Drop Your Tools
There’s a quote I haven’t been able to shake from one of my doctoral classes this past week:
“If we train to confirm our competencies, we’re probably not training to the point of failure that we need to be training to.” — Nick Graham
It hit a little too close to home.
Because the truth is, I like training to my competencies. I like mastering the thing. Knowing the answer. Being prepared. But that kind of training—comfortable, familiar, confirmatory—rarely prepares us for the moment when everything breaks open.
For class, we read the Mann Gulch fire story in conjunction with the interview between Nick Graham, a graduate from the program, and Chris Quinn-Trank, our professor. In the Mann Gulch incident, the firefighters who didn’t survive were the ones who couldn’t bring themselves to drop their tools. The very equipment that had once defined their purpose and skill became a weight that cost them their lives. It was a story about survival, yes—but even more, a story about identity.
In a way, the tools weren’t just tools. They were symbols. And dropping them wasn’t just a strategy—it was an identity shift.
I think a lot about how this shows up in schools. In leadership. In life. The habits, roles, and even skillsets that once served us can quietly become anchors. We hold on. We keep doing what we’re good at. We train harder at the thing we already know. And we call it progress.
But real progress might mean dropping our tools.
A classmate in my cohort, Drew, said something else in our live class that’s been circling around in my mind too this week:
“Train for the general. Prepare for the specific.”
We don’t get to know what’s coming. We don’t get to rehearse the infertility diagnosis, the funding shortfall, the institutional rupture, the loss. But we can train our minds and hearts for flexibility, humility, and a willingness to revise the plan.
Even imposter syndrome feels different in that light. Maybe it’s not always about becoming someone new. Maybe it’s about letting go of the old version of ourselves. Maybe it’s about identity disruption more than inadequacy.
I don’t have a clean conclusion here. Just the quiet invitation to notice where you’re still holding the tools. And to ask—gently—whether it’s time to set them down.