He's charming. He's smart. He's the reason you override your own knowing.
Let me introduce you to " Mr. Clever"
You Don’t Have a Clarity Problem -
I was sitting outside with Greg yesterday.
Coffee turned into more coffee. Pizza showed up. People drifted in and out. One of those unplanned afternoons where nothing is scheduled and everything is happening.
At some point the conversation shifted.
Greg is deciding who to lease a 4,000 square foot space to. Big decision. Real money. Real commitment. He was walking through it out loud, and I asked him the simplest question I know when things get complicated:
“What do you want?”
Not what makes sense. Not what’s practical. Not what checks all the boxes.
What do you want.
He paused.
Then: “What I really want to do...”
He stopped. Looked at me.
I looked right back and said, “Yeah. But I’m already doing what you really want to do.”
We both laughed. Because it was true.
He wants to get on YouTube and talk about faith and spirituality.
Then he said to me, “And I’m doing what you really want to do.”
He owns the building. He has the space. The capacity to open and run a gallery.
We both got quiet.
No fixing. No planning. No “well then you should...”
Just:
“Well. That’s interesting.”
Two people. Two lives. Each seeing another lane — and neither one of us is in crisis about it. Just... aware.
That’s what clarity looks like when you let it be what it is.
But that’s not always how I’ve operated.
Let me tell you about the villain — Mr. Clever.
Mr. Clever pops up every now and then. He’s a tool from the past. The old Monica. He knows I adore the very idea of being clever because it feels super smart. This is my ego’s way of grabbing the reins away from my soul.
A few days ago Mr. Clever dropped an idea for a short YouTube video about “3 voices” in my mind. Well, like a kid with a shiny bright new plaything, I stop what I was doing — which was writing my next article — and begin to take all the necessary steps to produce that particular video. BIG MISTAKE!
Lawd a mercy.
From the very first moment, something was off.
Tech problems. Lighting problems. Recording problems. Volume problems. Over and over and over again. What usually takes me a couple of hours took four. For a thirty-second video.
And here’s the thing I have to be honest about:
I knew.
I felt it every single time a new roadblock showed up. My soul — Rosie, if you know me — was not being subtle. She wasn’t whispering. She was throwing herself in front of the camera, pulling the plug, messing with the levels. She was screaming.
And I kept going anyway.
Because I was so in love with the word clever. With how smart the concept was. With what I imagined it becoming. I let that override every single signal I was getting that said this is not yours. Put it down.
I finished it. I posted it.
It bombed.
That’s not a story about a bad video.
That’s a story about a woman who had perfect clarity — and chose to ignore it because the idea felt too good to let go of.
And I want to ask you something, because I don’t think I’m alone in this:
What’s your version of Mr. Clever?
What word, what idea, what image of yourself is so seductive that you’ll push right past your own knowing to get to it?
Because here’s what I’ve learned the hard way:
You don’t have a clarity problem. You have a control problem. Somewhere along the way, you let Mr. Clever grab the wheel — and your soul, your real sidekick, got shoved into the passenger seat.
The signal was never missing. It was there from the first tech glitch, the first bad take, the first moment your gut went quiet in a way that wasn’t peace. It was there before you even started — that flicker of hmm you explained away before it could finish its sentence.
Clarity doesn’t always arrive as a big dramatic knowing.
Sometimes it comes as a roadblock.
Sometimes it comes as four hours of friction on a thirty-second video.
Sometimes it’s Rosie pulling the plug — again — and you unplugging it right back because goddammit, this idea is clever.
Here’s what I want you to sit with today.
Not what you’re confused about.
Where you’re already clear — and what you’re telling yourself instead.
Because those two things are never as far apart as we pretend they are.
The knowing shows up. Every time.
The question is whether we’re willing to trust it before it has to throw up a fourth roadblock to get our attention.
What’s your Mr. Clever? Hit reply and tell me. I read every one.-
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Thanks for the vulnerability in this post Monica. This is what came up for me.
Mr. clever shows up when life isn’t fair. It shows up as fear – fear of being taken advantage of, fear of loss – money, control, stability, reputation, then Mr. clever works overtime to get what he wants- control. My father had a lot of little sayings such as“life is not fair“, or “you can’t fight City Hall“. I hated these sayings. I still do, but sometimes they are reality. Mr. clever wants to fight back to the point of chewing off one’s own leg to escape the reality of the trap we’re in. The reality is life can be messy, unfair, and painful. The truth is my soul knows how to navigate it better than Mr. clever. My soul knows that a loss may be a doorway, but Mr. clever hates the loss, (How unfair!), so much he refuses to see the doorway.
For most of the last decade I think My Mr. Clever has been My Mr. GhostLife. I went through very many family crises in the years leading up to the pandemic, and my own personal mental health crises during the pandemic.
Thanks for this post, because I'm about ready to make a break with Mr. GhostLife. I'll now be more aware, I hope, when Mr. Clever shows up.