James Clear's Blog, page 10

Fast Growth is Overrated

We live in a world obsessed with what we do.

What did you earn from your job last year?
What place did your team finish in the standings?
What trophy did you win? What award did you get? What measure of social status did you receive?

In moderation, this focus on what is fine. I like getting results just as much as the next person. I like performing well. I like being on top of my game. Achievement can be a good thing.

However, our obsessive focus on what we’re winning can also blind us from understanding how, precisely, people become winners. If you focus too much on the finish line, you miss the strategy going on during the race.

As I continue to study top performers from all areas of life – athletes, artists, entrepreneurs, and more – I’ve begun to see similar patterns emerge among these people. Today, we’re going to venture to the world of weightlifting to uncover one of these patterns.

The Incredible Success of Yuri Vardanyan

Yuri Vardanyan is widely considered one of the greatest olympic weightlifters of all-time. Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, Vardanyan routinely set world records in the sport and his run of success from 1977 to 1985 is stunning. 1

Here are Vardanyan’s results at the World Weightlifting Championships and the Olympic Games during that time span:

1977 World Championships – Gold
1978 World Championships – Gold
1979 World Championships – Gold
1980 Olympics – Gold
1981 World Championships – Gold
1982 World Championships – Silver
1983 World Championship – Gold
1985 World Championship – Gold

Now for the important question:

What methods did Vardanyan use to achieve such an incredible run of success? Are there any lessons we can learn from him and apply to our own lives?



Yuri Vardanian receiving the gold medal at the 1980 Olympics in Moscow. (Image Source: RIA Novosti Archive.)

Volume Before Intensity

In 1992, after his own weightlifting career had finished, Yuri moved his family to the United States. His son, Norik Vardanian, began to make a name for himself in weightlifting a few years later.

Today, Norik is the number one ranked weightlifter in the United States and is hoping to qualify for his second Olympic Games in 2016. Recently, Norik posted a training video (here) of a successful attempt to set a new personal record on front squat as his dad watched on, coaching him.

Here’s what he said:

200 kg (440 lbs) PR front squat for 5 reps. These are the only types of PR’s my dad allows me to attempt… reps. He is not a big fan of 1RM in training. He had told me years ago that his best front squat workout was when he did 200kg for 5 reps.

Pause for a moment and consider how this training approach differs from that of most people in the gym (and in many other areas of life as well).

If the best training method for an Olympian is to focus on doing a volume of work and mastering repetition after repetition, why would it make sense for you or I to train by lifting a maximum amount of weight possible? And yet, this is often a trap we fall into.

The problem with the “Go Big or Go Home” philosophy is that when you don’t have the underlying foundation of strength to handle the intensity of the effort, you’re just setting yourself up for failure.

This is why I believe you should focus on volume before intensity.

Fast Growth Is Overrated

So many of the problems I have run into as an entrepreneur, as a writer, and as an athlete have been because I have tried to grow too fast. I was so focused on getting a particular result that I ignored the fundamental habits that would have made my growth sustainable.

Fast growth forces you into a higher cost environment and if you don’t have the systems and ability to handle those costs, you’ll end up paying for it.

When I tried to push myself to lift bigger weights in record time, my body got run down and injured.
When I tried to force my business to the “next level” without knowing what I was getting into, I got stressed out and stepped on people’s toes without meaning to.
When I tried to push down the accelerator and double revenues, I fell flat on my face with a product launch and didn’t have a system that could service customers properly.

Intense growth and intense effort are great — if you have the foundation to handle the intensity. This is why Yuri Vardanyan focuses on five-rep maxes. He’s building the foundation.

Put in your reps and build the capacity to do the work. There will be time for maxing out later. First, build the foundation.

Footnotes

Despite being the gold medal favorite, Yuri Vardanyan did not compete at the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles because the Soviet Union boycotted the Olympics along with 14 other countries.↩

Famous Biologist Louis Agassiz on the Usefulness of Learning Through Observation

Louis Agassiz, the famous Swiss biologist, placed a fish specimen on the table in front of his post-graduate student.

���That���s only a sunfish,��� the student said.

���I know that,��� Agassiz replied.

He continued, ���Write a description of it. Find out what you can without damaging the specimen. When I think that you have done the work I will question you.” 1

The Power of Observation

The student wrote for an nearly an hour, until he felt confident that he knew nearly all there was to know about this particular fish.

Much to the student���s frustration, however, Agassiz did not return to see him that day. His teacher did not come the next day either. Nor for the entire week that followed. Eventually, the student realized Agassiz���s game: the teacher wanted him to observe the fish more deeply.

After nearly one hundreds hours of study, the student began to notice finer details that had escaped his vision previously: how the scales of the fish were shaped and the patterns they made, the placement of the teeth, the shape of each individual tooth, and so on. When his teacher finally returned and the student explained all that he had learned, Agassiz replied, ���That���s not right.��� And walked out of the room. 2

Shocked and angry at first, the student eventually recommitted to the task with new vigor. He threw out all of his previous notes. He studied the fish for 10 hours per day for an entire week. When he met with Agassiz a final time, the student had produced work that ���astonished.��� 3

Louis Agassiz circa 1865. (Photographer: John Adams Whipple.)

The Art of Comparing Objects

After his investigation of the sunfish Agassiz���s student wrote, “I had learned the art of comparing objects.��� How does this tooth compare to the one next to it? How does this scale compare to the one on the opposite side? How does the symmetry of the bottom half of the fish compare to the top half?

The art of comparing objects is a remarkably useful strategy in many areas of life. Take weightlifting, for example.

For the first five years that I lifted weights, I experienced mediocre results at best. I assumed that it was information that held me back. Like many people, I thought that once I found the right workout routine, then I would be set. I was under the assumption that I simply hadn���t reached the next level yet because I hadn���t come across the right information. What I didn’t realize was my search for the perfect pre-made formula was preventing me from observing my actual results.

When I started to observe with greater care and focus, I realized that my body tended to respond better to higher volume rather than higher intensity. I noticed that my foundational strength in major movements like the squat and deadlift was lacking. I was able to use these observational discoveries to tailor my training to my needs and, subsequently, make much greater strides because of it. It was through comparing what I was doing with what was actually working for me that I made progress.

Do the Work For Yourself

���I never pay attention to anything by ‘experts.’ I calculate everything myself.”

-Richard Feynman

When Richard Feynman, the brilliant physicist, was working on a new theory of beta decay he noticed something surprising. For years, experts had been saying that beta decay occurred in a particular way, but when Feynman actually ran the experiments he kept getting a different result.

Eventually, Feynman investigated the original data that all of the expert���s were basing their theory on and discovered that the study was flawed. For years, nobody had bothered to read or repeat the original study! All of the experts just kept quoting one another and used their mutual opinions as justification for the theory. Then Feynman came along and turned everything upside simply because he did the calculations himself. 4

Look, And See for Yourself

“Take the facts into your own hands; look, and see for yourself!”

-Louis Agassiz

Pick any industry of life and you���ll find that very few people actually do the work.

Rather than read the original study, most people cite the headline from a secondary source. Rather than spend 100 hours observing every detail of a fish, most biology students would look up the description of the fish online. When most people say, ���I read an article on climate change,��� what they really mean is, ���I read the title of an article on climate change.”

This is exactly why doing the boring work more consistently is actually a competitive advantage. Ignore the expert advice and pay attention to what gets results for you.

Look, and see for yourself.

Footnotes

This story about Agassiz has been told by two different sources. First, in The Autobiography of Nathaniel Southgate Shaler, who was a student of Agassiz. Second, in Ezra Pound’s classic book, The ABC of Reading (Kindle). Pound’s version is known as the Parable of the Sunfish and deviates slightly from the original sources. I’ve done my best to represent Agassiz accurately here.↩

From what I can tell, this was fairly standard behavior for Agassiz. He would, reportedly, “lock a student up in a room full of turtle-shells, or lobster-shells, or oyster-shells, without a book or a word to help him, and not let him out till he had discovered all the truths which the objects contained.” (Source: Speech by William James at the reception of the American Society of Naturalists on December 30, 1896.) ↩

The Autobiography of Nathaniel Southgate Shaler. Page 99.↩

Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman! (audiobook) by Richard Feynman. Page 254-255.↩

How to Fall in Love With Boredom and Unlock Your Mental Toughness

Whether we are talking about athletes, artists, or academics, the story is the same. If you want to fulfill your potential then you must practice a specific skill for a long time with remarkable consistency. Mastery is never an accident.

Paul Erdos, the fantastic mathematician, published over 1,500 papers before establishing himself as a thought leader.
Famous composers put in 10 years of under appreciated work before earning recognition.
Greek legend Milo picked up a young calf every day until he developed incredible strength.

Somehow, top performers in any craft figure out a way to fall in love with boredom, put in their reps, and do the work.

Of course, whenever ���experts��� share stories about successful people they often leave out a key ingredient of the story. How, exactly, do top performers fall in love with boredom? Perhaps more important, how can you fall in love with boredom when you’re trying to build a habit that you know you should do, but you don’t really want to do.

Let me share two strategies that work for me.

How to Fall in Love With Boredom

First, there is very little hope for falling in love with a habit that you truly hate. I don���t know anyone who legitimately dislikes an activity and somehow falls in love with doing it. It doesn���t add up. It���s very difficult to hate something and be in love with it at the same time. (Your ex doesn���t count.)

Let���s say you dislike working out, but you know it���s good for you. If you want to fall in love with the boredom of going to the gym, then you have two options.

Option 1: Increase your proficiency at the task.

Even tasks that you are good at will feel monotonous some days, so imagine the uphill battle you’re fighting if you are constantly trying to do something that you don’t feel skilled at. The solution? Learn the basic fundamentals of your task and celebrate the small wins and improvements you make. With our workout example, let���s say you purchase Starting Strength and learn how to do a proper deadlift or bench press. Practicing these new skills in the gym can be fun and making tiny improvements each week builds momentum. It’s much easier to fall in love with doing something over and over again if you can look forward to making progress.

Option 2: Fall in love with a result of the task rather than the task itself.

Let’s be real: there are some things that we should do that are always going to be a hassle. Running sprints might be an example. Very few people look forward to setting their lungs on fire.

I find that I have more success in situations like these when I shift my focus away from the actual task and toward a result. Sometimes this is a direct result of the habit I’m trying to perform. Other times, it’s a result that I invent. For example, you can make a game out of not missing workouts even if you don���t enjoy the workout itself. Let���s say you have done two sprint workouts in a row. Your goal is to fall in love with becoming the type of person who doesn���t miss workouts. You���re not worried about how you perform. You���re not worried about if you���re getting faster. You���re not worried about getting six-pack abs or any other type of result. For the most part, you���re not even thinking about the workout. Instead, you���re simply focused on keeping your workout streak alive.

This is basically the Seinfeld Strategy applied to exercise. Your only goal is to ���not break the chain.��� By shifting your focus away from the activity you dislike, you’re giving yourself an opportunity to fall in love with the boredom of sticking to the streak (something you do enjoy).

The Power of Patience

I was speaking with a friend at the gym recently. He had decided to change his weightlifting routine despite making good progress with his old program. I asked him why. He made a few excuses before eventually saying, ���Basically, I got bored.���

It has taken me years to learn this lesson myself, but I���m starting to believe that a beautiful blend of patience and consistency is the ultimate competitive advantage. Success is often found by practicing the fundamentals that everyone knows they should be doing, but they find too boring or basic to practice routinely.

It���s like making 120 sales calls per day. There���s nothing sexy about it, but it works. You don���t need to reinvent the fundamentals. You need to commit to them. Do more of what already works. 1

Footnotes

Thanks to readers Roshni, Sebastian, and Jonathan for suggesting this topic. As always, I love hearing about the topics you���d like me to write about and welcome any feedback you have on how to make my work more useful.↩

What I Do When I Feel Like Giving Up

I am struggling today. If you���ve ever struggled to be consistent with something you care about, maybe my struggle will resonate with you too.

It has been 939 days since November 12, 2012. That���s the date when I first published an article on JamesClear.com and it���s almost 2 years and 7 months ago. During these 939 mostly glorious, sometimes frustrating days, I have written a new post every Monday and Thursday. Week after week. Month after month. Year after year.

But today? Well, today I am struggling. Today, I don���t feel like writing. Today, I don���t feel like sticking to the routine. Today, I don���t feel like I have any great ideas and I don���t feel like I have enough time to make the good ideas great. Today, I feel like giving up.

Research from the University of Pennsylvania has shown that grit is the characteristic linked most closely to success. I could use some grit today.

Here���s what I try to remind myself of when I feel like giving up…

Your Mind is a Suggestion Engine

Consider every thought you have as a suggestion, not an order. Right now, my mind is suggesting that I feel tired. It is suggesting that I give up. It is suggesting that I take an easier path.

If I pause for a moment, however, I can discover new suggestions. My mind is also suggesting that I will feel very good about accomplishing this work once it is done. It is suggesting that I will respect the identity I am building when I stick to the schedule. It is suggesting that I have the ability to finish this task, even when I don���t feel like.

Remember, none of these suggestions are orders. They are merely options. I have the power to choose which option I follow. 1

Discomfort Is Temporary

Relative to the time in your normal day or week, nearly any habit you perform is over quickly. Your workout will be finished in an hour or two. Your report will be typed to completion by tomorrow morning. This article will be finished in just a moment.

Life is easier now than it has ever been. 300 years ago, if you didn���t kill your own food and build your own house, you would die. Today, we whine about forgetting our iPhone charger.

Maintain perspective. Your life is good and your discomfort is temporary. Step into this moment of discomfort and let it strengthen you.

You Will Never Regret Good Work Once It is Done

Theodore Roosevelt famously said, “Far and away the best prize that life has to offer is the chance to work hard at work worth doing.” So often it seems that we want to work easily at work worth doing. We want our work to be helpful and respected, but we do not want to struggle through our work. We want our stomachs to be flat and our arms to be strong, but we do not want to grind through another workout. We want the final result, but not the failed attempts that precede it. We want the gold, but not the grind.

Anyone can want a gold medal. Few people want to train like an Olympian.

And yet, despite our resistance to it, I have never found myself feeling worse after the hard work was done. There have been days when it was damn hard to start, but it was always worth finishing. Sometimes, the simple act of showing up and having the courage to do the work, even in an average manner, is a victory worth celebrating.

This Is Life

Life is a constant balance between giving into the ease of distraction or overcoming the pain of discipline. It is not an exaggeration to say that our lives and our identities are defined in this delicate balance. What is life, if not the sum of a hundred thousand daily battles and tiny decisions to either gut it out or give it up?

This moment when you don���t feel like doing the work? This is not a moment to be thrown away. This is not a dress rehearsal. This moment is your life as much as any other moment. Spend it in a way that will make you proud.

Let the World Decide

So, what do I do when I feel like giving up? I show up.

Do I show up at my best? I doubt it. But my job isn���t to judge how good or how bad I am.

My job is to do the work and let the world decide.

Footnotes

Since my brain is currently mush, I can���t remember where I originally heard the mind-as-suggestion-engine idea, but I can assure you it was someone smarter than I who came up with this idea.↩

Inside the Mind of a Mad Scientist: The Incredible Importance of Personal Science

For decades the world’s greatest doctors and researchers had believed that stomach ulcers and, eventually, stomach cancers were caused by stress, spicy foods, and too much acid in the stomach.

Barry Marshall wasn’t buying it. Marshall was an Australian physician and microbiology researcher and he believed that stomach ulcers were not merely the byproduct of a hectic life or an overly spicy dinner. Instead, he believed ulcers were caused by bacteria. More specifically, Marshall believed ulcers were caused by Helicobacter pylori.

There was, however, a problem with this theory:



Marshall and his lab partner were pretty much the only people who bought into this crazy idea. Further complicating matters, Marshall had been unable to prove the link between bacteria and ulcers in his lab experiments on pigs and now his grant money was running out. Meanwhile, thousands of people continued to die from stomach cancer each year.

The Mad Scientist

Fed up with the situation, Marshall decided to take matters into his own hands and conduct a personal science experiment of the boldest kind.

In July of 1984, Marshall held a beaker of cloudy, brown liquid that was swimming with Helicobacter pylori and prepared to take a swallow. He “drank it down in one gulp then fasted for the rest of the day.”

In the words of author Siddhartha Mukherjee, Marshall had “swallowed a carcinogen to create a precancerous state in his own stomach.”

Three days later, Marshall started feeling nauseous. On Day 5, he began to vomit and continued doing so for three days straight. All the while, his colleague took samples of the bacteria in Marshall’s stomach lining and recorded the physiological changes as Marshall began to develop a severe episode of gastritis in his stomach. After two weeks of self-induced hell, Marshall had the proof he needed and began taking antibiotics.

Luckily, he made a full recovery. Within a month, Marshall and his colleagues had submitted his experiment and results to the Medical Journal of Australia for publication. Not only had they proven that Helicobacter pylori was the cause of stomach ulcers, they had also revealed an important precursor to stomach cancer. Marshall and his lab partner, Robin Warren, received the 2005 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for their efforts.

Helicobacter pylori under the microscope. (Photographer: Yutaka Tsutsumi, M.D. Image Source: Department of Pathology, Fujita Health University School of Medicine.)

The Power of Personal Science

Barry Marshall is a real life mad scientist. He drank a cancerous cocktail in hopes of discovering a scientific truth. His story is one of many mentioned in the fantastic book, The Emperor of All Maladies (audiobook). 1

Marshall is an extreme case of what my friend Josh Kaufman calls “personal science.”

Personal science refers to the idea of executing small experiments on your own with the intention of discovering new ways to solve problems and get results in your life. While typical studies are conducted on a large scale and published in academic journals, personal science experiments involve a single patient (you) and are focused on delivering highly practical and useful pieces of information.

Marshall used personal science to further his career goals, whereas you and I may use personal science to build a new health habit or improve our performance at work. The goal of these mini-experiments is to discover what gets you real-world results. As a writer and researcher who tries to blend science-based ideas with practical insights, I believe this philosophy of self-experimentation is incredibly important.

Why?

Because no matter how much science and theory you understand, you can never get a result in your own life unless you have the courage to take action.

Unleashing Your Inner Mad Scientist

Personal science isn’t an excuse to do something reckless. I don’t, for example, recommend drinking a test tube of precancerous bacteria. I do, however, believe that executing your own experiments and having a willingness to try things will make your life better.

Here are a few reasons why:

Personal science forces you to move past planning. If you want to accelerate your learning, develop new skills, and get useful results, then you must try things. So often we wait to take action because we believe we need to read or research more. What if, as an alternative, we spent less time trying to find the best strategy and more time testing the strategies we already have? It can be easy to forget that practice is often the most powerful form of learning.

Personal science is low risk. Unlike Marshall’s crazy cancer slushie, nearly any experiment you or I will conduct is typically low risk. Rarely, do we face life-or-death, cancer-in-the-stomach type of risks. Usually, the barriers to our progress are discomfort, uncertainty, inconvenience, and the fear of criticism. Personal science forces use to move past these emotional hurdles and see them for what they really are: limiting beliefs.

Here are some examples:

Wish you would finally write your book? Experiment with cutting out an activity you enjoy to make time for this important goal. What is the potential risk? Are you really worried that you’ll miss this season of your favorite TV show?
Trying to eat healthier? Create a bright-line rule and experiment with eating one vegetable per day, no matter what. What is the potential risk? That you’ll have a long day and have to make a batch of asparagus at 10 p.m.?
Want to be an early riser? Experiment with waking up at 5 a.m. this week. What is the potential risk? That you’ll feel tired for a week?

Personal science teaches you the key to true problem solving. We often read books and rely on research studies for the answers to our problems. Knowing where to get information is a useful skill, but the key to good problem solving is not to have someone else do the work for you. The key to good problem solving is a willingness to try things, experiment thoughtfully, and do the work. 2

Step Into the Arena

We all live our lives in different laboratories. Your corner of the world—filled with your experiences, your biology, your environment, your friends, your beliefs—is a different petri dish than mine. There are plenty of fundamentals that apply to all petri dishes, but no matter where you find yourself, you have to be willing to experiment if you want to get a result.

Let your mad scientist out every now and then. Step into the arena and put yourself through the fire. The only truth is what works for you. 3

Footnotes

The Emperor of All Maladies really is an incredible read. I highly recommend it, especially if you love science. Or, if you just want to be blown away by the amount of effort one author can put into a book.↩

This does not, by the way, mean that others do not have a responsibility to teach and to share their knowledge. Just because we should help one another, however, does not mean you are entitled to having others figure your problems out for you.↩

Thanks to Siddhartha Mukherjee, Josh Kaufman, and Matt Gemmell who each inspired pieces of this article.↩

Pat Riley on the Remarkable Power of Getting 1% Better

The 1986 Los Angeles Lakers were one of the most talented basketball teams ever assembled, but they are rarely remembered that way.

The team started the 1985-86 NBA season with a 29-5 record. ���The pundits were saying that we might be the best team in the history of basketball,��� head coach Pat Riley mockingly said after the season. 1

Despite their talent, the Lakers stumbled in the 1986 playoffs and suffered a surprising season-ending defeat in the Western Conference Finals. The “best team in the history of basketball” didn’t even play for the NBA Championship that year.

As the head coach, Pat Riley was tired of hearing about how much talent his players had and about how much promise his team held. He didn’t want to see flashes of brilliance followed by a gradual fade back to mediocrity. He wanted the Lakers to play up to their potential, night after night.

In the summer of 1986, Riley created a plan to do exactly that.

Step 1: Taking Their Number

Following the 1986 season, Riley revealed a new program that he called the Career Best Effort program or CBE. 2

���When players first join the Lakers,” Riley explained, “we track their basketball statistics all the way back to high school. I call this Taking Their Number. We look for an accurate gauge of what a player can do, then build him into our plan for the team, based on the notion that he will maintain and then improve upon his averages.���

You’ll notice that Riley was interested in the average speed of his players. His first calculation was to see what a player’s normal day looked like, not his best day.

In her book, When the Game Was Ours (Audiobook), author Jackie MacMullan explains Riley���s CBE calculations by saying,

“The Lakers coach recorded data from basic categories on the stat sheet, applied a plus or a minus to each column, and then divided the total by minutes played. He calculated a rating for each player and asked them to improve their output by at least 1 percent over the course of the season. If they succeeded, it would be a CBE, or Career Best Effort.” 3

Riley was careful to point out that CBE was not merely about points or statistics, but giving your “best effort spiritually and mentally and physically.” Players got credit for “allowing an opponent to run into you when you know that a foul will be called against him, diving for loose balls, going after rebounds whether you are likely to get them or not, helping a teammate when the player he’s guarding has surged past him, and other ‘unsung hero’ deeds.” 4

Step 2: Calculating Your CBE

I don’t know Riley’s exact formula, but here’s what the CBE calculation might look like in practice:

Let���s say that Magic Johnson had 11 points, 8 rebounds, 12 assists, 2 steals, and 5 turnovers in a particular game. Magic also got credit for an ���unsung hero��� deed by diving after a loose ball (+1). Finally, he played a total of 33 minutes in this imaginary game.

If we add up all the positive numbers (11+8+12+2+1), we get 34. Then, we subtract the 5 turnovers (34-5) to get 29. Finally, we divide 29 by 33 minutes played.

29/33 = 0.879

In this example, Magic���s CBE number would have been 879. 5 This number was calculated for all of a player’s games and he was then asked to improve his average CBE by one percent during the course of the season. Riley knew that if the Lakers could aggregate many small individual improvements they would achieve a big jump in team performance.

Step 3: Historical Comparisons

Throughout the 1987 season, Riley was constantly comparing each player’s current CBE to not only their past performances, but also other players around the league. As Riley put it, “We rank team members alongside league opponents who play the same position and have similar role definitions.” 6

“Riley trumpeted the top performers in the league in bold lettering on the blackboard each week and measured them against the corresponding players on his own roster.

Solid, reliable players generally rated a score in the 600s, while elite players scored at least 800. Magic Johnson, who submitted 138 triple-doubles in his career, often scored over 1,000.”7

The Lakers also emphasized year-over-year progress by making historical comparisons of CBE data. Riley said, ���We stacked the month of November, 1986, next to November, 1985, and showed the players whether they were doing better or worse than at the same point last season. Then we showed them how their performance figures for December, 1986, stacked up against November’s.���

Imagine you’re one of the players. Every week you walk into the locker room and see your name ranked alongside Michael Jordan or Larry Bird or some other competitor across the league. You’re constantly aware of how you are performing relative to the competition and relative to your average performance. It is impossible to lie to yourself about whether you are playing well or poorly. You are are constantly aware of your choices, your actions, and your performance.

Compare that situation to how most of us live our lives. We don’t track or measure the things that we say are important to us. We make excuses, create rationalizations, and lie to ourselves about our daily performance. We have no evidence of whether we are performing better or worse compared to previous months or years. It’s not hard to see why the CBE program delivered results.

The Results of CBE

The Los Angeles Lakers began executing the CBE program in October of 1987. Eight months later, they were NBA Champions. The following year, during the 1988-89 season, Pat Riley led his team to another title as the Lakers became the first team in 20 years to win back-to-back NBA championships.

“Sustaining an effort is the most important thing for any enterprise. The way to be successful is to learn how to do things right, then do them the same way every time. Players can’t excel in every area, but they can strive to better themselves in the areas that we value most for each individual. Then we can show them what they need to do to have their Career Best Effort. Over the length of a season, a correlation always appears between great effort and great overall numbers. It may not show from one game to the next, but in the long run superior effort is reflected in the win column.”

—Pat Riley

What Makes Great Performers Great?

There is a surprisingly narrow gap that separates the good performance from the great performance. And that narrow gap is separated by small habits and daily rituals.

It is so easy to dismiss the value of making slightly better decisions on a daily basis. Sticking with the fundamentals is not impressive. Falling in love with boredom is not sexy. Getting one percent better isn’t going to make headlines.

There is one thing about it though: it works.

Sources

Temporary Insanity and Other Management Techniques: The Los Angeles Lakers’ Coach Tells All by Pat Riley and Byron Laursen. Los Angeles Times Magazine.↩

Jackie MacMullan’s book (cited below), claims that Riley began his CBE program during the 1984-85 NBA season. From what I can tell, the Lakers began tracking statistics of individual players at that time, but the CBE program as it is described in this article was first used during the 1986-87 NBA season.↩

Thanks to a friendly reader, MSW, for originally telling me about Pat Riley’s CBE model.↩

Temporary Insanity and Other Management Techniques: The Los Angeles Lakers’ Coach Tells All by Pat Riley and Byron Laursen. Los Angeles Times Magazine.↩

From what I can tell, the Lakers talked about CBE scores in the same way you would talk about batting averages in baseball. That is, .312 is pronounced “three twelve.”↩

Temporary Insanity and Other Management Techniques: The Los Angeles Lakers’ Coach Tells All by Pat Riley and Byron Laursen. Los Angeles Times Magazine.↩

When the Game Was Ours (Audiobook)↩

One Month Sabbatical: I���m Taking May Off From Writing

As regular readers know, I believe that creative genius reveals itself when you show up consistently, put in enough repetitions, and focus on the system rather than the goal. This is one of the main reasons why I have published a new article nearly every Monday and Thursday since November 12, 2012.

But I also believe in balance, rejuvenation, and the importance of play and having fun. Recovery is non-negotiable. And for that reason, I���m choosing to take a sabbatical from writing during the month of May.



This is the fourth time I���ve done this. I usually take one break around May or June and one break during December. My strategy of taking one month off every summer and winter means that I have about 16 percent unstructured time each year (2 months out of 12). This is similar to the policies of other very successful businesses like 3M (15 percent free time), Google (���20 percent time��� policy), and Treehouse (4-day workweek). The 3M policy famously led to the invention of the Post-It Note and Google claims that their policy has led to major projects like Google AdWords and GMail.

With that said, I want to say that it is truly a privilege to write for you and I want you to know that I will be spending part of this sabbatical thinking about how I can raise the quality of my writing to a higher level. You can browse the most popular articles from the first half of the year (and the full archives) here: Most popular articles and the full archives.

And wherever you are in the world, I hope you find some time this month to balance yourself and insert play and discovery into your life.

Thanks for reading. See you in a few weeks.

One Month Sabbatical: I’m Taking May Off From Writing

As regular readers know, I believe that creative genius reveals itself when you show up consistently, put in enough repetitions, and focus on the system rather than the goal. This is one of the main reasons why I have published a new article nearly every Monday and Thursday since November 12, 2012.

But I also believe in balance, rejuvenation, and the importance of play and having fun. Recovery is non-negotiable. And for that reason, I’m choosing to take a sabbatical from writing during the month of May.



This is the fourth time I’ve done this. I usually take one break around May or June and one break during December. My strategy of taking one month off every summer and winter means that I have about 16 percent unstructured time each year (2 months out of 12). This is similar to the policies of other very successful businesses like 3M (15 percent free time), Google (“20 percent time” policy), and Treehouse (4-day workweek). The 3M policy famously led to the invention of the Post-It Note and Google claims that their policy has led to major projects like Google AdWords and GMail.

With that said, I want to say that it is truly a privilege to write for you and I want you to know that I will be spending part of this sabbatical thinking about how I can raise the quality of my writing to a higher level. You can browse the most popular articles from the first half of the year (and the full archives) here: Most popular articles and the full archives.

And wherever you are in the world, I hope you find some time this month to balance yourself and insert play and discovery into your life.

Thanks for reading. See you in a few weeks.

You���re Not Ready for Marriage

Sometime in 2014, two famous men walked into a recording studio. They were working on a rap album, but at this particular moment they were talking about marriage.



The first man was someone you would expect to be working on a rap album. His real name was Olubowale Akintimehin, but he is better known as the hip hop artist Wale (pronounced WAH-lay). The second man was someone you would never expect to be working on a rap album, the popular comedian Jerry Seinfeld.

Wale was partnering with Seinfeld for his fourth album, The Album About Nothing. During this particular session, he brought Seinfeld into the studio to ask him questions, record their conversation, and hopefully grab a few soundbites for the album.

While working on a track called The Matrimony, Wale questioned Seinfeld about his thoughts on marriage. At first, Seinfeld talked about what it felt like to get engaged. He explained the combination of excitement and nervousness and helplessness that made engagement feel like being strapped into a rollercoaster headed to the top of the hill where the marriage awaits.

Wale paused for a moment, looked at Seinfeld, and said, ���So, even if you make plans you never think you���re really ready for marriage?��� 1

���No,��� Seinfeld said. “It���s like any growth. You can���t be ready for it because it���s growth. It���s going to be new. You���re going to have a new life. You���re going to be a new person.���

You’re Not Ready for Growth

I like Seinfeld���s definition of growth. You’re not ready for marriage. You’re not ready to start a business. You’re not ready to move to a new city. You’re not ready for growth … and that’s exactly why it will make you grow. Start before you feel ready.

By definition, growth must be something that makes you feel unprepared and uncertain. If it was comfortable and easy, it wouldn���t be growth. It would be normal. It would be standard. It would be who you already are.

Jerry Seinfeld during the recording of The Album About Nothing.

There will never be a perfect time to do something that stretches you. That���s true whether you are starting a marriage, having your first child, changing careers, or wrestling with any number of challenging goals. That’s not a license to be reckless and never think things through, but at some point you have to embrace the uncertainty because it is the only path forward.

You can���t be ready for true growth. That���s why it���s growth. All you can do is step into it with everything you���ve got.

Sources

You can watch the clip of Seinfeld and Wale talking here.↩

You’re Not Ready for Marriage

Sometime in 2014, two famous men walked into a recording studio. They were working on a rap album, but at this particular moment they were talking about marriage.



The first man was someone you would expect to be working on a rap album. His real name was Olubowale Akintimehin, but he is better known as the hip hop artist Wale (pronounced WAH-lay). The second man was someone you would never expect to be working on a rap album, the popular comedian Jerry Seinfeld.

Wale was partnering with Seinfeld for his fourth album, The Album About Nothing. During this particular session, he brought Seinfeld into the studio to ask him questions, record their conversation, and hopefully grab a few soundbites for the album.

While working on a track called The Matrimony, Wale questioned Seinfeld about his thoughts on marriage. At first, Seinfeld talked about what it felt like to get engaged. He explained the combination of excitement and nervousness and helplessness that made engagement feel like being strapped into a rollercoaster headed to the top of the hill where the marriage awaits.

Wale paused for a moment, looked at Seinfeld, and said, “So, even if you make plans you never think you’re really ready for marriage?” 1

“No,” Seinfeld said. “It’s like any growth. You can’t be ready for it because it’s growth. It’s going to be new. You’re going to have a new life. You’re going to be a new person.”

You’re Not Ready for Growth

I like Seinfeld’s definition of growth. You’re not ready for marriage. You’re not ready to start a business. You’re not ready to move to a new city. You’re not ready for growth … and that’s exactly why it will make you grow. Start before you feel ready.

By definition, growth must be something that makes you feel unprepared and uncertain. If it was comfortable and easy, it wouldn’t be growth. It would be normal. It would be standard. It would be who you already are.

Jerry Seinfeld during the recording of The Album About Nothing.

There will never be a perfect time to do something that stretches you. That’s true whether you are starting a marriage, having your first child, changing careers, or wrestling with any number of challenging goals. That’s not a license to be reckless and never think things through, but at some point you have to embrace the uncertainty because it is the only path forward.

You can’t be ready for true growth. That’s why it’s growth. All you can do is step into it with everything you’ve got.

Sources

You can watch the clip of Seinfeld and Wale talking here.↩