The Pernicious Invisible Piano
Everyone has a few invisible pianos lying around. I’ve left the scope of this article at the personal level because I hope this article can offer some insight and support. If you’re interested in learning about the metaphor through the lens of leadership and business performance, please jump to my article called Of Elephants and Invisible Pianos (coming soon).
So what is an “invisible piano” and why do they matter?
True story:
Richard lived for a few years with my friend Charles in Montréal before moving elsewhere in the city. When Richard moved out, he left his gorgeous vintage piano behind, with the promise that he would come back to remove it soon.
“Soon” came and went, but the piano remained.
As you can imagine, the piano was quite in the way. For years it sat intrusively in a high-traffic area of the living room. Countless times every day Charles would to need step around it to avoid it. At best, it was just an extra step or two, at worst toes would be stubbed on it. Yet there it sat, attracting dust, clutter, and limiting how the room could be used. Because it had already been there for years, it had become part of the landscape. Present, yet no longer consciously noticed; it had become an invisible piano.
This bulky nuisance had become part of the baseline experience of living in the apartment. It reduced Charles’ quality of life in small but persistent ways. The room was less flexible, less spacious, and subtly less enjoyable to spend one’s time in. None of this was dramatic enough to demand any urgency, so removing it was constantly postponed.
The piano remained not because Richard had forgotten about it; he occasionally reassured Charles that he would come and collect it. But Charles also did not push much to have it removed because the inconvenience had become familiar, and familiar things are surprisingly easy to tolerate. This is the nature of clutter.
We all have a couple pernicious invisible pianos or two laying around. Annoying or inconvenient things that subtly degrade our quality of life.These are often the things we keep around simply because they are already there, and somehow decluttering feels like more effort than just working around the inconvenience. In this manner, we may end up collecting more than a few pianos, each one taking up space, energy, and attention, while quietly decreasing our quality of life in subtle but meaningful ways. It might be a bad habit that we just can’t muster the will to deprogram, objects cluttering our homes, tasks left undone, or relationships that have long since become stale.
So how do you get rid of an invisible piano?
The first step is to make it visible once again, and learning this safety technique from railways might just be your best tool. It’s called Point & Call and it’s designed to prevent momentary oversight, absentmindedness, or situational blindness. Rail agents executing this protocol point their hand at what they are to consciously observe and verbalise the observation.
This 👉 platform is empty… (therefore I can now safely close the door)
That 👉 signal is green… (therefore I can now safely accelerate the train out of the station).
This one technique alone has been attributed with reducing over 90% of human-caused railway accidents. The key is about creating deliberate awareness and making it a habit.
When dealing with invisible pianos, they might appear rather translucent in the beginning, but even noticing a feint outline is a small victory. Make it no longer invisible, no longer unknown. Keep observing, keep pointing, and keep trying to call. Over time, you’ll be able to point directly at it and call properly:
That 👉 is a piano.
Now it has a form… now it has a name… now you can do something about it.
If you struggle with taking action and resolving it, find someone to talk to and work through it with humility and patience. It is similar with that vague discomfort, that hazy source of friction, that quiet sense that something is taking more out of you than it is giving. Those are important signals; don’t ignore them. Finding the person who can help you separate signal from noise may be life-changing. It might be a family member, friend, mentor, coach, or even a psychologist or other care worker.
After you get rid of an invisible piano or two, you will often find that the room turns out to be bigger than you remembered. You’ll breath a bit easier, have a bit more time, more focus, more fun. It takes time and effort, but it is worth it. You are worth it.
P.S. Yes, the piano was eventually removed and Charles was able to hang a large painting he never seemed to have the space for.