All of us have a dream of who we will one day be.
Once we have that prestigious career, receive that graduate degree, make it as that famous artist, or win a gold medal.
The problem with that dream though is that it focuses on the outcome:
- Prestigious Career: A prestigious title, high salary, and everything else that comes with being the boss.
- Graduate Degree: An achievement and knowledge that separates you from the rest of the pack.
- Famous Artist: Fame and money.
- Gold Medal: Knowing that you are #1 in the world at something.
An outcome is just a snapshot in time though.
What you’re actually signing up for is the day-to-day grind it takes to get to that achievement.
- Prestigious Career: Late nights and weekends spent grinding on the corporate ladder
- Graduate Degree: Late nights studying and student debt
- Famous Artist: Years of failure, rejections, no money, and no guarantee of success.
- Gold Medal: 4 years of commitment to nothing but your chosen sport.
Every single choice in life you make has a downside so you’re really not picking what outcome you want, but more what you want your day-to-day to be.
It’s much easier to commit to something if you just dream of the outcome, but you’re more likely succeed if you approach decisions as a commitment to a specific day-to-day grind. The grind is guaranteed to be there, but the outcome is not.
Test The Waters
Once you understand that you’re signing up for the day-to-day commitment, it’s much easier to test out what a certain life path or dream will require by simply doing it.
When I first had the idea for creating this blog, I began writing sporadically after work everyday. About issues I was facing, about discoveries I’d read in other books, or just to distract myself from whatever was currently top of mind.
Through that process, I learned that writing was something that I really enjoyed doing.
So much so that I was happy to spend my time outside work doing it. This experience gave me confidence that when I launched this blog I would be able to achieve my goal of becoming a write not because it was a dream, but because I enjoyed (or at least didn’t hate) the day-to-day activity of it.
This tactic can be used in most other areas throughout your life.
Want to make a jump in your career?
Start by publishing a newsletter in the industry or position you want to move into. Solidify yourself as an expert.
Want to become a famous artist?
Commit to practicing and putting out songs on a clear schedule.
Want to become a writer?
Put out articles on a consistent schedule.
Consistency
This approach will teach you immediately what day-to-day grind you are signing up for.
Increase Your Failure Speed
One of the best parts of this strategy is it will help you quickly identify what you don’t enjoy doing. The faster you discover what you don’t enjoy, the sooner you can spend time exploring more options so you can find something .
This experimental creation phase is where you should be allocating the majority of your time early on in your life.
The key to discovering where you’ll succeed in life isn’t about discovering what you want or your passion, it’s discovering what type of daily grind and pain you can take. For most, it tends to be where you constantly allocate your free time when nobody else is watching.
For me, I realized that this was reading about self-improvement. It was where my mind constantly wandered so beginning to write about it made sense. To get here I pursued dozens of incorrect paths in life, but that is all part of the journey.
The Bottom Line
When in doubt, just try something new. It doesn’t need to be out of your comfort zone and it doesn’t require a huge life leap. The more you experiment, the closer you’ll be to finding something that you love.
You’ll never know where you will end up.