The Mindset You Need for 2022
Nothing changes until something changes. The Universal law of action states that for every action there is a reaction. This is a law that stems from the law of gravity, suggesting that there can be no movement without some form of action. Relating this to your life, and more specifically your professional and personal goals, you cannot grow and excel in your career without some level of action.
Another thing to consider is the second law of thermodynamics, which states that as an object goes forward in time, the degree of disorder, or entropy, to use the scientific term, will always either stay the same or increase. So, all things in nature trend toward a constant state of disorder.
With those two laws in mind, I pose this question: If nothing moves until action is taken, and when action is taken, if everything moves toward a constant state of disorder, how can we take an appropriate level of action while also maintaining order, in an effort to achieve our goals? Prepare for the worst, and hope for the best? Kind of, but it’s not so simple.
“The best laid schemes o’ mice an’ men. Gang aft a-gley”.
The answer is in our ability to manage, execute and make adjustments to a well-thought-out and realistic plan. There’s a saying that’s been floating around the internet, one that has mutated to take on many forms, and it states that: a person doesn’t rise to the occasion, they sink to the level of their training and preparation.
Whether the credit goes to an unnamed marine or to Simon Sinek, it doesn’t matter. The quote carries weight. And its significance stems from the way our brains respond to stimuli, particularly in our amygdala. When something happens that we aren’t expecting — a disruption, a setback, a mistake — the information as we receive it first passes through our amygdala. This is the part of the brain where our fight-or-flight-response mechanism is housed. This is the moment where we are heavily influenced to react emotionally. When we aren’t prepared, and when something happens that we aren’t expecting, we react with “fight or flight.” However, when we have trained, and practiced, and prepared for different situations that could arise, we allow that information to pass through our amygdala and to the more logical center of our brain, the cerebral cortex, where we can respond to the stimulus in a more reasonable manner.
“Between stimulus and response, there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response.” — Viktor Frankl
So yes, first and foremost we must accept that things will not go as we expect them. The future as we see it will happen in a way that is different from what we expect. So to fight back the world’s natural tendency to approach disorder, we must have a plan.
The problem is that merely writing a plan isn’t enough. A polished and comprehensive business plan represents a point in time assessment of what we feel we need to do to accomplish some result in the future. A plan which is usefully ordered for the time in which it was written.
“The ultimate purpose of life, mind, and human striving: to deploy energy and information to fight back the tide of entropy and carve out refuges of beneficial order.” — Steven Pinker
We have to accept Murphy’s Law, which states that anything that can go wrong will go wrong. We have to understand that the plan is a compass, a GPS, a guide — but we are the ones behind the wheel. Much like if you were to type a destination into the GPS application on your phone and five minutes into the drive you hit unforeseen construction, you’re not going to drive through the construction site because your phone is telling you to continue straight. You’re going to take a detour. The mission is to end up at the destination — but how you arrive might require some maneuvering and some agility.
So, as we gear up for the final 26 days of 2021, remember these things:
Nothing changes until something changes. If you aren’t satisfied with where you are in your life right now, then you can’t expect the actions and the behaviors that you’ve taken in the past will get you to where you want to go. If you want to produce different results, the first step is to change your behavior.
The Universal Law of Action: For every action, there is a reaction. You can’t think about the predicate of this law, the reaction. You have to think about it in reverse. In order for the reaction to exist, there has to first be an action. You cannot run a marathon without taking the first step. You cannot write a business plan without writing the first word. And you cannot achieve your goals without taking the first action.
The Second Law of Thermodynamics: As an object goes forward in time, the degree of disorder, or entropy, to use the scientific term, will always either stay the same or increase. So, all things in nature trend toward a constant state of disorder. Your plan will fail. You will run across hurdles and bumps, and road construction. Accept this and you will keep a more positive mindset focusing on the things you can control, while accepting the things which you cannot.
Make a plan, execute with agility and embrace change. Those who fail to plan are planning to fail. But there are also those people who over plan, and who aren’t willing to accept that plans can change. Avoid over-analysis paralysis by accepting that as you take more and more action, you will be required to make adjustments along the way.
Never change the goal. As you make adjustments to your plan, the key is to never change the destination. If you have a destination goal of making a six-figure income, for example, and you’re halfway through the year and only 20% of the way there, the last thing you want to do in this situation is to reduce your income goal. Reducing your goals only gets easier each time you do it. You must hold yourself accountable to the targets you set. And so rather than adjusting the goal, try making adjustments to the actions and the behaviors set forth to achieve the goal.
Let’s have a great finish to the year and best of luck to you in 2022!
Originally posted on Medium: https://medium.com/p/8edde6418f0