When you are a hammer 🔨, the whole world looks like a nail.

You know, a mentor of mine once told me, “When you’re a hammer, the whole world looks like a nail.” At first, I didn’t quite grasp what he meant. But the more I thought about it, the more it made complete sense.

Think about it: if my main focus is on growing my social media numbers, then everything I do will be filtered through that lens. Every action, every decision—it’s all colored by, “How will this impact my social media? How will this boost my numbers?” This singular focus shapes how I view the world.

The same goes for anything else. If you’re fixated on being respected, you’ll constantly be on the lookout for signs of disrespect. Not because people are necessarily being disrespectful, but because that’s the lens you’re using to view the interaction. Your “hammerness” might be trust, success, being smart enough, or even just being free. Whatever it is, it colors your interactions with people, circumstances, and even with yourself.

The question is: What is your hammerness? What lens are you using to shape your world?

Identifying your hammerness isn’t just about acknowledgment. It’s about recognizing when it’s skewing your perception. Because when you’re a hammer, everything does look like a nail. But the truth is, not everything is a nail. And if you’re only seeing nails, you might miss opportunities. You might act on things that aren’t really there—all because your hammerness has tinted your view.

Now, I know “hammerness” isn’t a real word, but then again, neither was “unmessablewith” until we added it to the Urban Dictionary and it made it intoWebster’s slang dictionary. So, why not? Language shapes our reality, after all. The way we talk about our world influences how we interact with it, and ultimately, what results we achieve.

So, take a moment. Look at your life. What’s the lens you’re using? What’s your hammerness? And is it worth loosening its grip, just a bit, to allow a broader perspective? Because when you widen your view, you start to see things you never noticed before—things that were hidden by your default, narrow focus.

I’d love to hear from you. What’s your hammerness? Email me and let me know what you discover. I respond to every email, and I’m genuinely interested in hearing your thoughts.