Shark vs Octopus: Which Are You?

2 kinds of people in the world

There are 2 kinds of people in the world. Okay there are more than that but for the purposes of our discussion, let’s look at two in particular:

1. Sharks: goal oriented, type A, tenacious specialists

2. Octopuses: creative, curious, meandering generalists

If you see a shark in the ocean, what do you assume it’s doing? Hunting for something to kill and eat, right?

If you see an octopus in the ocean, what do you assume it’s doing? You have no idea, as it could be doing any number of things.

Let us examine the skills of these two creatures:

The Success Gurus: We Should All Be Sharks

Shark people make the world go around. They ascend corporate ladders. Create successful businesses. Become pro athletes. They pick a single goal in life and pursue it until they get it.

Sharks are driven, relentless, tenacious, focused, hard working, and are willing to sacrifice things to achieve their goal. I respect shark people. They make things happen. They change the world. And they deserve the hard earned fruits of their labor. Nothing wrong with that.

The problem is, in the world of productivity gurus, successful business people, and motivational speakers, Shark advice is all we ever get. Social Media is littered with it. Have a single goal. Be relentless. Hustle. Grind. Move fast and break things.

You’ve seen the motivational podcast interview snippets on social media, where a Shark person is telling us the secret tips and tricks to get off our couch potato ass and get our lives into gear. The morning routine of billionaires! 6 ways to beat procrastination! On and on. Perusing social media, you would think Shark Life is the only way to define success, delivered from familiar voices like this:

• Tony Robbins

• Alex Hormozi

• Maria Forleo

• Mel Robbins

• Gary Vaynerchuk

• David Goggins

• Sahil Bloom

• Any pro athlete

• etc

You could probably list a dozen more Sharks off the top of your head.

What about team Octopus?

Let’s list some famous Octopus people:

• umm

Can you think of anyone?

Where are the modern Octopus people?

In the same way that introverts are overshadowed and undervalued by extroverts, Octopus people are overshadowed and undervalued by Shark people.

If you’ve been following me for a while, you know I use the octopus as a metaphor for generalists, polymaths, multipotentialites, and anyone else who likes to explore, and maybe become good at, many different things.

In an era of specialization that started with the industrial revolution and continues to this day, Sharks fit nicely into our current economic and occupational ecosystem. After all, they created it, maintain it, and are rewarded by it, so it’s no surprise they thrive in it.

Jacks and Jills of all trades on the other hand, have had to set aside their multiple talents, pick a single tentacle to focus on, and shape-shift into Shark-like behavior, just to fit into Shark world. It all starts with picking a college major. Then a specific kind of job. Then building experience in that particular job. Job hopping is not allowed. Having a resume that is not a straight and upward trajectory in the same discipline is frowned upon.

It’s time to embrace the Octopus Way

But the Shark tank is starting to crack. People don’t want to be confined to a narrow life-long specialization any more. They don’t want to pick one thing and do it forever. They want to live fuller, more meaningful lives, where they can bring more of their interests, abilities, and experiences to bear.

Young people today do not want to be pigeonholed into a boring cubicle job for 40+ hours a week, with no flexibility, no freedom, no creativity, and no time to meander and do what they really love. They want meaningful work. They want to travel. They want to work remotely. And companies that refuse to adjust to this new reality will soon struggle to find talented workers.

Picking “one thing” is also not as safe as it used to be. It might go out of vogue and leave you with no job, as tens of thousands of people found out recently. Even software engineering, one of the most lucrative, in-demand careers of the past 20 years, is now on shaky ground with the advent of AI “vibe coding”.

The Octopus Way of life may not provide perfect security either, but it can make work more fun, more rewarding, more flexible, and more meaningful, because it allows people to be more of who they really are, and utilize all their eight-tentacled skills.

Organizations that behave more like octopuses will also thrive in the future. You can’t just have one product any more. You can’t count on something lasting 50 years. You have to be nimble, agile, exploratory, embrace rapid change, willing to drop a tentacle faster, regenerate new tentacles faster, and think more broadly and strategically.

AI will eat up all the easy specialist jobs, and even some of the more difficult ones, so what kind of employee will businesses need? More specialists who can only do one thing? Or generalists who can learn new things quickly?

Go Be Your Octopus Self

If you ask people what they need to do to succeed in life, they will give you Shark answers. But if you ask what they really want out of life, they will give you Octopus answers. I can’t tell you how many people I’ve met over the years who had a certain kind of job, but their life’s true passion was something completely different.

I once worked with a guy who marketed health insurance products. It was good work for good pay, but boring. What he really wanted to do was be a musician! Most people want to live a curious, creative, wide ranging Octopus tentacle life, not a one note Shark life. Maybe it’s barbecuing. Horses. Spirituality. Pickleball.

What about you? What tentacles have you been ignoring, delaying, relegating to an hour or two on the weekend, just so you can fit into Shark World? What if you gave yourself permission to be your true Octopus self? How could that look?

Life can be more interesting and less confining if you embrace your true Octopus self, and accept that you are not a Shark.

Be curious. Explore more than one thing at a time. Learn multiple new skills. Expand your cultural, occupational, relational, and psychological horizons.

Be the Octopus you know you are.

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Personal Updates

-I haven’t written a newsletter in a while, it’s because I decided to take a little break from online life. I didn’t completely disappear from the internet but I’m increasingly feeling like spending so much time online/on social media is empty calories. I literally have nothing to show for it. The richness is in reality, not virtuality.

-Some of you may be wondering what happened to my “Life Mapping” 80 year calendar poster? Well I’ve been receiving print samples from different print on demand companies, and it’s been taking 4-5 weeks to get them shipped to Mexico, partly due to new shipping regulations, and partly due to uncertainty about tariffs, etc. There just seems to be some slowdown in delivery and customs. But I’m getting close to finding a printer I like, and once I do I will open the e-commerce store so you can get a poster. Sorry for the delay!

-I have a question for you: Would you be interested in a) Octopus coaching and/or b) Octopus community? I’ve been having some interesting calls lately with people I've never met before who just want to talk about how to live an Octopus life. If you’re in that boat, let me know if either of these might be something you’d want to do? I never set out to coach people or start a community on how to be an Octopus, I just wrote about it because I wanted to do it myself, but I feel like there’s an interesting small tribe of people that might like to take this one step further, and meet other Octopus people. Let me know by replying to this email, or in the comments.

Thanks, hope all is well in your corner of the ocean!

Dave