What I Learned from a Bad Driving Habit

I only started driving in 2017.

In those early days, I remember being crippled with anxiety whenever there were more than two vehicles on the road.

Back then, crawling at 30 miles per hour was very fast.

However, for me, the holy grail of driving was the ability to drive with one hand. You see, I always held the steering wheel with both hands and my brain would always fry whenever someone tried to hold a conversation with me as I drove.

In contrast, I saw other people flawlessly executing what I was incapable of doing.

As I saw other drivers use one hand to control a 4000-pound vehicle as they nonchalantly engaged in conversations with passengers, I could not help but grow green with envy every single time.

The question that never seemed to leave my mind was this: How are these guys able to drive a car with just one hand?

Fast forward to a couple of months ago, my boss and I traveled for a conference.

In the car, we talked about the finer details of the presentation we were scheduled to deliver together the following day.

Of course, I was the cool driver cruising along the highway — with just one hand on the steering wheel!

That’s when it occurred to me that I had been doing this bad habit for almost two years and I did not even know it!

If you think I am advocating for one-handed driving, you are missing my point.

The bigger picture is the process that took me from the ‘Day Crawler’ in 2017 to the ‘Cool Cruiser’ a couple of years later.

Now that I think about it, the one thing that transformed me from one state to the other is so obvious.

Consistency!

I became a better, more confident driver because I continued to drive every day and in every circumstance.

I drove in the rain.

I drove in the snow.

I drove at night.

I drove in the fog.

The more I drove, and the more contexts I drove in, the better I became as a driver.

Consistency made me a better driver!

At the end of every year, people give different motivational talks about how you need to keep reinventing yourself every year.

They talk about how it is essential for you to make plans for the new year to be your best year yet.

However, while I am all for planning and reinvention, I don’t know why people wait till the end of the year before they make such moves.

It’s not like your life stops and resets at the end of every year.

The earth does not stop revolving around the sun to give everyone a breather at the end of each year.

Yet, we are quick to hop on the bandwagon of those who conveniently advocate for reinventing yourself every year — forgetting the rewards that may arise from persisting with your current path.

If you really want to be successful in any field of endeavor, you need to reflect on previous successes you’ve experienced in your life.

If none comes to your mind, think about the following:

You did not learn to walk because you planned it. Rather, you learned to walk because you were consistent.

You did not learn to write alphabets because you reinvented yourself, you learned because you were consistent.

If you’ve earned a degree, it happened because your study habits were consistent over the duration of your schooling.

Consider this quote I have been meditating on for some days now,

He that tilleth his land shall be satisfied with bread; but he that followeth after vain persons is void of understanding
– King Solomon (Proverbs 12:11)

Every step of the farming process is a testament to the power of consistency.

A half-hearted attempt to clear the weeds on a farm will make it impossible to plant seeds.

A half-hearted attempt to plant seeds will jeopardize the farmer’s harvest when it is time.

Even harvesting is dependent on consistency. The farmer does not harvest half-way before trying to reinvent himself into a shepherd. Rather, when the crops are ripe, he goes all in and does not relent until he’s done.

On the other hand, there are the inconsistent ones who are tossed to and fro by the different doctrines pushed by the different thought leaders.

People in this camp are left overwhelmed with information, even as they sink into the cesspool of action paralysis…until the end of the following year when they get their next fix of reinvention talk.

If you are ready to thrive, you do not need to wait till the end of the year to make your desired change happen.

All you need is consistency, and here are 3 tips that will keep you on track.

1. Eliminate Ruthlessly

As humans, we are finite.

We can only be in one place at a time.

We only have enough resources for some things, but not everything.

As a result, we need to deliberately select what we choose to focus our attention on.

Again, when you think about the previous successes you’ve experienced in your life and you’d find them rife with elimination.

To walk, you needed to eliminate crawling.

To write, you needed to eliminate the uncoordinated hand movements that were not giving you the desired symbols.

Staying consistent becomes a simple ordeal when you ruthlessly eliminate the unessential and concentrate on what matters.

2. Design an Enabling Environment

When the defaults in your environment promote the performance of your desired behavior, you become more consistent at it.

For instance, if you want to be more productive with your time, you could redesign your physical space such that your phone is in a separate room whenever you need to work.

In the same way, if you want to be a generally more healthy individual, it is easy to build consistency in healthy eating when your immediate environment is filled with healthy meals.

Your environment is not just limited to the physical inanimate objects in your surroundings. Rather, it also comprises of your social environment, which is made up of the people you surround yourself with.

Before I started driving, no one in my immediate circle could move a car to save their lives. I naturally started driving as soon as my social environment comprised of drivers.

Think about it: You are able to walk today because the people who surrounded you as a child all walked and encouraged you to walk.

Like I said in my post, The Adullam Ring: Outsourcing Decision-Making for Better Outcomes, when you form your Adullam Ring of like-minded individuals, you set yourself for success in the long-run. This happens because of the positive peer pressure that constrains you towards consistency. No one wants to be the one dragging the group back.

3. Track Your Progress

When you are in the habit of measuring how often to repeat a desired behavior, you are more likely to stick with it.

As you track each time you write that article, meditate, go to the gym, make that sales pitch, or do some predetermined action outside your comfort zone, you will literally see those tiny actions add up over time in your tracker.

Self-sourced motivation is the best kind of motivation, and there are very few things that can spark motivation than seeing yourself going on a streak.

I have provided a simple habit tracker that you can download and adapt for the purpose of tracking your habit (No squeeze page or sign up!)

Gaining Clarity for Rational Decision Making: The Quality Decisions Accelerator (QDA)

In 1837, a 29-year-old Charles Darwin received an academic grant worth nearly $120,000 in 2019 dollars. Prior to that, he had embarked on a very successful exploratory voyage to Africa, Australia, and South America on the HMS Beagle from 1831 – 1836.

Darwin’s findings during the trip placed him at the cutting edge of the geological and biological research of his day. He would later go on to turn the scientific world upside down with his radical theories for which he’s still known today – almost 150 years after his death.

Yet, on this fateful summer afternoon in July 1838, Darwin penned the following words in his journal which reflected the more pressing matters on his heart:

Marry [pros]:

Children — (if it Please God) — Constant companion, (& friend in old age) who will feel interested in one, — object to be beloved & played with. — better than a dog anyhow.– Home, & someone to take care of house — Charms of music & female chit-chat. — These things good for one’s health. — but terrible loss of time. —

Not Marry [cons]:

Freedom to go where one liked — choice of Society & little of it. — Conversation of clever men at clubs — Not forced to visit relatives, & to bend in every trifle. — to have the expense & anxiety of children — perhaps quarelling — Loss of time. — cannot read in the Evenings — fatness & idleness — Anxiety & responsibility — less money for books &c — if many children forced to gain one’s bread. — (But then it is very bad for ones health to work too much)

Six months later, Darwin was married to Emma Wedgewood. Their marriage lasted 43 years and produced 10 children – many of whom went on to lead successful professional lives.

Needless to say, Charles Darwin made the right choice because he got something right.

Clarity! Clarity!! Clarity!!!

Many times, we make poor decisions, not because we are irrational or stupid, but because we lack clarity.

When we lack clarity about our desired preferences and outcomes, we end up making sub-optimal decisions. This is painfully obvious in circumstances where the choices we have to choose from are ambiguous.

As an example, if you are on a diet plan – once you have opportunity costs at the forefront of your mind, it is easy to choose between the calorie-dense chocolate cake and the tuna salad.

On the other hand, what do you do when you need to choose between relocating to another state and staying put where you are? How do you know whether it is time to go back to school, or whether your time is much better spent working your way up the corporate ladder?

That’s where the Quality Decisions Accelerator (QDA) comes in…

The Quality Decisions Accelerator (QDA) is a simple tool I created to bring you much-needed clarity when you need to make rational decisions in situations where the options are ambiguous and the opportunity costs not readily obvious.

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meaning,decision wheel,decision matrix,decision first,decision making synonym,decision fatigue,decision support tool,decision making model,decision making skills,decision tree template,decision support system,decision time,decision making techniques,decision tree analysis — The Quality Decisions Accelerator (QDA)

I’m going to walk you through the process of using the QDA in six simple steps.

So, here goes…

Step One: Pray Before Using the QDA

I bet you did not see that coming.

If there’s anyone who embodies the perfect representation of rationality, it’s God.

God created us in His Image and Likeness and the only reason we appreciate and strive for rationality is because God placed that ability within us!

Unfortunately, because we live in a deeply humanistic society, we have strived to make God totally irrelevant in our decision making.

Consider what the sage King Solomon had to say about decision making:

‘In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.’

Trying to make rational decisions without so much as a breath of prayer directed to God is like trying to navigate the Amazon forests without a map or a GPS – a total recipe for disaster.

When you pray to God before making decisions, even if it is for 30 seconds, you increase your chances of finding that ever-elusive clarity. More often than not, Step One is the farthest many people reach before God stirs up the answers from within them.

That’s not a bad thing!

Step Two: Be Calm in Your Mind and Emotions

If you find yourself having to make a high-impact decision (like buying a house or relocating to another city) when you are on an emotional rollercoaster, please refrain!

Periods of intense emotional reactivity are inconducive to rational decision making – rendering the QDA useless.

One key obstacle to clarity is a mind that is filled with mental clutter – many of which arise from emotions that are out of whack.

For best results with the QDA, you need to find a way to be calm.

Take a walk or listen to some relaxing music.

Do some meditative breathing.

Retreat to a room where you can have peace and quiet.

Do whatever you need to do to bring your mind and emotions back to a state of balance.

Step Three: Identify 5 – 7 Yardsticks That Will Influence Your Decision

If a person wanted to choose between going back to school for an advanced degree (Option B) and working a regular 9-5 job (Option A), some of the factors that may be considered include income, opportunities for growth, opportunities for networking, derived happiness, and free time for family.

These factors are what I call Yardsticks and they will be typed into the first column from the left on the QDA.

To get accurate results from the QDA, it is essential that you select yardsticks that are important to you.

In the hypothetical situation above, if ‘income’ or ‘free time’ is not a factor that will influence your final choice, it is useless to include them as yardsticks.

Also, while I designed the QDA to have enough space for 10 yardsticks, you do not have to fill up every single gap. However, try to base your decisions on at least 5 – 7 yardsticks for more accurate results.

Step Four: Score Each Yardstick According to Importance

At this point, it should be obvious that not every yardstick will have the same gravity for everybody.

In choosing between going back to school and staying at a corporate job, ‘opportunities for growth’ and ‘derived happiness’ are definitely valid factors that should be considered before making such a high-impact decision.

However, ‘opportunities for growth’ may hold more weight for a fresh-faced graduate, even as ‘derived happiness’ may be valued higher from the perspective of a seasoned veteran.

This is why the subjective value of each yardstick needs to reflect in the QDA. As a result, in the column named Impact of Yardstick, you need to assign scores to each yardstick (on a scale of 1 – 10) to reflect how much they mean to you.

In the hypothetical situation above, money is important to this decision-maker, but not as important as having free time and the Impact of Yardstick reflects that (scores of 5 and 7 respectively).

Step Five: Rate the Yardstick for Each Option and Watch the Magic Unfold

Now it’s time to fill up the Yardstick Ratings for each option.

From the example above, it is obvious that one will make more money being an employee than being a student. Hence, you see ‘income’ having a Yardstick Rating of ‘9’ for Option A (job) as opposed to a meager ‘1’ for Option B (school) for this hypothetical decision-maker.

Other Yardsticks are scored in a similar fashion.

The beautiful thing about the QDA is that it’s coded to automatically make arithmetic computations as you fill it up.

As a result, you see the Total scores as soon as you type your Yardstick Ratings.

Step Six: Make a Decision

If you have followed all the instructions to this point, you’d find that the option with the greatest Total at the bottom of the QDA is your preferred choice.

Based on the hypothetical example, Yardstick Ratings and Impact of Yardstick reveal that the rational choice for this hypothetical decision-maker is to go back to school despite the fact that the job may provide more income.

As a Note of Finality…

I designed the Quality Decisions Accelerator (QDA) to be used as a living tool.

This means that the decisions you make by virtue of using this tool are not cast in stone.

Neither are the Yardsticks or the Yardstick Ratings and Impact of Yardstick numbers.

We all make decisions based on our current level of knowledge, as well as our unique perspectives at a particular point in time.

Since both our knowledge levels and perceptions are capable of evolving in the process of time, do not shy away from revisiting and revising your QDA to reassess your choices and sharpen your clarity.

The Adullam Ring: Outsourcing Decision-Making for Better Outcomes

What would you do if you were distressed, discontented with your lot in life, and in debt?

To get to that point, you’d probably acted irrationally by ignoring sunk costs to keep dumping precious resources on projects that are doomed to fail.

You might have also failed to keep opportunity costs at the forefront of your mind, and as a result, you now find yourself regretting and imagining what might have been.

Perhaps, you’re now in debt because you have esteemed immediate gratification more than future rewards. Now you’re down and out.

You know poor decision-making habits got you to where you are.

Now’s the time to summon all your willpower and pull yourself out of the situation, because the only person to blame is you. Right?

Wrong. You’re Making the Fundamental Attribution Error

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As humans, we are often guilty of grossly overplaying the power that our personalities have on many aspects of our lives.

Yet, when you think about it, you’d realize that in your day-to-day activities, your environment is arguably at least as important as your personality.

Your environment influences the kind of options you have for food. For instance, yams do not grow in the United States, and as a consequence, they do not eat pounded yam. Similarly, apples do not grow in Nigeria, making it impossible to eat apple pies over there.

The environment also plays a key role in the type of clothes you will wear, which will, in turn, affect your appearance. Take a moment and ponder on this: No matter how fanatic an individual is as a Christian, she will still put on a shawl if she happens to be in the deserts of the Middle East. Failure to do so will make her vulnerable to the dusty winds of that region.

When you reduce what one eats or wears to the barest concept, you’d find them for what they really are.

They are decisions that you make without actively thinking.

Why? Because the environment you are situated in determines the range of your choices.

My point is simple: If the environment can influence our decisions in the form of the food we eat, or the clothes we wear, why do we fail to see its impact on other aspects of our decision making?

It’s because we are all guilty of committing the Fundamental Attribution Error.

According to researchers, the fundamental attribution error is the tendency to underestimate environmental factors and overestimate the role of personality in determining all forms of behavior – including quality decision making.

And you see the result in our societies today:

People identify as depressed individuals, while totally ignoring the fact that they might be in a depressing physical or social environment.

There are discontented individuals and families all over the world who are neck-deep in debt but fail to see how the prevalent culture of materialism and immediate gratification has made them vulnerable to buying unnecessary things.

Your personality may affect the quality of your decisions, but your environment is the real game-changer. It will make or break you.

Reciprocal Determinism and Your Adullam Ring

Some might read all these and conclude that I’m advocating a total lack of personal responsibility since we are in an unwinnable war against the environment.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

God, in His infinite power and wisdom, knows how powerful the environment can be in influencing our decisions, habits, and behavior. And what’s more? He has given us the ability to deliberately design our environment in such a way that it would influence the quality of our decisions.

Somewhere along the line, as David’s embarked on his journey of destiny towards Israel kingship, he punctuated his trip with a retreat in a cave at a place called Adullam.

While there, certain men sought to associate themselves with the future king.

Their resume wasn’t stellar in any shape or form.

These men were in distress.

They were discontent with their lots in life.

They were in debt.

These men were in a terrible place in their lives, likely due to the quality of their individual choices up until that point.

But when you fast-forward a few years, the narrative had changed.

These men were no longer referred to as the distressed, the discontented, or the debtors. Rather, they were called David’s Mighty Men.

Bold. Strong. Valiant.

Imagine being trapped in a pit.

On a snowy day.

With a lion.

And still escaping victorious!

That’s just one tale from the remarkable accomplishments of these men.

But there is every chance that these stories would have been lost to posterity if these men had not made the initial decision to change their environments to Adullam.

These men formed their Adullam Ring with David and the sky became the beginning.

Let’s apply this concept to the quality of your decisions.

Do you really think you will be out of shape if the five closest people in your circle are fitness junkies?

Do you think it will be possible for you to continue drowning in debt because of an extravagant lifestyle if your Adullam Ring comprised of individuals who are masters at living within their means?

When your network is made up of people who value delayed gratification over instant fixes of dopamine, you will find yourself doing the same in a matter of time.

Sheer willpower and grit can take you far, but if you want to see the quality of your decision making multiplied ten-fold, you must design your social environment through an Adullam Ring.

The Simplest Way to Form Your Adullam Ring

Sometimes, I write an epic post that people deem as valuable and the next thing I know, I get a message from someone asking me to be their mentor.

Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.

If you take this approach, it is very likely that you will not get a favorable response. Why? For those who truly understand, a true mentor-mentee relationship is an involved process that consumes the time, effort and resources of both parties for the desired results to be achieved. It’s not something done impulsively.

On the other hand, the Adullam Ring method will give you more traction in a faster period. Here’s how:

First, examine your current circle and identify people who have similar goals as you do. If you are finding it difficult to identify like-minded individuals, there is a good chance that your network needs to be broadened. You can do this by looking out for programs where you know you have a good chance of meeting like minds. Note that you do not need to look for gurus or top professionals for this purpose. All you need are 2 – 5 people who are headed in the same general direction as you are, and are either at your level of proficiency or a step or two ahead of you.

Next, reach out to these individuals and tell them what you are trying to achieve and how you feel you all could be a source of encouragement to each other. It is important to frame the request as a mutually beneficial relationship. Remember, this is not a mentorship, rather a platform for being a part of someone’s enabling social environment, even as they are part of your Adullam Ring.

Finally, have an accountability plan. Naturally, there are certain behaviors that are easier to get accountability than others. For instance, if your goal is to improve your fitness, a simple accountability system is simply to head into the gym at the same time with the group. Of course, if you want to save money, your accountability system will be slightly different. The goal of accountability is to promote what I consider the secret sauce for developing the habit of making quality decisions in the long-run. By incorporating accountability in your Adullam Ring, the decision-making power no longer lies with you, but the larger group. As a result, your decisions become outsourced to your environment, and you reap your desired outcomes.

In Conclusion…

The quality of your decision-making is often a reflection of where you choose to make your habitat. You already outsource the bulk of your decision-making to your environment. Why not take the next step and deliberately design your an enabling and empowering Adullam Ring that will improve your decision making, bring you closer to your desired results.

Defeat Delay Discounting Like David Blaine to Act in Your Best Interests

On November 27, 2000, David Blaine attempted to sit in a block of ice for 72 hours.

He failed, as he was able to do only 63 hours, 42 minutes and 15 seconds, which is still a pretty impressive feat to pull off.

So, how did David Blaine last that long?

I have a simple theory.

David Blaine knew that if he demonstrated that he had a rare skill, the world will deem him as valuable and he could increase his chances of earning millions of dollars over the course of his life.

So, in Blaine’s mind, he pretty much had two choices:

(1) Do what everybody is doing and remain just another ordinary, broke performer running helter-skelter in order to make ends meet, or;

(2) Try your hands at something notorious and reap the rewards of infamy.

David Blaine chose the latter option and it was rational for him to do so.

As he sat there in the ice, with all the cameras and Times Square pedestrians looking on, Blaine continued to persevere because he valued the fame and wealth in the future, more than the pain and discomfort in the present.

He kept on pushing the limits of his body. Minute after minute. Hour after hour. Day after day for nearly 3 days. All these without blinking his eyes for a second of sleep!

David Blaine went that far because he did not have one thing that many of us have in abundance when we are trying to pursue our goals.

That one thing is called delay discounting!

Delay discounting is the tendency most of us have when we downplay a reward we want for the simple fact that it is in the future and not immediately available.

The vast majority of people prefer healthier and trimmer bodies to beer bellies and love handles, right? Unfortunately, the gustatory reward of the cookies, soda, and sugary stuff in the present is valued more than the reward of having a fit body six months down the line.

In the same vein, many people prefer to have more money saved in their bank accounts. Yet, the reward derived from splurging funds on another piece of jewelry they don’t need is valued higher than the reward of financial stability in the future.

People who exhibit delay discounting, exhibit a malaise which I call the Esau Syndrome, named after Esau who valued an immediate plate of food more than his strategic position as the firstborn in his household.

So, how can you pull off a David Blaine and defeat delay discounting, even as you cure yourself of Esau’s Syndrome? The secret can be found in how you choose to interpret difficulties.

See Difficulties as Important for Defeating Delay Discounting

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If you’ve held an ice cube in your hand, you know how uncomfortable it is. Now, imagine how much physical. physiological and psychological distress David Blaine must have been in as he sat in a block of ice for hours.

Yet, David Blaine saw the difficulties of his present reality as an important ingredient that will transform him from just an ordinary performer into an exceptional one.

As I’ve said in a previous post, the way options are framed goes a long way in determining behavior.

In a study, college students who interpreted difficult experiences in school as a sign of its importance were willing to sacrifice more to attain their academic goals. Needless to say, those who interpreted difficulty as impossibility were not as willing.

Similarly, your decision to remind yourself of the importance of those difficult goal-oriented choices will prove beneficial to you in the long run. Stop framing beneficial habits such as saving, eating healthier or exercising as impossible. Rather, start seeing them as a vital ingredient for the results you want.

Overcome Delay Discounting by Interpreting Difficulties as the Path

David Blaine continued to sit in the ice – immune to delay discounting – because he saw the feat as the path to the fame and wealth he wanted.

It’s one thing to just mentally acknowledge that an act as important for a result you want. If you are serious about results, you need to see the act as the path towards your endgame – fitter body, more income, completed bestselling book, whatever it might be.

In this study, an African American student was asked what it meant to be an African American male. In response, he said,

“To be an African American means to me being strong, intelligent, and very proud of where I came from. Many African Americans have been successful and I plan to be the same way.”

The quoted student, as well as other African American students who gave similar responses, did better in a difficult math test when compared to other students who gave other responses.

The implication is obvious. Participants who perceived themselves as strong, intelligent and proud African Americans were likely to see difficult academic challenges as a path towards maintaining their cultural identities. It is the same reason that Asians seem to be highly proficient in their schoolwork. They interpret the difficulty as the path to reinforcing their identities.

You will defeat delay discounting when you start interpreting your challenges as the path that will link the present ‘you’ with your desired future ‘you’.

Overcome Delay Discounting with Episodic Future Thinking

As David Blaine sat in the ice, I’m sure he engaged in some form of visualization as he savored the fame and fortune his feat was going to earn him. He was able to find a way to enjoy his future rewards, even as he was in severe discomfort in the present.

Researchers from the School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences at the University of Buffalo observed that people who were encouraged to think about future, positive events turned out to be less impulsive than participants who didn’t get such kind of encouragement. The study also reported that participants in the former group were less likely to spend money on calorie-dense fast foods when compared to the control.

What’s the point in all these?

If you are serious about defeating delay discounting, finding a way to periodically think and remind yourself about your goals is essential. There are a number of ways you can do this. For instance, I’ve written extensively on the power of journaling every day. When you journal, the most important things in your life are brought to the forefront of your mind. As a result, you are able to easily recall them when the temptations to choose immediate small results present themselves.

Conclusion

Your decision to undervalue future rewards and overvalue present rewards is limiting you. The good news is that there’s a way out, and you do not need to sit in ice like David Blaine to crush delay discounting and the Esau Syndrome in your life. You can start the journey towards a fuller life by making the decision to change the frames with which you look at difficulty, while also bringing your long-term goals to the front of your mind from time to time.

Sometimes It’s Okay to Pull the Plug!: The Curious Case of Sunk Costs

Consider this simple thought experiment:

Assume that you have spent $100 on a ticket for a weekend ski trip to Michigan. Several weeks later you buy a $50 ticket for a weekend ski trip to Wisconsin. You think you will enjoy the Wisconsin ski trip more than the Michigan ski trip. As you are putting your just-purchased Wisconsin ski trip ticket in your wallet, you notice that the Michigan ski trip and the Wisconsin ski trip are for the same weekend! It’s too late to sell either ticket, and you cannot return either one. You must use one ticket and not the other. Which ski trip will you go on?

If you chose Michigan, you are like 54% of the respondents in this study who based their decision on the ticket prices.

This does not make sense, as you obviously derive more satisfaction from Wisconsin than Michigan, despite the higher price!

What just happened is referred to as sunk costs, which Ohio State University professors, Hal Arkes, and Catherine Blumer, describe as the ‘… greater tendency to continue an endeavor once an investment in money, effort, or time has been made. The prior investment, which is motivating the present decision to continue, does so despite the fact that it objectively should not influence the decision…the psychological justification for this maladaptive behavior is predicated on the desire not to appear wasteful.’

Sunk costs are a reason behind many people’s unhappiness in this day and age.

It is the reason why people continue to remain in abusive relationships. They consider the time and efforts they had already invested in the relationship, despite common sense appealing to them to stay alive by opting out.

The effects of sunk costs are not just limited to individuals. You see the same patterns repeating itself in the kinds of decisions made by corporations and governments.

Who can forget how the almighty Concorde passenger jet continued to fly for 27 years, despite the fact that it was not commercially viable to stay in business. Similarly, US citizens will not be in a hurry to neglect the way its government handled, not one, but two needless wars in the shape of the Vietnam and Iraq conflicts.

At this point, the question is pretty straightforward: How can we reduce errors in judgment made as a result of sunk costs?

In the next few paragraphs, I share three simple strategies that will be helpful to you.

Be Introspective to Reduce Sunk Cost Errors

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In my post, The Myth of Quitting: When Quitting is a Good Idea, I talk about the Stockdale Paradox, which states that, “You must never confuse faith that you will prevail in the end with the discipline to confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be.“

Most people allow sunk costs to cloud their judgments because they allow their heads to stay in the sky while seeing the world through rainbow-colored lenses.

If you want to reduce the negative impact of sunk costs in your life, you need to be willing to be introspective and have uncomfortable conversations with yourself.

Don’t be afraid to ask yourself the hard questions about your current course of action. Ask yourself, ‘Is this the best use of my time and resources?’ , ‘Would I be better off without this relationship?’, Should I be looking for alternative uses of my resources?‘

These are questions that have the potential of changing your life. However, you will never be able to answer them if you do not give yourself the time to slow down and be introspective.

Reduce Sunk Costs By Reaching Out for Advice

Many times, the quality of our decisions are a reflection of where we are, and what we know at a given time. In my native Yoruba dialect, there is a powerful proverb which says, ‘Nkan ti agba ri lori ijoko, b’omode ba gun’gi o le ma ri ‘. This roughly translates as ‘What a child needs to climb a ladder to see, an elder sees it effortlessly while seated’

Sometimes, no matter how much you introspect, there’s still no substitute for experience.

JoNell Strough, of West Virginia University, and her colleagues conducted a study to see how people reacted to a failing plan that was halfway complete. They discovered that older people were likelier to cancel the plan, as opposed to younger people who continued to plow through, despite all the signs pointing to failure.

You don’t need to make all the mistakes yourself.

If you want to improve the quality of your decisions and reduce errors due to sunk costs, don’t be afraid to reach out to experienced people who are more knowledgeable than you in a particular area or field.

Detach Your Identity from Your Decisions

If you want to reduce the hold of sunk costs over you, you must not be afraid to separate what you consider as your true abilities, from the results of your decisions.

In studies conducted by Itamar Simonson and Barry M. Staw, from the University of California, they observed that people have a tendency to justify their poor decisions by increasing their commitments to them.

This means one thing: Their identities are formed by their decisions.

Therefore, in order to protect their identities, people have a need to protect and commit to their decisions – even when it does not make sense!

As a result, they continue to plow through the path of sunk costs, despite it not being in their best interests to continue to do so.

When you take the bold step of not seeing your identity in the results of your decisions, your attitude changes.

Instead of seeing decisions as an identity to protect at all costs, you start seeing them as learning opportunities that will help you in the long run.

In Conclusion…

A lot of unnecessary pain, waste and heartache can be avoided if you are able to identify sunk costs.

To do that, you need to be more introspective about the status quo, more open to advise from mentors and experts, and more willing to detach your sense of self from the outcomes of your decisions.

Opportunity Costs: A Simple Tweak that Will Improve Your Decision Making by 95%

A life that is plagued with poor decisions is like a watch with dead batteries – the times are more awry than it needs to be.

If you are serious about improving the quality of your life, you need to be more conscious of one simple thing that everyone overlooks 90% of the time.

You wanna know what it is?

It’s Opportunity Costs.

So, what are Opportunity Costs? This is best explained with an example.

Suppose you have the option of choosing between vegetables and chocolate. If you opt for the chocolate, your opportunity cost is not just the vegetables, but the flat tummy and healthier body you’ve always wanted.

The same thing happens when you have to choose between scrolling mindlessly on Instagram and taking action on the online program you just purchased. As before, if you choose Instagram, your opportunity cost is not just the time you would have spent on the online course, but also the rewards the specialized knowledge could have brought you in the future.

As you can see, in spite of our best intentions, as humans, we find a way to not act in our best interests. As a result, the quality of our lives continues to plummet.

But it is not all tales of doom.

You can improve the quality of your life, and one way to do that is to be more conscious of opportunity costs when you make decisions.

So, how then can you be more conscious about opportunity costs to improve your decision making?

Be Ruthless in Your Planning to See Opportunity Costs Better

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Stephen Spiller, associate professor at the University of Califonia, Los Angeles, conducted a study to examine how sensitive people were to opportunity costs in their decision making. In his study of 242 people, Spiller discovered that respondents who planned how they spent their income were more likely to consider opportunity costs than their counterparts who did not plan.

What’s the point here?

If you want to improve your consciousness to opportunity costs, you need to plan ahead of time when you’re not under any pressure to choose! While this obviously applies to money, you can see the same effect in various aspects of life. For instance, when you plan your day ahead of time, you’re less likely to ‘waste’ time on activities and choices that can derail you from your desirable destination

Impose Constraints on Yourself Simplify Opportunity Costs

In the same study, Spiller discovered something interesting.

Among the respondents that did not plan, those whose salaries came in every month thought more about opportunity costs than those who got their wages every week.

This means that, even though the monthly salary earners did not want to think about it, the conditions of their pay still constrained them to think about opportunity costs. Naturally, the results would be quadrupled if planning was involved, but this is much better than nothing!

So, how can you set up constraints? A good example is leveraging on technology.

I’ll explain with a personal example.

Some months ago, I noticed that I spent a lot of time mindlessly surfing the internet. To help constrain my tendencies, I installed an app on my phone that blocked me from accessing my favorite sites for a large chunk of the day.

The result? My productivity skyrocketed because I constrained myself from having to choose between mindless surfing and projects I had on my desk!

Change the Frames and Opportunity Costs Become Clearer

Many times, we fail to consider opportunity costs because of the way the options are framed (i.e., presented to us).

Some researchers conducted a study where they offered a group of students the opportunity to by a DVD.

For some of the participants, the researchers presented the opportunity as a choice between buying the DVD and not buying it. Other participants received the opportunity as a choice between buying the DVD and ‘keeping the money for other purchases’.

Needless to say, the first group made 20% more DVD purchases than the second group.

This goes to say that the way the options are presented to you will determine how easily you will consider opportunity costs.

If you want to improve decision making, you need to learn how to deliberately change the frame.

So, when everyone is seeing the sale as “just 40% off”, you are changing the frame and realizing that you’re still paying 60%!

In the same vein, when everyone else is seeing the extra work as an opportunity to make extra money and advance your career, you’re changing the frame to see it as a means by which you lose valuable time with your significant other.

In Conclusion…

Just as it’s never too late to change dead batteries out of a clock, you can dramatically improve the quality of your life by improving the quality of your decisions.

All you need to do is to be more sensitive to opportunity costs by planning ruthlessly, imposing constraints on yourself, and actively changing frames presented to you.

My Reaction to Trevor Noah’s “Why Is the Alt-Right So Angry?”

I’ll be the first to tell you this: I love Trevor Noah and his team.

That said, I still have 3 problems with the video below, which seemed to suggest that the behavior of the alt-right was related to their unwillingness to consume porn.

Confirmation Bias

There are tons of empirical evidence that pornography coupled with masturbation is not healthy. Nowadays, people in their teens and twenties are suffering from premature ejaculation and other forms of erectile dysfunction. To put that into context, before the proliferation of porn on the internet, these kinds of ailments typically happened to men over 40 years. Confirmation bias sets in when you ignore the myriads of evidence against pornography consumption and look for that one person theorizing about how porn is causing the alt-right to be angry. I had the choice to simply watch the video and move on, but I feel there are thousands of people here who are miseducated on the real harm that porn causes in society.

Anybody Can Do Armchair Theorizing

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Dr. David Ley was only providing a theory of how he thought masturbation influenced the behavior of a certain group of people. I do not have any problem with that. I think every good scientist has the right to theorize about anything. That is the way of science. However, science does not start and stop at theorizing. You start with a hypothesis, and you test that hypothesis by experimentation. This does not even have to be a true experiment with real people in a lab. You can go to aggregated data from national surveys such as the BRFSS and many others, and simply compare the reported happiness of people who watch porn and masturbate, versus people who do not. All I am saying is that it is irresponsible to push such a theory without empirical evidence of any form. This is one of the reasons I feel psychology continues to get a bad rep among the hard sciences. You do not see physicists, chemists or biologists theorize and end there. They follow-through by providing empirical evidence that supports or disproves their hypotheses.

Correlation is NOT Causation

One of the first things you learn in grad school is that correlation is not causation. The fact that two events happen concurrently does not mean that one caused the other. You cannot simply say that the alt-right is always angry because they do not watch porn. That’s simply lazy science. As an example, I typically wake up when the sun rises. But I won’t go on to say that sunrise caused me to wakeup. Neither would I say that my waking up caused the sun to rise. There are more factors that directly impact when I get up, such as the time when I slept, or how much I slept the previous night, or how tired I was the previous day. Similarly, there are myriads of factors that directly translate into anger in the alt-right, just in the same way that there are myriads of factors that translate into anger in other people groups.

Conclusion…

Now, I understand this is satire (i.e., Trevor Noah and similar satirists should not be taken very seriously). However, the problem with satire is that you see what you want to see depending on your stand. People on the right would watch this video and laugh at how dumb liberals are to believe that not watching porn can cause anger. People on the left would watch the same video and laugh at how dumb conservatives are to not watch porn. And that’s why I have taken the time to write this long essay, so that irrespective of your leaning, you learn to see through the lenses of objectivity.

The Valley is Crowded, Here’s How To Climb To the Top

According to the economic theories of choice, man is a rational being who makes choices based on an order of preference.

So, as an example, let’s assume you had the option of choosing between chicken and fish. As a rational being, the economic theories predict that you would choose chicken if you prefer it to fish.

Now, what if the options were expanded to include beef?

The theories predict that if you prefer chicken to fish, you only have two choices. Either you select chicken, or, you select beef – if you prefer it to chicken.

Let’s go a step further.

What if after the options were expanded, you decided to pick fish, despite your initial preference of chicken? Well, according to the economic theories of choice, you just acted irrationally!

Truth be told, a lot of us are living irrationally.

If you conduct a simple social experiment asking random people whether they are satisfied with their current status in life, you can be sure that 8 out of 10 will express dissatisfaction. As it were, the reality is that a lot of people are stuck in the valleys of life – doing jobs they hate and running helter-skelter just to make ends meet.

Given the opportunity to choose between their current lives and a much better one, a lot of people will say that they prefer a better life.

However, if you take a moment to observe what people do in their day-to-day activities, you’d find a great deal of irrationality.

The result? The crowded valley remains full while there’s ample space at the top.

Do you desire to climb out of the valley?

Do you desire to take rational steps that would increase your chances of remarkable success?

If that’s you, keep reading to learn practical paradigm-shifting ideas that will uproot you from the pit and lift you to the mountaintop…

1. Understanding Where Your Responsibility Lies

You know, it’s funny that many people in the valley are quick to let others take responsibility for the position they find themselves in.

They are a number of favorable parties they love to pass the blame to.

It’s because of their family.

It’s because of their genes

It’s because of their color.

It’s because of their degree.

It’s because of the government and politicians.

It’s because of this, or that.

Naturally, the blame game works and many people end up postponing the time when they finally take responsibility for the direction their lives are headed. And in my opinion, this is one of the biggest reasons why the valley is crowded.

One of my role models, Andrew Wommack says it best:

“Until you’re sick and tired of being sick and tired, you will continue to endure the same results you have now”

If you don’t like the results your seeing in your life, take stock and reflect on the choices you’ve made in the past and maybe…just maybe, the answers you’re seeking have been hidden in plain sight and you didn’t know all along.

2. You Always Have a Choice

As I’ve hammered time and time again, the valley is crowded because many people are irresponsible with their thoughts. They are not deliberate with their thoughts and their lack of thought discipline allows weeds to grow in their minds. A person who is disciplined in his thoughts would have a cultivated mind that yields desirable actions and desirable results.

Understand: The first step to thought discipline is having a deliberate perception and awareness of your thoughts.

When you deliberately choose to elevate your perceptions, you’re also deliberately elevating your life.

Moving even deeper, there’s a perception that separates the Rich from the middle-class and poor. The valley is crowded and will continue to be so because a lot of people take this kind of perception for granted.

If you can handle it, here’s the mystery:

The poor and middle class avoid thinking about worst-case scenarios, while the rich deliberately think about worst-case scenarios.

I know that would rub many of you the wrong way, so let me explain!

In The Aggregation of Marginal Gains, I share the story of how I quit my job and jumped headlong into a business.

I did not have any safety nets. Neither did I have any extra funds to see me through the first rough months of my business.

Instead of factoring worst-case scenarios, I was busy visualizing success and how I was going to rake in millions of naira from people who bought my products.

That’s why this quote by Carl Jung resonates deeply with me:
“Until you make the unknown known, it would dictate your life and you’d call it fate”

Success is predictable because it is built on a foundation of principles. The valley is crowded because many people are oblivious to these principles.

Am I saying positive confessions and visualizing stuff is stupid? Of course not! I still do it to this day, however, I’m learning how to do realistic thinking by factoring worst-case scenarios!

And that’s how the wealthy’s perception elevates them to the point of wealth.

At this point, it’s also appropriate to mention that merely thinking worst-case scenarios is not enough.

The truth is that in the few times that poor people think of worst-case scenarios, they do it so that they can worry about it, or use it to create excuses.

For the Rich, it’s different. And here’s where choice perceptions and thought discipline comes into play.

Rather than worrying about worst-case scenarios, the Rich analyze them using these 3 measurements:

They clearly identify the worst-case scenarios of their choices. Doing this prevents them from living in their heads. In fact, if you notice, thoughts are scarier in our heads than on paper. When written down, even the scariest thing can be solved with a logical plan.
They think of the likely results that can arise from that worst-case scenario. For instance, if you want to ask your boss for a raise, what’s the worst thing that can happen? Your boss would fire you, right? The poor stop here and starts worrying. The Rich don’t stop here… They go on to think about how likely it is for the boss to fire them. They look at his personality, mood, likes and dislikes, desires for company, etc and see how they can use that information to reduce the odds of the worst-case scenario.
Finally, they check whether the outcomes of the worst-case scenarios are worth the risk. If yes, they go ahead with their plan. If no, they make safety nets to catch them in the event that the worst-case scenario comes to pass. As the adage says, “to fail to peruse prepare is to prepare to fail’ If you’re building a skyscraper, you don’t buy harnesses when you’re on the 30th floor. Rather, you do that before you even lay the first brick. You might eventually not need the harness, but it’s better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it

3. Ignore Process at Your Own Peril

We live in interesting times where we are so event-focused.

Someone posts her marriage pictures on Instagram? Event.

Someone launches his book? Event.

Someone earns $1m per month? Event.

Someone graduates from the University? Event.

Unfortunately, our focus on events leaves us overwhelmed because we’re comparing the struggles of our day-to-day lives with the climatic events of other people’s lives.

What you don’t see on social media is this…

The number of heartbreaks the married girl suffered before she met her prince in shining armor. Process

The seasons of writer’s block that nearly drove the celebrated author to depression. Process

The loan that the business dude needed to Kickstart his business and is still paying back in installments. Process

The student who burnt the midnight oil for 5 years. Process

On social media, the more you look, the less you see. The valley is crowded because they do not realize that a picture on Instagram is only telling a part of the story.

The truth is simple: You only know yourself.

Stop comparing yourself with others because you don’t know what they are doing behind the scenes.

4. Begin With the End in Mind

There’s power in vision. There’s power in being able to get a peek into what God has ordained you to accomplish with your life. When you’re able to catch a glimpse of the magnitude of your destiny, you can’t help but be very deliberate with whatever you do with your time. Once you have a glimpse of your destination, you can’t help but be focused.

Sadly, the valley is crowded because the vast majority of people have the eyes of their hearts blinded.

As I mentioned in my book “The Aggregation of Marginal Gains“, journaling is one powerful tool that can help in keeping your vision/destination consistently at the back of your mind.

The perks of engaging in this habit – particularly at the beginning of your day – are very rewarding.

You are able to start your day with remarkable energy because you have something to live for.

You are motivated because you have something to look forward to.

And if you keep at this, it’s only a matter of time before you start achieving phenomenal results!

5. Something More Important Than Money

In my book, You Too Can Be Free, I emphasized on the fact that after the sin issue had been settled, the root of all our problems is knowledge.

You don’t have a money problem, you have a knowledge problem, and your knowledge problem is reflecting in your mental models and mindsets pertaining to every aspect of your life. This is the story for the vast majority. And this is yet another reason why the valley is crowded.

If a computer hard drive is virus-infected, and you keep on changing the monitor, the performance of the computer will still be poor. In the same way, if you take stock of your life to this point and you don’t like what you’re seeing, maybe it’s time to admit that what you’ve been doing isn’t working so you can try something else.

That’s why Paul of Tarsus advises us to engage in an exercise he called “renewing your mind”. You need to deliberately change the way you think in order to attain the results that God has ordained you to have from the foundations of the world.

God has done His part. Would you take responsibility and do yours?

6. Delayed Discounting is Your Biggest Downfall

“If you cannot immunize yourself from the temptations instant gratification, you will be hard-pressed to find success in health or wealth. Both demand a lifestyle shift from short-term thinking to long-term thinking. This is the only defense to lifestyle servitude… When instant gratification entices you to bite the bait…you become a causality…” – MJ DeMarco

At the beginning of 2019, I shared a short course where I mentioned that the year will yield phenomenal results for high-status individuals. I also explained the tool that can enable you to attain that level is increased willpower.

If you’ve read my book, The Aggregation of Marginal Gains, one thing I hammer on, again and again, is how easy it is to stand out today because of the sheer amount of people leading mediocre lives.

The valley is crowded and there’s ample space at the top.

However, to climb out of the valley, you need to be able to harness your willpower to escape the mediocrity that instant gratification brings.

You need to set your face like a flint and make a commitment to place more value on the potential that God had placed within you, as well as the destinies attached to you.

You owe it to them to be the best version of yourself possible.

And how are you going to do that? By the proper use of willpower to escape the temptations of instant gratification

7. Be Ruthless With Your Biggest Asset

When your outlook on life is from an abundance perspective, you’d realize that we’d never arrive at a point where we’d exhaust money. The worst that could happen would be that the Central Bank would print more cash.

When all is said and done, the true equalizer of life is time. The valley is crowded because the vast majority of people fail to recognize that time, not money, is your biggest asset!

It doesn’t matter whether you’re Black or White, Christian or Atheist…

You’ve only got 24 hours in a day.

That’s why the wealthy are very aggressive with their time.

It’s not pride.

It’s not personal.

It’s just an elevated awareness of the abundance of money and the scarcity of time

How have you been disrespecting time while hoping to make money?

Take stock of your life and make the necessary arrangements.

8. Clarity of Perception Isn’t Far From Perspective

We live in interesting times where more and more people are trapped within the quagmire of consumerism. For many people, as soon as their monthly salary/ weekly wages come in, they embark on a mindless shopping spree for either thing they cannot afford or things they don’t need. Needless to say, this contributes greatly to why the valley is crowded.

Interestingly, the wealthy understand that the very things that make you rich are not things. Rather, wealth comes when your perspective is first of all elevated from that of the common man. With this perspective, you realize that in the gold rush, your best bet is not to join the masses digging for gold in the valley…but to sell shovels.

Remember, you don’t have any other problem but that of organized knowledge. Little wonder Jesus said, “You shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free”

9. Appreciate the Power of Systemic Thinking

If there is any story that emphasizes why the valley is crowded, it would be the mythological story of the Pharaoh and his two nephews.

So, once upon a time, two nephews were commissioned by their Pharaoh uncle to build two mighty pyramids. As a reward for completing the task, there would be riches and luxury until the rest of their lives.

The first nephew started hauling large stones to his building site. The people of the city hail him as a great hard worker. At the of the first year, the first nephew had completed the base of the pyramid while the second nephew is yet to lift a stone.

By the second year, the first nephew realized that he needed more strength to lift rocks to the next level, so he employed the services of the strongest man in the city to assist in lifting the rocks. On the other hand, the second nephew had not even started clearing his land.

Then, at the beginning of the third year, the second nephew arrived at his plot of land with a powerful machine that is capable of lifting heavy rocks with minimal effort. By the end of the week, the second cousin had finished the foundation of his pyramid – the same foundation that took the first cousin nearly a year to build. Then by the end of the 40 days, the second cousin as arrived at the same level as the first cousin who simply worked hard.

Needless to say, the second cousin finished his pyramid in record time – while also having spare time to engage in scholarly works and other creative inventions. The first cousin, on the other hand, never finished his pyramid because he died from a heart attack as he continued to toil lifting heavy stones.

So, which are you? The first cousin who spends his time toiling on a system that doesn’t work… Or the second cousin who spends his time building an efficient system that allows him to achieve more in less time?

10. Ignore the Law of Effection to Your Peril

There’s a concept referred to as The Law of Effection, which states,

‘The more lives you affect in an entity you control, in scale and/or magnitude, the richer you will become. Affect millions and make millions. The amount of money you have (or don’t have) is a direct reflection on the amount of value you’ve provided (or not provided)’

I think that’s self-explanatory: The more value you create, the more money flows towards you.

The valley is crowded because everyone is consumed by self-interest. No one wants to bring value to the table. Rather, everyone is a default money-chaser.

When you have a money-first paradigm, money seems to run away from you. As Napoleon Hill said in Think and Grow Rich, money has to be wooed like a beautiful damsel.

People don’t walk into the street and ask the first person they see to marry them. Rather, they become acquaintances, then friends, then they become romantically involved, then they court, get engaged, and then married. It’s a value ladder where every step makes the next step easier.

In the same way, if you want to woo money, you have to learn how to be a value dispenser everywhere you go.

Check the Bible, check the history books, carry out your research on the internet, you’d find an unmistakable pattern – money flows towards incessant value.

It’s not personal. It’s just the law of Effection at work.

So, how can you get the Law of Effection to work on your behalf as you gradually inch your way out of the valley?

It’s simple.

You see, many times we take our differences for granted. We’re so familiar with our uniqueness that we forget how they make us stand out.

Something that is second nature to you is the answer to another person’s prayers.

Stop waiting for an audible voice from the skies to strike you with innovative insights.

God has commanded you to dress and keep your Eden.

Why? Because that’s where your food will come from!

Go out there and be a solution provider in your environment.

Are you already thinking about how you can partner with this law? My book, “The Aggregation of Marginal Gains” is an important tool that will provide you 5 key areas where you can start dispensing immense value.

11. There’s Something Bigger Than Ideas⁩

The valley is crowded because people naturally have a tendency to be loss averse. That means if there’s any chance of them losing time, money, effort or resources in any activity, they would run away from it. There is security in being loss averse.

The successful on the other hand are freaks of nature. They are not loss averse because of one important factor.

They see failure as feedback!

That’s why the wealthy are almost paranoid about execution.

They understand that there’s a learning curve in everything new, so they want to fail as fast as possible. They want to make the mistakes as soon as possible. By doing this, they are able to separate the gold from the dross and home in on the variables that work.

The poor on the other hand are there, folding their arms in the valley, waiting for the planets to align before they get their hands dirty.

Then when they eventually someone else executing their ideas, they complain to all who care to listen, “Ah! They stole my idea again”

Don’t be this person!

So, how can you be the person that is ready to get your hands dirty as quickly as you can?

Break the ginormous task down into smaller baby steps.

The valley is crowded because many people have a syndrome I call Difficulty Intolerance where they are extremely sensitive to the slightest difficulty.

As I shared in The Aggregation of Marginal Gains, the ability to fall in love with learning difficult things quickly is a superpower that would put you head and shoulders above the rest.

The poor and unsuccessful don’t know this. That’s why they are stressed and overwhelmed by difficult things. That’s why the valley is crowded and will continue to be.

People in the valley prefer to hang out on social media and continue scrolling down their news feed to infinity.

That’s the easy path of least resistance.

The Rich and successful think differently. They are not overwhelmed by difficulty. Rather, they think and act strategically by breaking down ginormous tasks to actionable chunks.

You too can do the same.

Growth Without Tears: How Anybody Can Catalyze Growth by 350%

In high school math, we were taught that a number series could be expressed in two forms. These forms are Arithmetic Progression and Geometric Progression.

In an arithmetic progression, the difference between any two consecutive numbers in the sequence is constant. For instance, in the number series 3, 6, 9, 12, 15, 18, 21, 24…, the next number in the series is gotten by adding 3 to the previous number.

On the other hand in a geometric progression, the numbers follow a pattern such that the next term is found by multiplying by a constant called the common ratio. For instance, in the number series 3, 9, 27, 81, 243, 729, 2187, 6561…, the next number in the series is gotten by multiplying the previous number by 3.

‘Great example’, you might think, ‘but how does this relate to growth?’

It’s simple. Some people are going through life in an arithmetic progression where there is no difference between where they were 8 years ago, and where they are right now. On the other hand, there are people whose lives are marching forward in a geometric progression. The fruits their lives are able to produce in just one year trumps what their peers are able to achieve in 10 years. As it were, the only constant in these people’s lives is predictable progress.

Do you feel like you are trudging through life in an arithmetic progression Well, the good news is that you are not condemned to a lifetime of mediocrity. I will be sharing with you some lessons I got from American bestselling author, speaker, and coach, John Maxwell, in his bestselling book: The 15 Invaluable Laws of Growth: Live Them and Reach Your Potential

Growth is Impossible Without Deliberate Intention

‘To reach your potential, you must grow. And to grow, you must be highly intentional about it’ – John Maxwell

I’ve come to understand that we don’t have a potential problem. In fact, once you have a glimpse of the potential you have bubbling within and around you right now, you will never think of yourself as a small person anymore.

Unfortunately, for all the potential we have within and around us, many people will lead mediocre lives.

Why? They lack intentionality.

It’s just like the person who is extremely hungry, but goes to a buffet with a table spoon and a saucer, while others are piling up food on large plates and even going for second and third servings.

In my analogy, the problem is not the availability of food. The problem is the lack of intentionality on the part of the hungry man. There’s nothing or nobody stopping him from picking up his larger plate and stockpiling it with assorted cuisines. He exercised his own power of choice to play a smaller game.

Similarly, unless you’re intentional, you would appear very busy and hardworking with very little to show for it. Why? Because you’re showing up to God’s abundance party called life with nothing more than a thimble to pick your blessings.

You need to be intentional!

You Have to Commit to Growth Now

“The greatest danger you face in this moment is the idea that you’ll make intentional growth a priority later” – John Maxwell

A quote I’ve come across countless times in the past weeks is this: ‘The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The next best time to plant a tree is now’

Stop waiting for all the planets to align before you take a first step. Take intentional steps towards your growth right now. Your goal is not perfection in the beginning.

You will fail. Yes, you will fall. But you will also find out what does not work in the process, even as you home in on the processes and systems that work.

Remember, the successful don’t think in terms of failure. They only see feedback, make iterations with the feedback and then they act again.

That’s why John Maxwell said, “One of the greatest obstacles to curiosity and learning is the reluctance to look foolish in the eyes of other people. There are two easy ways to tell if this is a problem in your life: The first is being afraid to fail. The second is taking yourself too seriously. The cure is to take what I call “learning risks.” Sign up to do or learn something that takes you completely out of your comfort zone…”

The comfort zone is a safe zone. No stress. No stretching. No challenges. Just the same old limited life day after day.

If you want to stand out, you need to be confident enough to introduce new dimensions to your daily experiences.

An example of how you can do that?

Talk to that stranger in the taxi. Who knows, the life-changing information you need might sprout out of that conversation.

Ask questions. More often than not, wisdom is unleashed when questions are asked. And besides, if you don’t ask the stupid questions, you will never get round to asking the questions that matter.

That’s why one quote that I’ve repeated again and again is this,

“The quality of your life is governed by the amount of uncomfortable conversations you’re willing to have”

Form the habit of having uncomfortable conversations. Yes, it’s outside your comfort zone. Yes, the vast majority of people will rather keep mute and fuddle with their phones. But those kinds of conversations are exactly what you need to grow and become that 1% of the population that the Aggregation of Marginal Gains work for, instead of against.

Growth is Impossible Without Direction

“You have to know who you are to grow your potential. But you have to grow in order to know who you are. So what’s the solution? Explore yourself as you explore growth” – John Maxwell

There’s a reason why I have a passion for helping people crystallize the potentials trapped within and around them.

Many people cannot grow because they are totally oblivious to who they are capable of becoming.

Their minds are constantly fixated on the mistakes they made in the past, or their fears and concerns for the future.

True growth begins with identity.

Your identity doesn’t stop with who you think you are right now. Neither does it end with your nationality, tribe, biases and prejudices. Rather, your identity extends to the desirable future ‘you’ that you’re capable of becoming.

The more you are aware of this future ‘you’, the easier it would be to grow into that identity. I talk about the exact steps you can use in changing your identity here: Identity-Based Motivation: The Problem Isn’t Habit, It’s Identity!

You Don’t Have a Growth Problem, You Have an Identity Problem

Zig Ziglar once said, “It’s impossible to consistently behave in a manner inconsistent with how we see ourselves. We can do very few things in a positive way if we feel negative about ourselves”

If there’s anything I’ve hammered on again and again, it’s this: You don’t have a faith, or power, or purpose problem, you have an identity problem.

Character and behavior arises from your most dominant identity.

That’s why the Chinese will continue to be excellent in math.

It’s the same reason Indians will continue to be drawn towards computer science, engineering and technology.

That’s why the Igbos would continue to be successful in commerce.

These identities resonate with these groups of people and you eventually find their behaviors and career choices being influenced.

To change your behavior in pursuit of growth, you need to change your most dominant identity. I discuss how to go about that here

Growth is Incomplete Without Reflection

John Maxwell said, ‘If we pause to allow growth to catch up with us, it makes our lives better, because we not only better understand the significance of what we’ve experienced, but we can implement changes and course corrections as a result’

There’s so much information in the environment that is constantly bombarding our consciousness.

Without deliberate reflection, we miss out on the variables that influence our actions, behaviors and results. Consequently, we’re trapped by the same faulty mental models and we make the same mistakes again and again.

Spending time on reflection is an action that is important, but not urgent. And as result, it gets overlooked every time by the vast majority.

If you want uncommon results, you must engage in uncommon actions.

“It does little good to see something new without taking the time to think about it. It does no good to hear something new without applying it. I’ve find that the best way to learn something new is to take time at the end of the day to ask yourself questions that prompt you to think about what you learned… Remember, experience is not the best teacher, evaluated experience is” – John Maxwell

A lot of people are stuck in their current phase because they have not learnt the lessons attached to that circumstance. As a result, that keep on repeating the same ‘class’ year after year. Unfortunately, you cannot learn if you don’t reflect. And you cannot reflect if you’re not deliberate with making out time to do it.

That’s why you’d see the average person leading a mediocre life. They have formed a faulty hypothesis about life, and in spite of all the feedback, they do not take the time to reflect and make iterations.

Understand: Reflection is a lost art in this generation. If you want to grow, reflection needs to be a vital part of your life. Do this consistently and you’d be pleasantly surprised with the results

Growth Will Have Boring and Mundane Stages

“The successful person has the habit of doing the things that failures don’t like to do. The successful person doesn’t like them either, but his dislike is subordinated to the strength of his purpose” – John Maxwell

One myth of success that is peddled by the gurus is following your passion.

The problem is that even when you follow your passion, you won’t feel goosebumps and butterflies in your stomach every minute you’re at it. Yet, the gurus don’t sell that part of the story to their followers.

Following your passion involves doing what you hate. For instance, everyone wants to write a book, but not everyone enjoys the pain and bleeding of writing. There’s a price to pay for every prize. There’s a painful process behind every successful event.

In addition, following your passion involves taking the lonely path of mundane routines. The successful understand this and they follow through with their course until they attain their objectives. The unsuccessful, on the other hand, are easily bored by routine and end up on Facebook for their next dose of dopamine-fueled entertainment.

Understand: the path to your desired results would be boring and lonely. When that happens, stick with it because your destination is now closer than before

That’s why John Maxwell went on to make the following remark: ‘If you do the things you need to do when you need to do them, then someday you can do the things you want to do when you want to do them‘

Sometimes ago, two people in my circle of influence told me that they are disillusioned with their jobs and were considering quitting.

And one of the guys had a wife and two kids!

Naturally, I advised the two guys to stay put in their jobs until their “dreams” or “passions” can become a stable source of income. Anything other thing is simply irresponsible.

In every sincere success story – whether in the Bible, or in the history books – you’d find that there’s a period of boring routine.

For instance, between the ages of 12 – 30, there’s nothing written about Jesus, even though His Destiny was to be the Savior of the world.

For the 13 years that Joseph was in prison, there was nothing written about him, except for the dreams he interpreted. Yet, his destiny was to become the prime minister of Egypt.

Before Michael Jordan won his first of 6 NBA championships in 1991, he had been a routine loser for the nearly 7 years leading to his first title.

What’s my point in all of these?

Behind every success event, there’s usually a boring process that is in no way glamorous. If you feel that your job is getting in the way of your purpose, how about waking up an extra hour everyday to work on your purpose? If it’s as important as you say, then you should be able to make out the extra time for it!

Growth is Stimulated by the Right Variables

‘Do not wait for a change of environment before you act. Cause a change of environment through action‘ – John Maxwell

There are variables that determine the results you get out of life. And when the variables are obscured, you’re liable to continue getting the same poor results out of life.

However, irrespective of how aware of the variables you are, there’s always one constant that you have control of.

That constant is You!

You might be born into lack. You don’t have any control over that. However, you can choose to learn how to get out of lack and follow through with action.

You always have a choice. And when you are deliberate with your choices, with time those choices compound and you’d find yourself translated to more optimal environments!

“Most people allow their lives to simply happen to them. They float along. They wait. They react. And by the time a large portion of their life is behind them, they realize they should have been more proactive and strategic” – John Maxwell

If there’s anything I drummed on again and again in my book, The Aggregation of Marginal Gains, it’s how easy it is to stand out from the crowd, because the crowd has made the standards very low. All you need to do is a little more than the average person and you’d see phenomenal results.

One area where you can do this is strategic, proactive planning. In your regular day, there are factors that you can control, and yes, there are factors that are out of your control. Focus on those that are in your control and follow strategic planning with ruthless action.

Do this over the course of a month, and you’d be pleasantly surprised with your results.

Growth Maintains the Right Perspective for Life Experiences

‘No one likes it when they’re in the middle of a bad experience. It’s usually just painful. But if they manage the experience well, then they enjoy talking about it afterwards. It becomes a great war story’ – John Maxwell

If you study the annals of history, you’d find that there’s always a period of pain and intense hardship at the cusps of breakthrough.

In instances when you’re passing through bitter times, you can always decide to be as bitter as your circumstances, or make the decision to come out of the other side better. Everything ultimately comes down to perspective. Would you keep your gaze on the inevitable light at the end of the tunnel? Or would you throw in the towel at the slightest inkling of pain.

Remember, when all is said and done, tough times really don’t last at all – for both tough people and soft people. What differentiates the two categories of people is their perspective.

John Maxwell shares an insightful story that buttresses this point:

“There’s a story about a chicken farmer whose land was flooded every spring. He didn’t want to give up his farm and move, but when the water backed up onto his land and flooded his chicken coops, it was always a struggle to get his chickens to higher ground. Some years he couldn’t move fast enough and hundreds of his chickens drowned

“After the worst spring he’d ever experienced and losing his entire flock, he came to the farmhouse and told his wife, “I’ve had it. I can’t afford to buy another place. I can’t sell this one. I don’t know what to do”

“His wife replied, “Buy ducks“”

Everything ultimately comes to perspective. If you train yourself to identify pain and failure as feedback, you would be able to make course-corrections as you progress in this journey called life. And as I mentioned earlier, your ability to interpret failure and pain as feedback puts you in an elite category of individuals who will escape the gravitational pull of mediocrity.

Understand: Sometimes your success is hidden behind your areas of pain and failure. Stay sensitive. Listen to feedback. Make course-corrections. And it’s only a matter of time before you lay hands on the prize.

Growth is a Process, Not an Event

US politician Dan Coats is reported to have once said, “Character cannot be summoned at the moment if crises if it has been squandered by years of compromise and rationalization. The only testing ground for the heroic is the mundane. The only preparation for that one profound decision which can change a life, or even a nation is those hundreds of half-conscious, self-defining, seemingly insignificant decisions made in private. Habit is the daily battleground of character”

Here’s another example of process vs event.

Everybody loves celebrating the big win. The fireworks and sound effects that accompany success.

But when you peel back the layers, there’s nothing more than the boring, mundane process of showing up everyday.

Consistency is boring. But when it compounds over time, it’s really attractive.

So, this is 2019 and I’m currently following the build up to the US Presidential elections. This is the period where people who intend to run are making their intentions clear.

One of the presidential hopefuls is Bernie Sanders. And while I don’t agree with everything he’s saying, he earned my respect, and that of millions of people because of the consistency of his stand on issues.

Here’s an example:

Recently, a 20-year-old video clip of Bernie Sanders made the rounds on the internet. And guess what? The only difference between him back then and him now was that he had more hair on his head back then!

The man showed that he’s consistent because his stand on his values are largely unchanged and that is winning him a lot of fans at the moment!

Understand: There’s power in consistency. It would always compound and you can determine whether it becomes a liability or an asset in the future

Understanding the Strategy Behind Molding Your Life in Pursuit of Mastery

Do you desire to get better at something that matters to you?

Do you have the intense longing to deliberately increase your productivity levels in leaps and bounds?

Do you want to be a difference maker in your sphere of influence?

Is it even possible to predictably achieve the results you seek?

Years ago, I would have sworn that mastery only came to the fortunate few who were born with certain genetic advantages or talents that gave them the edge in whatever field of endeavor they found themselves in.

If I had thought in this way, I would have been very wrong.

You see, back then, I had no idea of what I wanted to do with my life. I was purposeless, directionless and clueless about my future.

But today, I’m taking very deliberate steps towards the attainment of my God-given purpose and destiny. I’m not where I want to be just yet, but I’ve definitely left where I was.

So, do you want to learn how to attain mastery in the fulfillment of your own dreams and purpose?

Let’s dive into some ideas I gleaned from the tutelage of American-born business strategist, Robert Greene, in his bestselling book Mastery…

Look Inwards to Develop Mastery

“The first move towards Mastery is always inward – learning who you really are and reconnecting with that innate force. Knowing with clarity, you will find your way to the proper career path and everything else will fall into place. It is never too late to start this process” – Robert Greene

A lot of people are going to lead mediocre lives because they do not take the time to look inwards. Their minds are in a constant state of mental clutter and they are totally alienated from the Primal Life Force that God has deposited within them from the time they were born.

If you fail to look inwards with an attitude of reflection and introspection, you are setting yourself up for failure in life. This is why there’s so much power in meditation. When you meditate, you are able to temporarily silence the mental clutter persistently fluttering in your mind and you’re able to focus on what matters. Perhaps this is one reason why a lot of people subconsciously run away from meditation. They are subconsciously afraid of what they might find when they look inwards.

Here’s the truth, if you can take it: If you want to make impact on the world outside, you need to start from within.

Check the annals of history and hardly would you find anybody that made impact in this life without some form of inward observation.

I remember reading a biography of Albert Einstein and I was amazed by the sheer amount of meditation and introspection that he did. In fact, he engaged in so many thought experiments that it’s only normal for him to later come up with his theories of special relativity and general relativity – two theories that have greatly shaped our understanding of how the world operates, nearly 100 years after they were postulated.

If only you’d take the time to observe within through reflection, introspection and meditation, you’d give yourself an unfair advantage in a world where everybody is merely existing, not living.

Celebrate the Daily Routine to Pursue Mastery

“In order to master a field, you must love the subject and feel a profound connection to it. Your interest must transcend the field itself and border on the religious” – Robert Greene

Success in life is not for dabblers. Once you have identified the area in life you want to dominate, you need to go all into it with every ounce of strength you have got. You need to be obsessed with your vocation. You need to do it to the point that people start complaining that “Your own is too much”. The truth is that talent is overrated. What would really make you stand out is your ability to consistently focus and ability to show up everyday.

Many people are familiar with Malcolm Gladwell’s book “Outliers” where he talked about the 10,000 rule. He found out that gurus of different niches were not more talented that the rest of us. Rather, by sheer obsessive repetition of their life assignments, they were much better than others.

Tend to Your Destination to See the Fruits of Mastery

“In dealing with your career and its inevitable changes, you must think in the following way: You are not tied to a particular position; your loyalty is not to a career or a company. You are committed to your Life’s Task, to giving it full expression. It is up to you to find it and guide it correctly. It is not up to others to protect or help you. You are on your own. Change is inevitable, particularly in such a revolutionary moment as ours. Since you are on your own, it is up to you to foresee the changes going on right now in your profession. You must adapt your Life’s Task to these circumstances. You do not hold on to past ways of doing things, because that will ensure you will fall behind and suffer for it. You are flexible and always looking to adapt.” – Robert Greene

It is expedient for you to take personal responsibility for your life. No one is going to think for you. No one is going to direct you. No one is going to be your constant go-to counselor. As I love saying, “It’s only you, your two ears and the Holy Spirit within you”.

This is why it is necessary for you to be aggressively attached to your vision, purpose and destiny and do everything in your power to fulfill it. Do not be sentimental with people you may meet along the line. Instead, embrace the process with the realization that nothing is permanent. When it’s time to move on, pick the lessons you gleaned from your current stage and move to the next level with the same attitude.

A Biblical example that comes to mind is Jonathan, David’s friend.

Jonathan knew that God had rejected his father, King Saul, and had selected David. In fact, Jonathan had practically told David that David will be king (1 Samuel 23:17) while he was going to be his second in command.

However, Jonathan refused to leave Saul and adapt to signs of the times. The result? Jonathan died like an animal with his father in battle (1 Samuel 31:1-2).

There is a season for everything under the sun. Stay sensitive to the signs of the times. The last place you want to be is in a place that you are stagnated.

Focus on Your Weaknesses to Manifest Mastery

“Your Life’s Task does not always appear to you through some grand or promising inclination. It can appear in the guise of your deficiencies, making you focus on the one or two things that you are inevitably good at. Working at these skills, you learn the value of discipline and see the rewards you get from your efforts. Like a lotus flower, your skills will expand outward from a center of strength and confidence. Do not envy those who seem to be naturally gifted; it is often a curse, as such types rarely learn the value of diligence and focus, and they pay for this later in life. This strategy applies as well to any setbacks and difficulties we may experience. In such moments, it is generally wise to stick to the few things we know and do well, and to reestablish our confidence” – Robert Greene

Many times, we think that we will find your purpose and destiny in our area of strength.

That’s usually not true. In fact, I am a living witness.

Many of you are aware of my book “You Too Can Be Free”. I didn’t write that book from a position of strength. Rather porn addiction was the weakness that pushed me to find solutions. And once I found solutions that worked, I shared them with people in their thousands.

The truth is that any problem or pain you are experiencing right now could be a pointer to problems that God has called you to solve. Many people would not want to talk about the problem, because it might be embarrassing (like porn addiction in my example). Yet, your choice to channel your energies on finding a solution to that problem converts you to a resource person that adds value to the world.

Stay Sensitive to Overlaps to Find Mastery

“The future in science does not lie in increased specialization, but rather in the combining and cross-fertilization of knowledge in various fields.” – Robert Greene

This one really hit home!

One way to stand out and attain mastery (not just in science but in any field) is to be able to combine knowledge from different fields. Learn more about this in my post, How Good Ideas Are Created With Remarkable Predictability

In any case, I’ve written blog posts where I applied knowledge from Chemistry and Quantum Physics to explain real life situations. This is because I’ve conditioned my mind to see every field as somehow interrelated.

To stand out, you have to be able to use different mental models, philosophies or worldviews to make sense of the situation. This is also called the Lollapalooza effect (This is a term that Charlie Munger beautifully coined to explain this concept!)

The ability to do this makes you more valuable to the world and you’re able to stand out more easily.

Believe me, I’ve seen this skill work in my life and in the life of others.

Some years ago, I applied for a job. During the interview, I demonstrated my possession of “seemingly unrelated” skills that my employer saw valuable. In his mind, he was thinking, “Why should I employ two people when a single individual has the skills of two different people.” Right there and then, the dynamics of the interview changed and we were taking as though I already had the job. I walked out of that office with the job!

No knowledge is a waste. However, it is your responsibility to find out new applications and combinations that would turn all the knowledge you’ve accumulated into value to your sphere of influence.