I’m the type of person that is outcome-driven, even though I’ve said this isn’t a good thing. I feel like this is how humans generally behave, people go on fancy dinners when they are offered jobs or have parties when they graduate. And as much as you try to acknowledge what went into this success, we inevitably end up painting a straight line from start to finish. Rarely do we acknowledge the “unproductive” days, and even afterwards we look back and think about how much faster the journey would have been if we were just more focused or dedicated or hard-working.
I think it’s generally true that 20% of work leads to 80% of the outcomes, and because of this we spend a lot of time doing things that don’t yield tangible progress, but rather set up success in the future. Even the best sports players inevitably have terrible games, and I’ve talked before about how the best of the best are those that use that failure to refuel their passion. But another facet of learning from failure is realizing that you haven’t failed if you genuinely tried, as cliche as it might sound.
Whenever you’re trying really hard to do something, you are setting yourself up to be better at it in the future. You’re not tired after the first week at the gym, but that makes sense, you’re getting used to the machines. And I think we don’t ever appreciate this type of work, maybe because it's impossible to quantify. We see the perfect person as someone who perfects the process of trying and succeeding, but really the most successful are those that know how to try and fail.
Failure is not unproductive, at the very least, every failed idea is one less thing to try in the future. But the most important part about failing is trying, and it’s not what you achieve rather the drive that takes you there. Productivity is the mindset that today has to be the day you take action, regardless of the outcome, and with that mindset failure just becomes a necessary part of life.
I often find that I have a lot of things to do, and yet still do nothing. If “today is the day,” shouldn’t I be making it the best day possible? When you’re working towards multiple things, it becomes natural to try and prioritize what will provide the most tangible output, but prioritization is extremely difficult when there’s so much to do and not enough time to do it. I think the ideal mindset should be to improve in any way possible instead of finding the most time-optimized route to success. By spending every moment trying to get a 1% improvement, you stop worrying about what you aren’t doing and more about what you are doing. It's not that today is the day, it’s that today is the day. You don’t need to change the world, but at least give it a try, and be happy with that.
Comments
Post a Comment