II Paradigms
“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence then is not an act but a habit.” Aristotle
Before I get into the specifics of the rituals I’ve integrated into my life I think its important to understand the paradigms I’m operating under. The epiphanies and understandings I’ve come to have allowed me to implement these habits and take massive action. If you’re starting from scratch, I’d guess it would take about six months to a year to develop the self discipline required to sustain the regiment of habits I’m discussing. The first paradigm and concept you need to understand is the lifetime approach.
Habits – A lifetime approach
When considering doing something every day for forever you obviously consider what effect it would have on you. Both in the long term and the short term. You will look at what it is you want to do every day, such as exercise and consider the short and long term effects. In the short term what gives? Well it makes you feel pretty good for one. A runners high, a sense of pride and accomplishment, and also the rollover it has to other parts of your day. It’s not like you exercise and then hit mcdicks and your couch. Generally this converts to momentum that you carry to other tasks. The benefits of exercising on any given day are obvious and realized immediately. Consider also the long term effects. As you maintain a regiment of exercise your body fat percentage drops, your flexibility and strength increase (less chance of injury) your lifespan extends, your immune system is bolstered, you maintain your youth longer, you carry over a sustained vigor to other parts of your life, your resting heart rate goes down, and you have a general feeling of well being. Pretty sweet. Clearly excersiing is very important; given both its short and long term benefits.
This is the algorithm I’ve used for proactively constructing my life. Take the activity, consider the long and short term effects and evaluate if that’s what I want in my life. Many activities I regularly engaged in had wonderful short term effects but terrible long term effects on my health, well being and prosperity.
Follow me through a short aside and lets apply this algorithm to a different and arguably negative activity; drinking alchohol. Short term effects can be great (state, fun, makes game easier) but with a little more inspection you realize the rollover effects it has. Health-wise this is obvious. Drinking is bad for you, especially binge drinking. But its easy to overlook what else is going on… its not just alcohol it’s the partying. The shitty sleeps when you drink, the wrecked immune system, the shitty food you eat drunk, my increased likelyhood of smoking cigarettes, and the long term damage of alchohol Financially its obviously detrimental – drinks at the bar can crucify a student budget. You’re productivity also takes a huge hit when you drink, the next day is a write off. Even if you have a lot of will power and momentum taking charge of your life, go at it a couple of days in a row and you set yourself way back. There are books to be read, weights to be lifted, laundry to be done… but no… hungover = DURR state.
By taking a step back and looking at the ecosystem of consequences your choices have you can better decide what things you do and don’t want in your life.
Mastery – The “S” Curve
The next concept is derived from George Leanords book “Mastery” The idea is that progress with regards to anything skill related is not a liner equation, ie the effort you put in does not directly correlate with what you get out. The reality is that you spend most of your time on platues, putting in effort and not getting anywhere, until eventually you break through emerging better than before. I agree but would like to extend his model to include the exponential S-curve. The diagram below is fairly autobiographical.
In my limited time on earth I have found this to be true. Lifting weights, picking up girls, learning calculus, playing piano, meditation, carpentry, programming, writing, painting, gardening, using chopsticks, chess and checkers; They all follow this formula. Everything you do will have a discouraging period of slogging through with little to no progress (I refer to this as ‘sucking shit’)
Its important to understand this because it can help prevent you from getting discouraged. Knowing that when you break through a plato it will be with a bang and it will be glorious.
This is how its going to go. You make the decision that you’re going to walk the path. You will do this every day. Now you can begin the process of advancing along the mastery curve. If you put in no effort you make no forward movement - obviously (*In my experience when you give up on a skill you don’t lose it entirely you just kind of accumulate rust.)
Exponential Growth and Spillover
Two things happen as you move along the mastery curve, and understanding these can help motivate you. For one, you will eventually gain exponential progress. Learning is exponential. You start to see compounding returns as you put the pieces together. You pick up a momentum. Your results are fuel for your motivation and it puts you into this self fulfilling cycle where you gain results, which give you motivation, which gets you to push harder until you get more results. This doesn’t really happen if you suck though… How do you hit that exponential growth - the cycle of improvement? You’ll do it through sheer FORCE OF FUCKING WILLPOWER. That’s what it takes to break through.
The second thing that will happen is you begin to accumulate ‘spillover’ effects. For example, as you play more chess your critical thinking develops, your social skills sharpen and your performance at work improves. As you begin to cultivate willpower and self discipline in your life the probability that you will succeed when you pick up a new skill is much, much higher.
Meta-meta-cognition
Cognition is your ability to read something and understand it. Meta cognition is your ability to evaluate your comprehension as you read it. Meta meta cognition is thinking about the process of evaluating your comprehension.
Every level is a higher order of thinking. Basic cognition is purely operational - it may get you through life from paycheck to paycheck. Taking a step back and thinking about how you’re living your life is meta cognition, this can help you manage your life as you introduce an element of proactivity into it. Meta-meta cognition is taking one further step back and assessing the very values that you decide to live your life by – if any of that makes sense. Meta cognition will help you manage your life, finances, relationships, business, and learning. Meta meta cognition is thinking about your values, purpose, and direction in life. They say that meta cognition is associated with intelligence, then meta meta cognition is associated with brilliance. It is a very powerful tool. (expanded on in habit 16)
“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence then is not an act but a habit.” Aristotle
Before I get into the specifics of the rituals I’ve integrated into my life I think its important to understand the paradigms I’m operating under. The epiphanies and understandings I’ve come to have allowed me to implement these habits and take massive action. If you’re starting from scratch, I’d guess it would take about six months to a year to develop the self discipline required to sustain the regiment of habits I’m discussing. The first paradigm and concept you need to understand is the lifetime approach.
Habits – A lifetime approach
When considering doing something every day for forever you obviously consider what effect it would have on you. Both in the long term and the short term. You will look at what it is you want to do every day, such as exercise and consider the short and long term effects. In the short term what gives? Well it makes you feel pretty good for one. A runners high, a sense of pride and accomplishment, and also the rollover it has to other parts of your day. It’s not like you exercise and then hit mcdicks and your couch. Generally this converts to momentum that you carry to other tasks. The benefits of exercising on any given day are obvious and realized immediately. Consider also the long term effects. As you maintain a regiment of exercise your body fat percentage drops, your flexibility and strength increase (less chance of injury) your lifespan extends, your immune system is bolstered, you maintain your youth longer, you carry over a sustained vigor to other parts of your life, your resting heart rate goes down, and you have a general feeling of well being. Pretty sweet. Clearly excersiing is very important; given both its short and long term benefits.
This is the algorithm I’ve used for proactively constructing my life. Take the activity, consider the long and short term effects and evaluate if that’s what I want in my life. Many activities I regularly engaged in had wonderful short term effects but terrible long term effects on my health, well being and prosperity.
Follow me through a short aside and lets apply this algorithm to a different and arguably negative activity; drinking alchohol. Short term effects can be great (state, fun, makes game easier) but with a little more inspection you realize the rollover effects it has. Health-wise this is obvious. Drinking is bad for you, especially binge drinking. But its easy to overlook what else is going on… its not just alcohol it’s the partying. The shitty sleeps when you drink, the wrecked immune system, the shitty food you eat drunk, my increased likelyhood of smoking cigarettes, and the long term damage of alchohol Financially its obviously detrimental – drinks at the bar can crucify a student budget. You’re productivity also takes a huge hit when you drink, the next day is a write off. Even if you have a lot of will power and momentum taking charge of your life, go at it a couple of days in a row and you set yourself way back. There are books to be read, weights to be lifted, laundry to be done… but no… hungover = DURR state.
By taking a step back and looking at the ecosystem of consequences your choices have you can better decide what things you do and don’t want in your life.
Mastery – The “S” Curve
The next concept is derived from George Leanords book “Mastery” The idea is that progress with regards to anything skill related is not a liner equation, ie the effort you put in does not directly correlate with what you get out. The reality is that you spend most of your time on platues, putting in effort and not getting anywhere, until eventually you break through emerging better than before. I agree but would like to extend his model to include the exponential S-curve. The diagram below is fairly autobiographical.
In my limited time on earth I have found this to be true. Lifting weights, picking up girls, learning calculus, playing piano, meditation, carpentry, programming, writing, painting, gardening, using chopsticks, chess and checkers; They all follow this formula. Everything you do will have a discouraging period of slogging through with little to no progress (I refer to this as ‘sucking shit’)
Its important to understand this because it can help prevent you from getting discouraged. Knowing that when you break through a plato it will be with a bang and it will be glorious.
This is how its going to go. You make the decision that you’re going to walk the path. You will do this every day. Now you can begin the process of advancing along the mastery curve. If you put in no effort you make no forward movement - obviously (*In my experience when you give up on a skill you don’t lose it entirely you just kind of accumulate rust.)
Exponential Growth and Spillover
Two things happen as you move along the mastery curve, and understanding these can help motivate you. For one, you will eventually gain exponential progress. Learning is exponential. You start to see compounding returns as you put the pieces together. You pick up a momentum. Your results are fuel for your motivation and it puts you into this self fulfilling cycle where you gain results, which give you motivation, which gets you to push harder until you get more results. This doesn’t really happen if you suck though… How do you hit that exponential growth - the cycle of improvement? You’ll do it through sheer FORCE OF FUCKING WILLPOWER. That’s what it takes to break through.
The second thing that will happen is you begin to accumulate ‘spillover’ effects. For example, as you play more chess your critical thinking develops, your social skills sharpen and your performance at work improves. As you begin to cultivate willpower and self discipline in your life the probability that you will succeed when you pick up a new skill is much, much higher.
Meta-meta-cognition
Cognition is your ability to read something and understand it. Meta cognition is your ability to evaluate your comprehension as you read it. Meta meta cognition is thinking about the process of evaluating your comprehension.
Every level is a higher order of thinking. Basic cognition is purely operational - it may get you through life from paycheck to paycheck. Taking a step back and thinking about how you’re living your life is meta cognition, this can help you manage your life as you introduce an element of proactivity into it. Meta-meta cognition is taking one further step back and assessing the very values that you decide to live your life by – if any of that makes sense. Meta cognition will help you manage your life, finances, relationships, business, and learning. Meta meta cognition is thinking about your values, purpose, and direction in life. They say that meta cognition is associated with intelligence, then meta meta cognition is associated with brilliance. It is a very powerful tool. (expanded on in habit 16)
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