Why Consistency Is Overrated

3 Thoughts

I.

The most successful people I know have this uncanny ability to sit with mild discomfort for extended periods of time.

II.

The fastest way to change your life is to force yourself to level up by placing yourself in an environment where you feel like you don’t belong.

How to get ahead early in your career: find the highest performer you know and copy everything they do.

Mimicry is fundamentally baked into the psychology of every human being. Rather than trying to fight it, use it. Find the best people you know and spend as much time with them as you can.

III.

If you feel stuck, I strongly encourage you to wake up one hour earlier and dedicate that hour to working on the one thing you believe will drive your life forward the most.

Most people’s lives are determined by how they choose to spend the first hour of every morning.

2 Quotes

I.

Podcaster Chris Williamson on your content diet:

If your body is made up of things you put into your mouth, your mind is made of things you put into your eyes and ears.

Your content diet should be spirulina for the soul, not fast food for your amygdala.

II.

Researcher Daniel Schmachtenberger on the power of the written word:

“The written word as the primary type of media was probably required for democracy to work, because it required people to think well enough… and they were reading, which meant increased attention span of non-dopaminergic stuff, which also meant enough working memory to hear multiple perspectives.”

1 Game-Changing Idea: The Parable of Consistent Chris

There was once a woodsman who prided himself on his consistency. The village nicknamed him “Consistent Chris”.

Every morning before the sun rose, he would take his axe to the trees. His hands blistered, his shoulders ached, but still he chopped. Neighbors praised him for his discipline. “He never misses a day,” they said. “He will never go cold in winter.”

Chris believed it too. He measured his worth by the steady rhythm of his axe. The sound was proof of his consistency. Proof that he was moving forward.

One season, a new logging company set up camp at the edge of the forest. Chris laughed when he saw them. Their men lounged by fires while he worked. Their blades were not polished like his. Their hands not scarred. “They will never last,” he thought.

But when the company began its work, Chris’ smile disappeared. Fifty lumberjacks poured into the trees, each one driving a machine that could fell more timber in a day than he could in a year. The forest that had taken him decades to chip away at was gone in weeks.

Chris was furious. “This is unfair,” he shouted. “I worked harder. I was more consistent. I never missed a day.”

The foreman of the company looked at him and shrugged. “And yet here we are, with the wood.”

Chris realized too late that the world doesn’t reward the man who swings hardest, or longest, or most consistently. It rewards the one who finds leverage.

Consistency is comforting because it’s visible. You can see the blisters. You can count the hours. You can point to the stack of firewood and say, “I did this.” But consistency without leverage is a trap. It tricks you into believing progress is guaranteed when in truth you may be falling further behind.

The question is never, “Am I working hard enough?” The real question is, “Am I working on the right thing, with the right tools, in the right direction?”

The lumberjacks weren’t more disciplined. They simply had tools that multiplied their effort. And when force is multiplied, consistency for the sake of consistency becomes irrelevant.

Until next week,
Jay “Busy Isn’t Better” Yang

Ps. She ate that

Kind words for ‘You Can Just Do Things’

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