adjustable, pivoting becomes less emotional and more practical. It simply means responding to new information. This is a pragmatic approach and makes us much more flexible in life.

A few things that helped me keep it grounded:

Keep the eyes open. Notice when there is prolonged friction. It usually tells you something is up.

Adjust the vision. Adjusting direction is not adjusting your entire identity. We’re just slightly adjusting the vision to see clearly. It’s like following a boat towards the horizon with binoculars. You have to adjust the vision continuously. Most pivots are course corrections and not reinventions. 

Action speaks louder than words. Move before you feel fully ready. Clarity often follows movement, it’s not the other way around. Again, think about adjusting vision on the binoculars. You need movement for that.

Final words

When talking to successful business owners and generally happy people, I’ve noticed something. Whether you’re leading a team, shaping policy or just trying to make your week a little better… The people and organisations that move forward are rarely the ones with perfect plans. It’s the people and organisations that are willing to adjust whilst in motion that are the most successful. 

Sometimes life just says pivot…

The real question after reading this blog is: will you notice when it does?