Triggers: Creating Behavior That Lasts by Marshall Goldsmith Flashcards
1
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Not all of us require a violent life-threatening knock on the head to change our behavior. It only seems that way. 258
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2
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A trigger is any stimulus that reshapes our thoughts and actions. 266
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Our environment is the most potent triggering mechanism in our lives—and not always for our benefit. We make plans, set goals, and stake our happiness on achieving these goals. But our environment constantly intervenes. 275
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4
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Fate is the hand of cards we’ve been dealt. Choice is how we play the hand. 282
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5
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The pain that comes with regret should be mandatory, not something to be shooed away like an annoying pet. When we make bad choices and fail ourselves or hurt the people we love, we should feel pain. That pain can be motivating and in the best sense, triggering—a reminder that maybe we messed up but we can do better. It’s one of the most powerful feelings guiding us to change. 322
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6
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Truth #1: Meaningful behavioral change is very hard to do. 345
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7
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three problems we face in introducing change into our lives. We can’t admit that we need to change—either because we’re unaware that a change is desirable, or, more likely, we’re aware but have reasoned our way into elaborate excuses that deny our need for change. 357
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8
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We do not appreciate inertia’s power over us. Given the choice, we prefer to do nothing—which 360
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9
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Inertia is the reason we never start the process of change. It takes extraordinary effort to stop doing something in our comfort zone (because it’s painless or familiar or mildly pleasurable) in order to start something difficult that will be good for us in the long run. 362
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10
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Truth #2: No one can make us change unless we truly want to change. 393
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11
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A man or woman who does not wholeheartedly commit to change will never change. 395
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12
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Some people say they want to change, but they don’t really mean it. 398
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13
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two-thirds of smokers who say they’d like to quit never even try. And of those who do try, nine out of ten fail. And of those who eventually quit—namely the most motivated and disciplined people—on average they fail six times before succeeding. 421
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14
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Everyone around you has to recognize that you’re changing. Relying on other people increases the degree of difficulty exponentially. 430
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15
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even when the individual and societal benefits of changing a specific behavior are indisputable, we are geniuses at inventing reasons to avoid change. 462
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16
Q
An excuse explains why we fell short of expectations after the fact. Our inner beliefs trigger failure before it happens. They sabotage lasting change by canceling its possibility. We employ these beliefs as articles of faith to justify our inaction and then wish away the result. I call them belief triggers. 472
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17
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- If I understand, I will do. 474
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18
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- I have willpower and won’t give in to temptation. 485
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19
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- Today is a special day. 496
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20
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- “At least I’m better than…” 503
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21
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- I shouldn’t need help and structure. 507
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22
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- I won’t get tired and my enthusiasm will not fade. 518
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- I have all the time in the world. 524
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- I won’t get distracted and nothing unexpected will occur. 530
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9. An epiphany will suddenly change my life. 546
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10. My change will be permanent and I will never have to worry again. 551
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11. My elimination of old problems will not bring on new problems. 564
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12. My efforts will be fairly rewarded. 574
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13. No one is paying attention to me. 583
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14. If I change I am “inauthentic.” 587
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15. I have the wisdom to assess my own behavior. 595
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help you understand how to close the gap between the “ideal you” and the “real you.” 476
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When we want to make an excuse for errant behavior, any day can be designated as a “special day.” 497
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Dr. Atul Gawande reported in The Checklist Manifesto, central line infections in intensive care units virtually disappear when doctors follow a simple five-point checklist involving rote procedures 509
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This is a natural response that combines three competing impulses: 1) our contempt for simplicity (only complexity is worthy of our attention); 2) our contempt for instruction and follow-up; and 3) our faith, however unfounded, that we can succeed all by ourselves. In combination these three trigger an unappealing exceptionalism in us. When we presume that we are better than people who need structure and guidance, we lack one of the most crucial ingredients for change: humility. 514
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1) we chronically underestimate the time it takes to get anything done; 2) we believe that time is open-ended and sufficiently spacious for us to get to all our self-improvement goals eventually. 525
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mathematical economics taught me about the high probability of low-probability events. We don’t plan for low-probability events because, by definition, any one of them is unlikely to occur. 534 yet the odds of at least one of these events occurring are high. 536
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Even when we get there, we cannot stay there without commitment and discipline. We have to keep going to the gym—forever. 561
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research shows that only two years after winning the lottery, the winners are not that much happier than they were before they collected their checks. 570
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if the reward is the only motivator people revert to their old ways, 580
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While our slow and steady improvement may not be as obvious to others as it is to us, when we revert to our previous behavior, people always notice. 585
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There is an even larger reason that explains why we don’t make the changes we want to make—greater than the high quality of our excuses or our devotion to our belief triggers. It’s called the environment. 606
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We think we are in sync with our environment, but actually it’s at war with us. We think we control our environment but in fact it controls us. We think our external environment is conspiring in our favor—that is, helping us—when actually it is taxing and draining us. It is not interested in what it can give us. It’s only interested in what it can take from us. 631
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Our environment is a nonstop triggering mechanism whose impact on our behavior is too significant to be ignored. 637
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I’ve learned how one tweak in the environment changes everything.* 662
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The most pernicious environments are the ones that compel us to compromise our sense of right and wrong. 664
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Our environment changes us even when we’re dealing one-on-one with people to whom we’d ordinarily show kindness. 673
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Some environments are designed precisely to lure us into acting against our interest. 698
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Dutch sleep researchers at Utrecht University call “bedtime procrastination.” 717
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Our environment isn’t static. It alters throughout our day. It’s a moving target, easy to miss. 726
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Every time we enter a new situation, with its mutating who-what-when-where-and-why specifics, we are surrendering ourselves to a new environment—and putting our goals, our plans, our behavioral integrity at risk. It’s a simple dynamic: a changing environment changes us. 732
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can easily start believing they’re immune to the environment’s ill will. In a frenzy of delusion, they actually believe they control their environment, not the other way around. 754
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If we do not create and control our environment, our environment creates and controls us. 786
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since learned that David Letterman lowered his Late Show studio temperature to a chilly 55 degrees before going onstage. He experimented with room temperatures in the 1980s and discovered that his jokes worked best at 55 degrees, which makes the sound crisper and the audience more alert. 789
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Feedback—both the act of giving it and taking it—is our first step in becoming smarter, more mindful about the connection between our environment and our behavior. 807
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A feedback loop comprises four stages: evidence, relevance, consequence, and action. 831
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Drivers get data about their speed in real time (evidence). The information gets their attention because it’s coupled with the posted speed limit, indicating whether they’re obeying or breaking the law (relevance). Aware that they’re speeding, drivers fear getting a ticket or hurting someone (consequence). So they slow down (action). 832
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our good behavior is not random. It’s logical. It follows a pattern. 846
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What if we could control our environment so it triggered our most desired behavior—like 859
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A behavioral trigger is any stimulus that impacts our behavior. 863
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1. A behavioral trigger can be direct or indirect. 865
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Direct triggers are stimuli that immediately and obviously impact behavior, with no intermediate steps between the triggering event and your response. You see a happy baby and smile. 866
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Indirect triggers take a more circuitous route before influencing behavior. 868
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2. A trigger can be internal or external. 870
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External triggers come from the environment, bombarding our five senses as well as our minds. Internal triggers come from thoughts or feelings that are not connected with any outside stimulus. 871
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3. A trigger can be conscious or unconscious. 876
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Conscious triggers require awareness. You know why your finger recoils when you touch the hot plate. Unconscious triggers shape your behavior beyond your awareness. 876
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4. A trigger can be anticipated or unexpected. We see anticipated triggers coming a mile away. 882
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5. A trigger can be encouraging or discouraging. Encouraging triggers push us to maintain or expand what we are doing. They are reinforcing. 887
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6. A trigger can be productive or counterproductive. This is the most important distinction. Productive triggers push us toward becoming the person we want to be. Counterproductive triggers pull us away. 892
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what we want often lures us away from what we need. 908
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Pain, of course, is the ultimate discouraging trigger: we immediately stop a behavior that hurts. 930
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a trigger is a problem only if my response to it creates a problem. 969
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The terms trigger and response suggest an uninterrupted A-to-B sequence with no breathing room for hesitation, reflection, and choice. Is that true? 980
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known as ABC, for antecedent, behavior, and consequence. 984
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The antecedent is the event that prompts the behavior. The behavior creates a consequence. 987
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The Power of Habit, Charles Duhigg applied this ABC template to breaking and forming habits. Instead of antecedent, behavior, and consequence, he used the terms cue, routine, and reward to describe the three-part sequence known as a habit loop. Smoking cigarettes is a habit loop consisting of stress (cue), nicotine stimulation (routine), leading to temporary psychic well-being (reward). 992
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Duhigg’s Golden Rule of Habit Change—keep the cue and reward, change the routine—but 996
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first the impulse, then the awareness, then a choice 1024
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Paradoxically, the big moments—packed with triggers, stress, raw emotions, high stakes, and thus high potential for disaster—are easy to handle. When successful people know it’s showtime, they prepare to put on a show. It’s the little moments that trigger some of our most outsized and unproductive responses: 1054
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Paul Hersey. Paul’s most durable contribution to the field of organizational behavior was a concept he called “situational leadership.” He developed it with my friend and hero, Ken Blanchard. 1087
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Hersey and Blanchard’s premise was that leaders need to adapt their style to fit the performance readiness of their followers. Readiness not only varies by person, it also varies by task. Followers have different levels of motivation and ability for different tasks. 1089
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Hersey and Blanchard believed that leaders should • keep track of the shifting levels of “readiness” among their followers, • stay highly attuned to each situation, • acknowledge that situations change constantly, and • fine-tune their leadership style to fit the follower’s readiness. This was “situational leadership.” 1094
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the relationship between leaders and their followers into four distinct styles: 1. Directing is for employees requiring a lot of specific guidance to complete the task. 1099
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2. Coaching is for employees who need more than average guidance to complete the task, but with above-average amounts of two-way dialogue. 1103
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3. Supporting is for employees with the skills to complete the task but who may lack the confidence to do it on their own. 1106
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4. Delegating is for employees who score high on motivation, ability, and confidence. 1109
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inside each of us are two separate personas. There’s the leader/planner/manager who plans to change his or her ways. And there’s the follower/doer/employee who must execute the plan. 1126
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Whether you’re leading other people or leading the follower in you, the obstacles to achieving your goals are the same. You still have to deal with an environment that is more hostile than supportive. You still have to face other people who tempt you away from your objectives. You still have to factor in the high probability of low-probability events. And you still have to consider that as the day goes on and your energy level diminishes, your motivation and self-discipline will flag. 1143
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The planner in us is delegating the job to the doer in us—and assuming it will get done. 1152
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We make plans that are wholly contradicted by our previous actions. The planner who intends to make a deadline is also the myopic doer who forgets that he has never made a deadline in his life. The planner believes this time will be different. The doer extends the streak of missed deadlines. 1196
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Mike Tyson said, “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face.” 1221
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As we wander through life, what punches us in the face repeatedly is our environment. 1222
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Forecasting is what we must do after acknowledging the environment’s power over us. It comprises three interconnected stages: anticipation, avoidance, and adjustment. 1245
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In the major moments of our lives, when the outcome really matters and failure is not an option, we are masters of anticipation. 1248
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The problem is that the majority of our day consists of minor moments, when we’re not thinking about the environment or our behavior because we don’t associate the situation with any consequences. 1260
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Peter Drucker famously said, “Half the leaders I have met don’t need to learn what to do. They need to learn what to stop.” 1283
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Quite often our smartest response to an environment is avoiding it. 1285
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we rarely triumph over an environment that is enjoyable. We’d rather continue enjoying it than abandon or avoid it. 1292
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It takes enormous willpower to stop doing something enjoyable. 1293
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This impulse to always engage rather than selectively avoid is one reason I’m called in to coach executives on their behavior.*2 It’s one of the most common behavioral issues among leaders: succumbing to the temptation to exercise power when they would be better off showing restraint. 1302
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To avoid undesirable behavior, avoid the environments where it is most likely to occur. 1335
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there are many moments in life when avoidance is impossible. We have to engage, even if doing so terrifies us 1339
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Adjustment, if we’re lucky, is the end product of forecasting—but only after we anticipate our environment’s impact and eliminate avoidance as an option. Adjustment doesn’t happen that often. 1341
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Most of us continue our errant ways unchecked. We succeed despite, not because of, falling into the same behavioral traps again and again. Adjustment happens when we’re desperate to change, 1343
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“dramatic narrative fallacy”—the notion that we have to spice up our day by accepting more, if not all, challenges, 1369
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Golfers believe a boring round of golf is a great round of golf. 1373
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there is no harder task for adults than changing our behavior. We are geniuses at coming up with reasons to avoid change. 1381
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One of our greatest instances of denial involves our relationship with our environment. We willfully ignore how profoundly the environment influences our behavior. 1383
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Creating represents the positive elements that we want to create in our future. • Preserving represents the positive elements that we want to keep in the future. • Eliminating represents the negative elements that we want to eliminate in the future. • Accepting represents the negative elements that we need to accept in the future. 1406
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Successful leaders don’t behave inappropriately across the board (if they did, they’d be unemployed). But they often behave inappropriately in one or two areas, which colors people’s perceptions of everything else they do. 1435
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“Tradition with a future,” she called her radical combination of preserving and creating, which inspired the organization with new purpose. 1452
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A politician once told me, “The most thankless decision I make is the one that prevents something bad from happening, because I can never prove that I prevented something even worse.” Preserving is the same. We rarely get credit for not messing up a good thing. It’s a tactic that looks brilliant only in hindsight—and only to the individual doing the preserving. 1454
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“What in my life is worth keeping?” 1457
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preserving a valuable behavior means one less behavior we have to change. 1458
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When someone tells me I’m “too good” my brain shifts into neutral—and I bask in the praise. But Hersey wasn’t done with me. “You’re not investing in your future,” he said. “You’re not researching and writing and coming up with new things to say. You can continue doing what you’re doing for a long time. But you’ll never become the person you want to be.” 1466
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Peter Drucker’s words, I was “sacrificing the future on the altar of today.” 1470
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Creating is innovating, taking risks on new ventures, creating new profit centers within the company. Preserving is not losing sight of your core business. Eliminating is shutting down or selling off the businesses that no longer fit. 1483
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our natural impulse is to think wishfully (that is, favor the optimal, discount the negative) rather than realistically. 1495
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We take in what we want to hear, but tune out the displeasing notes that we need to hear. 1497
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our episodes of nonacceptance trigger more bad behavior than the fallout from our creating, preserving, and eliminating combined. 1512
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Good things happen when we ask ourselves what we need to create, preserve, eliminate, and accept—a 1561
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Apology is where behavioral change begins. 1590
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Asking for help is a magic move. 1590
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Optimism—not only feeling it inside but showing it on the outside—is a magic move. 1591
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a fourth magic move: asking active questions. 1595
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American company’s $10 billion investment in training programs to boost employee engagement. 1603
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passive questions can be the natural enemy of taking personal responsibility and demonstrating accountability. They can give people the unearned permission to pass the buck to anyone and anything but themselves. 1620
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(Gallup research in 2011 showed almost no improvement—with 71 percent of Americans saying that they are “disengaged” or “actively disengaged” in their work. 1647
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The four levels of engagement:
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- Committed: The proactively positive employees would examine the card as if they’d never seen it before, 1665
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- Professional: Then there are the passively positive responses, 1672
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- Cynical: The most common response I get is the passively negative tone of “That’s nice, sir.” 1674
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- Hostile: At the bottom of the engagement barrel are the proactively negative types who dislike their jobs and can barely tolerate me. 1677
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I was still holding the employer, not the employee, solely responsible for creating engaged workers. 1692
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Did you do your best to be happy? 2. Did you do your best to find meaning? 3. Did you do your best to build positive relationships with people? 4. Did you do your best to be fully engaged? 1709
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The results were amazingly consistent. The control group showed little change (as control groups are wont to do). The passive questions group reported positive improvement in all four areas. The active questions group doubled that improvement on every item! 1713
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Here are the six Engaging Questions I settled on—and why. 1. Did I do my best to set clear goals today? 1726
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2. Did I do my best to make progress toward my goals today? Teresa Amabile, in her scrupulous research and in The Progress Principle, has shown that employees who have a sense of “making progress” are more engaged than those who don’t. 1735
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We don’t just need specific targets; we need to see ourselves nearing, not receding from, the target. 1737
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3. Did I do my best to find meaning today? 1739
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It’s up to us, not an outside agency like our company, to provide meaning. 1743
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4. Did I do my best to be happy today? People still debate if happiness is a factor in employee engagement. I think that because happiness goes hand in hand with meaning, you need both. 1744
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Daniel Gilbert shows in Stumbling on Happiness, we are lousy at predicting what will make us happy. We think our source of happiness is “out there” 1748
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5. Did I do my best to build positive relationships today? The Gallup company asked employees, “Do you have a best friend at work?” and found the answers directly related to engagement. 1752
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One of the best ways to “have a best friend” is to “be a best friend.” 1754
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6. Did I do my best to be fully engaged today? This gets to the head-spinning core of the Engaging Questions: To increase our level of engagement, we must ask ourselves if we’re doing our best to be engaged. 1756
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active self-questioning can trigger a new way of interacting with our world. 1771
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• Did I do my best to be happy? • Did I do my best to find meaning? • Did I do my best to have a healthy diet? • Did I do my best to be a good husband? 1794
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Adding the words “did I do my best” added the element of trying into the equation. It injected personal ownership and responsibility into my question-and-answer process. 1803
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Here’s my current list of twenty-two “Did I do my best?” questions that I review every day: 1816
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your Daily Questions should reflect your objectives. 1839
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Injecting the phrase “Did I do my best to…” triggers trying. Trying not only changes our behavior but how we interpret and react to that behavior. 1851
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“Within two weeks,” I announce, “half of you will give up and stop answering the Daily Questions.” 1870
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Successful people show up with an arsenal of previous achievements that they can apply to new challenges. 1939
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One of the unappreciated benefits of Daily Questions is that they force us to quantify an unfamiliar data point: our level of trying. 1963
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The shorter the time gap between our planning and our doing, the greater the chance that we’ll remember our plan. 1968
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We can always get better at something, even if it’s just preserving the progress we’ve made. 2015
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This is where Daily Questions can be a game-changer. They create a more congenial environment for us to succeed at behavioral change, in several ways. 2021
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1. Daily Questions - reinforce our commitment. Daily Questions are what behavioral economists refer to as a “commitment device.” The questions announce our intention to do something and, at the risk of private disappointment or public humiliation, they commit us to doing it. 2023
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2. Daily Questions - ignite our motivation where we need it, not where we don’t. Generally speaking, we are guided by two kinds of motivation. Intrinsic motivation is wanting to do something for its own sake, because we enjoy it, 2041
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Extrinsic motivation is doing something for external rewards such as other people’s approval or to avoid punishment. 2047
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my public speaking would never come up as a Daily Question—because I don’t need to monitor my motivation as a speaker. In this area, I’m already maxed out. 2057
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Daily Questions press us to face them, admit them, and write them down. 2059
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3. Daily Questions - They highlight the difference between self-discipline and self-control. 2061
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Self-discipline refers to achieving desirable behavior. Self-control refers to avoiding undesirable behavior. 2063
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4. Daily Questions - They shrink our goals into manageable increments. 2074
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we want to see results now, not later. We see the gap between the effort required today and the reward we’ll reap in an undetermined future—and lose our enthusiasm for change. We crave instant gratification and chafe at the prospect of prolonged trying. 2076
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Daily Questions, by definition, compel us to take things one day at a time. 2078
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Daily Questions remind us that: • Change doesn’t happen overnight. • Success is the sum of small efforts repeated day in and day out. • If we make the effort, we will get better. If we don’t, we won’t. 2082
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The only essential element is that the scores are reported somehow—via direct phone contact, email, or a voice message—to someone every day. And that someone is the coach. 2098
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At the highest level, a coach is a source of mediation, bridging the gap between the visionary Planner and short-sighted Doer in us. 2109
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A Coach reminds us of the unreliable person we become after we make our plans. 2112
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behavioral change—talking about it, writing books about it, helping others achieve it—is my life. And yet I have to pay a woman named Kate to call me every night to follow up on how I’m doing! This isn’t professional hypocrisy, as if I’m a chef who won’t eat his own cooking. It’s a public admission that I’m weak. We’re all weak. The process of change is hard enough without grabbing all the help we can get. 2146
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three benefits of Daily Questions.
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1. If we do it, we get better. 2188
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2. We get better faster. 2192
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3. Eventually we become our own Coach. 2201
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the Farsighted Planner and Myopic Doer in us. Coaches can bridge that gap because they’re objective, not caught up in the environment that so often corrupts us. 2204
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after the starving children of Mali, I knew I hadn’t earned the right to victimhood. 2238
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repeat this mantra: “Never complain because the airplane is late. There are people in the world who have problems you cannot imagine. You are a lucky man.” 2240
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you should be asking yourself whenever you must choose to either engage or “let it go.” Am I willing, at this time, to make the investment required to make a positive difference on this topic? 2255
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AIWATT (it rhymes with “say what”). 2260
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It’s Always an Empty Boat The Buddhist wisdom is contained in the Parable of the Empty Boat: A young farmer was covered with sweat as he paddled his boat up the river. He was going upstream to deliver his produce to the village. It was a hot day, and he wanted to make his delivery and get home before dark. As he looked ahead, he spied another vessel, heading rapidly downstream toward his boat. He rowed furiously to get out of the way, but it didn’t seem to help. He shouted, “Change direction! You are going to hit me!” To no avail. The vessel hit his boat with a violent thud. He cried out, “You idiot! How could you manage to hit my boat in the middle of this wide river?” As he glared into the boat, seeking out the individual responsible for the accident, he realized no one was there. He had been screaming at an empty boat that had broken free of its moorings and was floating downstream with the current. 2264
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We behave more calmly when we learn that it’s an empty boat. With no available scapegoat, we can’t get upset. We make peace with the fact that our misfortune was the result of fate or bad luck. 2275
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The moral: there’s never anyone in the other boat. We are always screaming at an empty vessel. 2277
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“How much sleep is that person losing over you tonight?” I ask. “None.” “Who is being punished here? Who is doing the punishing?” I ask. 2290
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getting mad at people for being who they are makes as much sense as getting mad at a chair for being a chair. The chair cannot help but be a chair, and neither can most of the people we encounter. 2293
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“false positives”—making statements to upgrade ourselves, often at the expense of others—and they appear in many forms: 2304
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We’re trying to prove how smart we are to an empty boat! 2331
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AIWATT is the delaying mechanism we should be deploying in the interval between trigger and behavior—after a trigger creates an impulse and before behavior we may regret. AIWATT creates a split-second delay 2334
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Am I willing implies that we are exercising volition—taking responsibility—rather than surfing along the waves of inertia that otherwise rule our day. We are asking, “Do I really want to do this?” At this time reminds us that we’re operating in the present. Circumstances will differ later on, demanding a different response. The only issue is what we’re facing now. To make the investment required reminds us that responding to others is work, an expenditure of time, energy, and opportunity. And, like any investment, our resources are finite. We are asking, “Is this really the best use of my time?” To make a positive difference places the emphasis on the kinder, gentler side of our nature. It’s a reminder that we can help create a better us or a better world. If we’re not accomplishing one or the other, why are we getting involved? On this topic focuses us on the matter at hand. We can’t solve every problem. The time we spend on topics where we can’t make a positive difference is stolen from topics where we can. 2337
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Confirmation bias—our tendency to favor information that confirms our opinions, whether it’s true or not—is an established psychological concept. It afflicts how we gather information (selectively), interpret it (prejudicially), and recall it (unreliably). 2394
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when you cite demonstrable facts to counter another person’s belief, a phenomenon that researchers call “the backfire effect” takes over. Your brilliant marshaling of data not only fails to persuade the believer, it backfires and strengthens his or her belief. 2402
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“Every decision in the world is made by the person who has the power to make the decision. Make peace with that.” 2411
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Is this battle worth fighting? If your answer is no, put the decision behind you and plant your flag where you can make a positive difference. If your answer is yes, go for it. 2420
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Business Plan Review (BPR) process that he has developed is the most effective use of organizational structure that I have ever observed. 2457
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We do not get better without structure. 2459
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one of structure’s major contributions to any change process. It limits our options so that we’re not thrown off course by externalities. 2504
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Imposing structure on parts of our day is how we seize control of our otherwise unruly environment. 2507
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We do not get better without structure, whether we’re targeting an organizational goal or a personal one. But it has to be structure that fits the situation and the personalities involved. 2531
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The agenda for each meeting was a sheet of paper with the following questions: • Where are we going? • Where are you going? • What is going well? • Where can we improve? • How can I help you? • How can you help me? 2560
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Structure not only increases our chance of success, it makes us more efficient at it. 2601
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social psychologist Roy F. Baumeister coined the term ego depletion in the 1990s to describe this phenomenon. 2620
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Like fuel in a gas tank, our self-control is finite and runs down with steady use. By the end of the day, we’re worn down and vulnerable to foolish choices. 2626
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the more fatigued we get in handling subsequent decisions. Researchers call this decision fatigue, a state that leaves us with two courses of action: 1) we make careless choices or 2) we surrender to the status quo and do nothing. 2630
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Israeli parole board. Researchers discovered that prisoners who appeared before the board early in the morning were granted parole 70 percent of the time while prisoners appearing late in the day were approved only 10 percent of the time. 2634
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all the natural urges we try to rein in during the day have the potential to rush toward center stage as the day progresses and our depletion increases. It doesn’t mean they will materialize, but they’re lurking within us, waiting for the right trigger. 2658
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Making big decisions late in the day is an obvious risk. 2678
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Structure is how we overcome depletion. In an almost magical way, structure slows down how fast our discipline and self-control disappear. When we have structure, we don’t have to make as many choices; we just follow the plan. And the net result is we’re not being depleted as quickly. 2684
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We need help when we’re least likely to get it. Our environment is loaded with surprises that trigger odd, unfamiliar responses from us. 2721
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a simple structure that (a) anticipates that our environment will take a shot at us and (b) triggers a smart, productive response rather than foolish behavior. I suggest that simple structure is a variation on the Daily Questions, 2740
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pretend that you are going to be tested at every meeting! 2766
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Adapting Daily Questions into Hourly Questions creates a powerful structure for locating ourselves in the moment. 2787
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The simpler the structure, the more likely we’ll stick with it. 2824
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Pre-awareness. Successful people are generally good at anticipating environments where their best behavior is at risk. 2826
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Commitment. Successful people aren’t wishy-washy about a course of action. 2831
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Awareness. We’re most vulnerable to our environment’s whims when we ignore its impact on us. 2833
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Scoring. Grading our performance adds reflection to mindfulness. It’s a force multiplier for awareness. 2836
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Repetition. The best part of Hourly Questions is their rinse-and-repeat frequency. 2839
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I won’t eat the wonderful dessert. Sometimes I make a pact with the person sitting next to me: neither of us will succumb to the temptation of dessert. Sometimes, like Odysseus putting wax in his sailors’ ears, I ask the waitstaff to ignore me if I attempt to order dessert. 2867
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test myself hourly, and doing so reminds me that I am not an unconscious victim of my environment. 2872
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The best we can hope for is a consistency in our effort—a 2881
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For most things we suspend our hypercritical faculties and find satisfaction with the merely good. The economist Herbert Simon called this “satisficing”—our tendency to commodify everyday choices because chasing that last bit of improvement is not worth the time or effort. It will not significantly increase our happiness or satisfaction. 2892
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four environments that trigger good enough behavior. 1. When our motivation is marginal. 2909
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Skill is the beating heart of high motivation. The more skill we have for the task at hand, the easier it is to do a good job. The easier to do a good job, the more we enjoy it. The more we enjoy it, 2922
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Marginal motivation produces a marginal outcome. 2945
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We also underestimate how the quality of our goals affects our motivation. 2947
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If your motivation for a task or goal is in any way compromised—because you lack the skill, or don’t take the task seriously, or think what you’ve done so far is good enough—don’t take it on. Find something else to show the world how much you care, not how little. 2955
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2. When we’re working pro bono. 2958
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We think that because we raised our hand to help out we can raise our hand to opt out at the inconvenient moments. 2972
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Integrity is an all-or-nothing virtue (like being half pregnant, there’s no such thing as semi-integrity). 2974
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Pro bono is an adjective, not an excuse. If you think doing folks a favor justifies doing less than your best, you’re not doing anyone any favors, including yourself. People forget your promise, remember your performance. 2980
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3. When we behave like “amateurs”. 2985
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Who among us hasn’t noticed how in our home environment we behave in ways we’d never tolerate in a work environment? 3003
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A professional shoots for the highest standards. An amateur settles for good enough. 3010
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We segregate the parts we’re good at from the parts we’re not—and treat our strengths as the real us. The weaknesses are an aberration; they belong to a stranger, someone we refuse to acknowledge as us. 3025
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We are professionals at what we do, amateurs at what we want to become. 3028
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I learned that if I change my behavior, I change the people around me. 3100
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We can’t change until we know what to change. 3142
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“Never wrestle with a pig—because you both get dirty but the pig loves it”). 3147
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A speech, no matter how pointed or eloquently delivered, rarely triggers lasting change—not if we lack a compelling reason to change. 3169
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We rarely blame ourselves for mistakes or bad choices when the environment is such a convenient fall guy. 3183
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Honestly assessing the interplay in our lives between these two forces—the environment and ourselves—is how we become the person we want to be. 3185
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The first objective is awareness—being awake to what’s going on around us. Few of us go through our day being more than fractionally aware. We turn off our brains when we travel or commute to work. Our minds wander in meetings. 3193
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The second is engagement. We’re not only awake in our environment, we’re actively participating in it—and the people who matter to us recognize our engagement. 3196
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When we lack awareness (in many cases because we are lost in what we’re doing or feeling), we are easily triggered. The gap from trigger to impulse to behavior is instantaneous. 3230
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A trigger leads to an impulse, which leads directly to a behavior, which creates another trigger—and so on. 3231
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think about one change, one triggering gesture, that you won’t regret later on. That’s the only criterion: you won’t feel sorry you did it. 3275
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