"Talk to me, Goose..."

On trusting your gut on the bold decisions | Lessons from Top Gun

"You don't have time to think up there. If you think, you're dead." - Maverick

If you're anything like me, you don't spend most of your day doing high-adrenaline manoeuvres in top-range fighter jets at 2,000Km/hr and making decisions that have 0 margin for error. So, watching it on screen feels simultaneously exhilarating, unreal, and metaphoric.

I just rewatched Top Gun—both the 1986 version and the 2022 sequel. Though I've seen them before, this time, they interestingly brought such colour to a concept I believe the universe has been teaching me over the last few months. I've heard. I’ve heard and I think I'm slowly learning it.

But before we get into the lessons from the universe, here's a quick run-up if you haven't watched the film yet (I say "yet" because you absolutely must). The film tells the story of a hot-headed, highly talented navy pilot who gets recruited into an elite aerial combat training school called Top Gun. They fly these 2-man million-dollar fighter jets and learn incredibly intricate, dangerous manoeuvres, all in preparation for an "impossible" mission only they can complete. The main character, Maverick, and his 'robin' Goose stand out because, unlike the rest, who focus on flying by the book, they're more like "push-the-boundary" guys. Maverick is, much to the irritation of his commander and squad-mates, an 'instinctive pilot', and that's where his genius lies. Together, they are rule-breakers; they are gamblers in the sky.

While fiction would have us believe that the hero of the story wins every time, we know that that is simply not true—risk is not without consequence. In one of the training sessions, while engaging in what they call a "dogfight," Maverick loses control of the aircraft, and they have a terrible crash in which Goose, his right hand and copilot, dies. Something interesting happens after...

While he was alive, Goose believed in him (Maverick 100%). He checked him often, but he believed. Now, when he dies, Goose becomes his "courage compass," the voice in his ear when he needs to be bold, to push the limits beyond the facts, beyond the commands through the radio, beyond his fear. When he's up there and he has no time to think, he gently whispers "talk to me, goose".

I've been thinking a lot about how now more than ever, we are separated by the big and bold decisions we make. Growing up, someone else decided what school you went to, what hobbies you took up, how fast you moved, who you spent time with, what you spent time on and everything in between. It was okay to outsource those decisions. As an adult, however, the difference between you and the next person is your decisions about life, career, pace, location, partners, money, etc. I know it's nothing like being a fighter jet pilot, but yet sometimes it can be hard to make a decision that lies squarely on you trusting your gut, on you taking a gamble- not because you don't know how to but because you've not built that courage compass yet. Maybe it's because that voice in your ear when you need to be bold, call it intuition, call it courage, call it "goose" isn't strong enough.

So we delay decisions. We say, "Let's wait and see" or "Let's give it time," but maybe that's the trap we fall into. So, what stops us from making bold decisions and trusting our gut? (Here come the lessons the universe has been screaming!)

1. We keep waiting to have all the facts. The truth is that anyone with an average dose of intelligence can make the right decisions if they have all the facts laid out. That means you can assess the outcomes and pick the one that suits you best. With all the facts, there is no risk or danger, and therefore, it requires no boldness. What truly sets you apart is building the ability to make a decision even with limited facts- forming a story and a thesis, which is the source of your conviction. Trusting your gut is an exercise in knowing that, though I do not have all the facts possible, the ones I have are sufficient for me to decide. It is also appreciating that sometimes, what is instinctive is counter to the facts. Sometimes, your gut is simply an interpretation or a reaction to the facts. So, while the commander in your ear says the aircraft cannot be pushed beyond a specific limit, you're the captain in the seat, and your gut tells you it can. That's probably why Maverick's guiding force is not to think, to simply do because sometimes, when we live in our heads, we lose courage and lose the edge.

2. We pre-brief rather than debrief. The most interesting thing I learned from watching the movie and also from doing my own digging on fighter pilots was how sacred the debrief was. As a navy pilot, any other pilot, regardless of rank, can debrief you, and that's running through a list of questions on the decisions you made, why you made them, the facts you considered, and the outcomes you got. It is a super structured and documented ritual so that anyone can interrogate your decisions and make improvements where need be. They learned that you could strengthen a pilot's judgment for the next scenario by running through the big decisions and rationale during the debrief. The criticisms, the notes, additions, and subtractions go somewhere into a person's subconscious mind such that the next time they whisper, "Talk to me, Goose," they have a pattern and a voice to draw from. Now, we tend to do the opposite; before we make a decision, we spend so much time asking for advice, before the act, before the decision, before the gut. We're just looking for validation to make the decision we want to make. The rounds of advice feel incredibly soothing, and even if they disagree with the decision, we can find comfort in the delay. Pre-briefing or overindulging in advice has the opposite effect of weakening our ability to trust our gut because we feel paralysed the next time we need to make a decision on our own. This is a subtle reminder to resist the urge to run our lives by committee, lol!

The gut is the midpoint between your head and your heart. It is the solid and subtle force that is your truest guide, but it is also a muscle, which means it must be exercised. I hope that by recognising what weakens our ability to trust our gut, we can flip the equation and work towards strengthening it. This is for you if there is a big decision you’re delaying, a move you’re scared to make or even a conversation you’ve been putting off. Make the bold decision, take the risk, trust your gut without ceremony- don’t think, just do.

What stands in the way of you trusting your gut?

I’ll be a little better next week,

See you then!

-K