Lessons From Striving

Considering What Endures

This is Part Three of a series on Personal Planning. You’ll find Parts One and Two in the links.

Last time, I may have given you the impression that I was aiming for a world best for my age category. That could happen but I’ve learned some things about success and high-performance over the years. My experience has been defining success with respect to others is self-limiting.

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A Framework for Enduring Benefits

My son reminds me of my younger self. I’ll illustrate with a story.

A few years back, we were discussing what it would be like for him to have a younger brother.

His first reaction was to ask, “Do you think he’d be faster than me?”

That gave me a big laugh as the ultimate form of sibling rivalry is seeking to compete with an imaginary sibling.

…but it’s not far from how I have lived my life, at least until my kids arrived. I had a habit of competing with everyone, all the time. Over time, I have found more effective ways to channel that drive.

In Part One, I touched on the enduring legacy of my athletic striving; I have experienced minimum functional losses from 40 to 55 years old.

Let’s dig deeper into what endures from the key phases of my external life:

• In Academics => a deep understanding of math, finance and accounting.

• In Finance => building core capital and a skill set to manage capital.

• In Sport => slowing the aging process.

These benefits…

• Have nothing to do with relative results or other people.

• Continue to be available, regardless of external circumstances.

• Don’t require competition.

Let’s pull these out explicitly for making future time allocation decisions.

1. Will the benefits of these continued efforts endure?

2. What is the life I want next year, and for the next decade?

3. Looking back, what’s been the source of satisfaction?

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Choosing Actions, Not Chasing Outcomes

When I consider my future choices using the above framework, certain themes pop out.

• Make it about actions, not other people. The lowest satisfaction periods of my life have been when I was caught up in others.

• Make it about doing our best, not about specifics. I consistently underestimate what is possible.

• Don’t set a time limit. Maintain a childlike curiosity, and joy, in the process that’s required to find out what’s possible.

To help you, I’ll share my NOT-to-do-list:

• Don’t Evaluate Based On Others

• Don’t Set External Targets

• Don’t Set A Timeframe For Achievement

When you see that, you might think… well how can I achieve anything?

Aren’t we supposed to set S.M.A.R.T goals? My kids are taught... specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, time-based. I think it's better to apply this to our system, not our outcome.

For everything I’ve achieved in my life… I’ve exceeded my initial best case scenario (and I’ve never been told I have a small ego, or lack confidence).

What’s that tell me? A lot of the traditional goal-setting process is wasted energy. Why? Because we have no idea what is possible if we persist wisely.

Perhaps we need S.A.D. goals.

• Simple

• Actions

• Daily

How can we better target those simple daily actions?

Enjoy The Process. Sounds trite. Let’s get specific. Build a team of people we like spending time alongside. Don’t want to build? Then JOIN a team. Be sure to choose wisely. Building, or joining, we pick up the attributes of our peers - not just the ones that attracted us.

Keep What Works. What are the enduring benefits of the way you’ve lived your life so far? Make an inventory of strengths and advantages. I listed mine above. There’s another list for our household (sleep, nutrition, simplicity, patience in execution, two engaged parents). We have attributes that make us successful. Hold onto your advantages.

There is another aspect that’s important. Relationships.

• As we move through life, we share experiences. 2023 has provided me with an opportunity to reconnect with my favorite people and share experiences with them.

• 2024 will represent the 20th anniversary of meeting my wife. The benefits of a 20-year relationship can only be experienced by spending 20 years with someone. Inside and outside marriage, long-term relationships are powerful and unique. Who is someone you’d like to see in 2024? Make it happen - do something fun, together.

1,000 Day Pacing. 20 years ago, I had it all figured out. Well, not really. The arrival of my kids showed me I wasn’t as serene as I thought. But… the reality is, I’d figured out how I wanted to live, and the sort of people I wanted to spend time alongside. I don’t think my experience is unique.

Sometime in our 30s, we’ve had enough experience to know the sort of life we’d like to lead. 1,000 Day Pacing is about giving ourselves a mindset to patiently, and relentlessly, maintain a focus on building that life.

Setbacks happen, kids appear, family needs us… there are times when the right thing to do is put our desires to one side… for a period of time.

But listen to the voice that’s pointing towards your true nature. Attached to each of my not-to-dos is a period of my life when I was striving towards something that had no payoff.

My final tip, for today => Learn & Document. I can read my writing from 5, 10, 20 years ago and the core values of my younger self ring true.

Sharing my life, with all of you, has been a very positive experience. Not only for my own thinking, but because it draws like-minded people into my circle.

Next time, we’ll get into the nitty gritty of specific tactics I’ve added. If you want to play along then read this article by Tim Ferriss. I considered several of Tim’s questions against my 10-year plan. My answers are different than Tim’s and yours will be different than mine.