My Rating: 8/10

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Summary

Not a “good morning habits to win the day” kinda book. These habits are hard, and that’s (probably) what makes them valuable. I read this in the middle of doing my planning for 2020, then assembled the habits I want to remember into a checklist to refer back to on a daily basis. Excellent book for mid- to high-level personal development geeks.

Notes

We’ve also learned that there are habits for tactically getting ahead, and strategic habits for enjoying life. You’ll learn both.

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Achievement is not your problem—alignment is. If you’re reading these words, then the odds are that achievement is not the issue. You already know how to set goals, make checklists, knock off to-dos. You care about excelling in your chosen field. But odds are, you’re experiencing your fair share of stress and overwhelm. You can deliver, sure, but you’ll learn something every achiever must discover: Just because people want to put things on your plate because you’re good doesn’t mean you should let them. What’s achievable is not always what’s important. You

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As you will learn, meeting this definition of “succeeding beyond standard norms consistently over the long term” requires habits that protect your well-being, maintain positive relationships, and ensure that you serve others as you climb. You simply can’t beat the norms if you’ve driven yourself into the ground. As it turns out, high performers’ sustained success is due in large part to their healthy approach to living. It’s not just about achievement in a profession or in just one area of interest. It’s about creating a high performance life, in which you experience an ongoing feeling of full engagement, joy, and confidence that comes from being your best self.

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Seek clarity. Generate energy. Raise necessity. Increase productivity. Develop Influence. Demonstrate Courage.

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1. Habit One: Seek Clarity

1. Envision the future four (self, social, skills, service)
2. Determine the feeling you’re after
3. Define what’s meaningful

Knowing this, you might as well start with the end in mind. Start bringing your full attention to the moments of your life. Start bringing more joy. Start bringing more confidence.

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That’s not what achievers do. When they’re struggling, especially when they are unsure what they want, they tend to march on like good soldiers. They don’t want to mess things up. They’re afraid to make sudden changes because the reality is that things are good. They don’t want to walk away from everything they’ve worked so hard for. They don’t want to go backward or lose momentum or be overtaken by their coworkers or competitors.

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The essential habit of seeking clarity helps high performers keep engaged, growing, and fulfilled over the long haul.

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You generate clarity by asking questions, researching, trying new things, sorting through life’s opportunities, and sniffing out what’s right for you.

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focus on the future and divine how they would achieve excellence. They didn’t just know who they were; indeed, they rarely focused on their present personality or preferences. Instead, they consistently thought about who they wanted to be and how to become that.

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High performers are clear on their intentions for themselves, their social world, their skills, and their service to others.

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So what makes the difference is that high performers imagine a positive version of themselves in the future, and then they actively engage in trying to be that. This part about actively engaging is important. They aren’t waiting to demonstrate a characteristic next week or next month. They are living into their best self now.

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Be more intentional about who you want to become. Have vision beyond your current circumstances. Imagine your best future self, and start acting like that person today.

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Describe how you’ve perceived yourself in the following situations over the past several months—with your significant other, at work, with the kids or team, in social situations with strangers. Now ask, “Is that who I really see myself being in the future?” How would my future self look, feel, and behave differently in those situations? If you could describe yourself in just three aspirational words—words that would sum up who you are at your best in the future—what would those words be? Why are those words meaningful to you? Once you find your words, put them in your phone as an alarm label that goes off several times per day.

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I’ve found that high performers also regularly ask themselves a few primary questions right before interacting with people. They ask questions like these: How can I be a good person or leader in this upcoming situation? What will the other person(s) need? What kind of mood and tone do I want to set?

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What is apparent across all high performers is that they anticipate positive social interactions and they strive consciously and consistently to create them.

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They’ve thought about how they want to be remembered—they think about their character and legacy. High performers are looking out there, beyond today, beyond the meeting, beyond the month’s to-dos and obligations. They’re consistently wondering, “How do I want those I love and serve to remember me?”

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Do you know what the issue with that is? When you are constantly juggling and feel depleted, you don’t think about the future. You’re just trying to survive today, and so you start to lose your clear intention for your interactions with your family and teams tomorrow.

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They don’t draw a blank when you ask them, “What three skills are you currently working to develop so you’ll be more successful next year?”

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distinction: High performers are also working on skills that focus on what I call their primary field of interest (PFI). They aren’t scattershot learners. They’ve homed in on their passionate interests, and they set up activities or routines to develop skill in those areas. If they love music, they laser in on what kind of music they want to learn, and then study it. Their PFI is specific. They don’t just say “music” and then try to learn all forms of music—playing guitar, joining an orchestra, singing with a band.

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they know their passions and set up time to dial in the skills that will turn those passions into proficiencies. This means high performers approach their learning not as generalists but as specialists.

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The lesson was simple but powerful: Look to the future. Identify key skills. Obsessively develop those skills.

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I hope the takeaway is clear: No matter your current level of performance, clarifying your PFI and the skills you need to master for your next level of success must be a priority. Reconnecting with your passion and setting up structure to develop more skills related to it is a game changer.

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2. Habit Two: Generate Energy

1. Release tension, set intention
2. Bring the joy
3. Optimize Health

It turned out that Kate hadn’t actually spoken with any of her customers in years. She had become an internal executive in a big company, far removed from the front lines—and the real people that her organization served. So she started a monthly practice of visiting her customers and really listening to them and asking what they wanted from her company in the future. Soon, her enthusiasm for work came roaring back.

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“How can I serve people with excellence and make an extraordinary contribution to the world?”

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In our interviews, we found that high performers give an extraordinary amount of thought to questions of service: how to add value, inspire those around them, and make a difference. Their attention in this area could best be described as a search for relevance, differentiation, and excellence.

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The second practice that will help you heighten and sustain clarity in your life is to ask yourself frequently, “What is the primary feeling I want to bring to this situation, and what is the primary feeling I want to get from this situation?”

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the shower: “What can I get excited or enthusiastic about today?” That simple question has changed the way I walk into each day. Try

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What’s unique about high performers, though, is that connection often correlates with meaning, especially at work. Connection is less about comfort than about challenge. In other words, high performers feel that their work has more meaning when they are in a peer group that challenges them.

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Passion + Growth + Contribution = Personal Satisfaction Other researchers have found that security, autonomy, and balance can also be important to satisfaction, especially on the job.21

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Enthusiasm + Connection + Satisfaction + Coherence = Meaning

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You might recall that joy is one of the three defining positive emotions of the high performance experience. (Confidence and full engagement in the moment—often described as presence, flow, or mindfulness—are the other two.)

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It turns out that joy, more than anything else, is what gives them capital “E” Energy. If you feel joy, your mind, body, and emotional reality all get a lift.

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awesome. Just like everyone else, they experience negative emotions. It’s just that they cope with them better and, perhaps even more important, they consciously direct their thoughts and behaviors to generating positive emotion.

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What emerged from their responses is that high performers tend to follow similar habits every day. They tend to . . .

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. . . prime the emotions they want to experience, in advance of key events (or of the day in general). They think about how they want to feel, and ask themselves questions, or practice visualizations, that generate those feelings. (This aligns well with “focus on the feeling” from the previous chapter.) . . . anticipate positive outcomes from their actions. They’re optimistic and clearly believe that their actions will be rewarded. . . . imagine possible stressful situations and how their best self might gracefully handle them. As much as they anticipate positive outcomes, they’re realistic about hitting snags, and they prepare themselves for difficulties. . . . seek to insert appreciation, surprise, wonder, and challenge into their day. . . . steer social interactions toward positive emotions and experiences. They are what one respondent called “conscious goodness spreaders.” . . . reflect regularly on all that they’re grateful for.

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What can I be excited about today? What or who might trip me up or cause stress, and how can I respond in a positive way, from my highest self? Who can I surprise today with a thank-you, a gift, or a moment of appreciation?

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The second trigger I set was what I call a “door frame trigger.” Every time I walk through a doorway, I say to myself, “I will find the good in this room. I’m entering this space a happy man ready to serve.” This practice helps me get present, look for the good in others, and prepare my mind to help people. What positive phrase or sentence could you say to yourself every time you walk through a doorway?

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The fifth trigger I created was the “gift trigger.” Whenever something positive happens around me, I say, “What a gift!” I did this because so many high performers talked about how they felt a sense of reverence or sacredness in everyday life.

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His first was that whenever he felt stress and he was alone, he’d stand up, take ten deep breathes and then ask, “How would my best self handle this situation?” His other favorite was a trigger he set so that whenever his wife called his name, he would say to himself, “You are on this planet for this woman. Bring joy to her life.”

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“Well, I’ve become successful sleeping only five hours, so sleep isn’t a factor for me.” I said this, oblivious to the logical next thought: Imagine how much more successful I would be with just two more hours of sleep. Lack of sleep wasn’t the correlate to my success. That was not what was giving me the edge. But I was young and dumb. I started researching ways to hack my sleep in order to get less of it.

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This is a huge point that too many people miss: Exercise improves learning. Exercise also decreases stress, which is a killer of mental performance.28 Stress actually lowers BDNF and overall cognitive function, and exercise is your best bet for throwing off much of that stress.

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3. Habit Three: Raise Necessity

1. Know who needs your A game
2. Affirm the why
3. Level up your squad

The answer is a phrase that explains one of the most powerful drivers of human motivation and excellence: performance necessity.

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Necessity is the emotional drive that makes great performance a must instead of a preference. Unlike weaker desires that make you want to do something, necessity demands that you take action. When you feel necessity, you don’t sit around wishing or hoping. You get things done.

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“I feel a deep emotional drive and commitment to succeeding, and it consistently forces me to work hard, stay disciplined, and push myself.”

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Naturally, we all want to do a good job on things that are important to us. But high performers care even more about excellence and thus put more effort into their activities than others do.

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High performers don’t just know that they have high standards and want to excel; they check in several times throughout their day to see whether they are living up to those standards. It’s this self-monitoring that helps them get ahead.

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Striving to play at your best in any area of life can make you truly vulnerable. It’s scary to demand a lot of yourself and push to the boundaries of your capabilities. You might not do a good job. You might fail. If you don’t rise to the occasion, you can feel frustration, guilt, embarrassment, sadness, shame. Feeling that you have to do something isn’t always comfortable.

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necessarily. Sometimes, they have lots of interests, passions, and desires. But what they lack is that one thing, that abiding and unquenchable obsession. You know within minutes of meeting someone whether they have an obsession. If they have it, they’re curious, engaged, excited to learn and talk about something specific and deeply important to them. They say things like “I love doing what I do so much, I’m sort of obsessed.” Or “I live, eat, and breathe this; I can’t imagine doing something else—this is who I am.” They speak enthusiastically and articulately about a quest for excellence or mastery in their field, and they log the hours of study, practice, and preparation to achieve those ends. Their obsessions land on their calendars in real work efforts.

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I learned that when you have the opportunity to serve, you don’t complain about the effort involved. When you feel the drive to serve others, you sustain solid performance longer. This is one reason, for example, why members of the military are often so extraordinary. They have a sense of duty to something beyond themselves—their country and their comrades in arms.

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High performers are more focused on doing what really matters when it matters. But that’s not simply because high performers are superhuman and always focused on their own deadlines. In fact, for the most part, the real deadlines that high performers are marching to have been placed on them by others, by outside forces.

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Bottom line: We change and improve over time only when we must. When the internal and external forces on us are strong enough, we make it happen. We climb. And when it gets most difficult, we remember our cause. When we are afraid and battling hardship and darkness, we remember we came in the cause of light and we sustain positive performance over the long term.

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Set a “desk trigger” for yourself. From now on, whenever you sit down at your desk—that’s the trigger action—ask: “Who needs me on my A game the most right now?” Butt hits chair; then you ask and answer the question. That’s the practice. I love this practice for several reasons:

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Being on your A game means that you are giving your best effort with full focus on the singular task at hand. To get it, you need to stoke the internal and external demands of necessity.

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High Performers are like players but with greater all-around necessity, skill, and team spirit. They are all-in on the game. They play at a high level no matter what the recognition or rewards, because the game is intrinsically rewarding and also part of how they view their service to the world. Their identity is tied to the game but also to the team and those they serve. They don’t want to master just one area of the game; they want to be known for the game itself. And yet, unlike players, they don’t mind sharing the spotlight. They have such a high degree of personal excellence and duty to the team, they become the go-to person in every game. They stand out because they not only deliver exceptional individual performance but also make every person better through their influence.

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High performers don’t keep their goals, or the why behind those goals, secret or silent. They confidently affirm their goals to themselves and others. If there is one necessity practice that seems to divide high performers and underperformers the most, it’s this one.

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It is saying with confidence that something is true or will happen. This is the way high performers speak about their goals and their whys. They don’t sound doubtful. They have confidence in the reasons they are working so hard, and they are proud to tell you about their purpose.

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It’s in affirming their whys with other people that high performers not only feel more confident but create social consequence and obligation. If I tell you I’m going for a goal and why it’s so important to me, and if I speak as though it’s going to happen, declaring that I will make it happen, then my ego is now on the line. There are social stakes.

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Many, of course, laughed or played along. But I didn’t need them to affirm me; I needed to affirm myself publicly so I could create a situation where I needed to honor my word. As soon as I promised it, my human need for congruence motivated me even further to perform well and on time.

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I tell my clients that their job is to start spending more time with the best in their peer group, and less with the more negative members. That’s an easy win. But it’s not the full picture.

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Expand your peer group to include more people who have greater expertise or success than you, and spend more time with them. So it’s not just about increasing time with your current squad of positive or successful peers, but about adding new people to the squad as well.

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This means that with or without social support, you can use your thoughts to improve your mind, mood, memory, reactions, happiness, and performance.

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4. Habit Four: Increase Productivity

1. Increase the outputs that matter
2. Chart your five moves
3. Get insanely good at key skills (progressive mastery)

You must consistently think it through: “Have I associated the important activities of my day with my identity and my sense of obligation? Why is chasing this dream so important to me? Why must I do this? When must I do it? How can I get around more amazing people who up my game and help me serve at the next level?”

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Productivity starts with goals. When you have clear and challenging goals, you tend to be more focused and engaged, which leads to a greater sense of flow and enjoyment in what you’re doing.

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“One of the most common ways for the modern person to maintain self-deception is to keep busy all the time.” —Daniel Putnam

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I’ve found that it is useful to organize life into ten distinct categories: health, family, friends, intimate relationship (partner or marriage), mission/work, finances, adventure, hobby, spirituality, and emotion. When I’m working with clients, I often make them rate their happiness on a scale of 1 through 10 and also write their goals in each of these ten arenas every Sunday night. Most of them have never done that before. But doesn’t it stand to reason that only from measuring something in the first place can we determine whether it’s in “balance”? If you aren’t consistently measuring the major arenas of your life, then you couldn’t possibly know what the balance you seek is or is not.

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If you want to become extraordinary, you need to figure out the productive outputs that matter in your field or industry.

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High performers have mastered the art of prolific quality output (PQO). They produce more high-quality output than their peers over the long term, and that is how they become more effective, better known, more remembered. They aim their attention and consistent efforts toward PQO and minimize any distractions (including opportunities) that would steal them away from their craft.

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Figuring out what you are supposed to produce, and learning the priorities in the creation, quality, and frequency of that output, is one of the greatest breakthroughs you can have in your career.

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One of the great realizations of life can come from discovering that the outputs you are being compensated for are not exciting or fulfilling. When that realization comes, it’s time to honor that truth and make a change.

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I cannot overemphasize the importance of this strategy. Whenever I have to help a client increase high performance, quickly discovering what output they should be creating is one of my go-to strategies. No matter what topic or type of deliverables they decide to get productive toward, I have them reorient their entire work schedule toward that endeavor. As quickly as possible, I want them spending 60 percent or more of their workweek oriented to PQO.

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Why don’t more people focus on producing prolific quality output, especially given that they still have the 40 percent allocation for dealing with the inevitable obligations of work? The most common excuses (Is delusions a better word?) are procrastination and perfectionism.

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you that her cupcake business is still a priority, but dig into her calendar and you can see that “priority” no longer equates to work. Look closer and you’ll see that most of her efforts are unaligned. She’s busy, but she’s not progressing with purpose. What should she do now to get back on track? She should simplify, strip things down to the essential parts, and favor deep work. Most importantly, she should get a plan.

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I had already started building an e-mail list and had about ten friends with e-mail lists who agreed to promote some of my videos. Lining them all up took two weeks of begging and prodding. I spent three days shooting videos, and four days uploading them to a blog and creating an e-mail sequence. In sixty days total, I took The Millionaire Messenger from idea to number one New York Times bestseller, number one USA Today bestseller, number one Barnes and Noble bestseller, and number one Wall Street Journal bestseller. That includes thirty days of writing the book, then thirty days getting it ready for printing; creating the social media, web pages, bonuses, and videos; and getting people to agree to e-mail links to the videos to everyone on their lists. Five moves. Sixty days. Number one bestseller.

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It doesn’t matter whether you know how to achieve your Five Moves at first. The important thing is that for every major goal you have, you figure out the Five Moves. If you don’t know the moves, you lose.

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I know, this seems almost too simplistic. But I can’t tell you how many hopeful strivers I meet who can’t quickly answer “What are the five major projects you are working on, in sequential order, to achieve what you want?” Unfocused people respond with off-the-cuff thoughts, long lists of unnecessary things, a top-of-mind purge of ideas. High performers know. They can tell you what they’re working on and why that order, in exacting detail. They can open their calendar and show you the blocks of time they’ve allocated to their major goals and projects.

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My goal here is for you to determine the five major skills you need to develop over the next three years to grow into the person you hope to become. One principle lies at the heart of this effort: Everything is trainable. No matter what skill you want to learn, with enough training and practice and intention, you can become more proficient at it.

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I got committed and began a process of learning that I call “progressive mastery,” which quickly changed my life.

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These are the steps to progressive mastery:

• Determine a skill that you want to master.
• Set specific stretch goals on your path to developing that skill.
• Attach high levels of emotion and meaning to your journey and your results.
• Identify the factors critical to success, and develop your strengths in those areas (and fix your weaknesses with equal fervor).
• Develop visualizations that clearly imagine what success and failure look like.
• Schedule challenging practices developed by experts or through careful thought.
• Measure your progress and get outside feedback.
• Socialize your learning and efforts by practicing or competing with others.
• Continue setting higher-level goals so that you keep improving.
• Teach others what you are learning.

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The difference is that progressive mastery places a high emphasis on emotion, socialization, and teaching. In other words, you are more strategic and disciplined in how you attach emotion to your journey, enhance your capabilities by training or competing with others, and leverage the extraordinary power of teaching to discover greater insights into your own craft.

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Life is short. We’re only allotted so much time to make our mark. I say that’s all the more reason to get focused. Stop producing outputs that don’t make your soul sing. Avoid trying to be effective or efficient doing things that you’re not proud of and make no impact.

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5. Habit Five: Develop Influence

1. Teach people how to think
2. Challenge people to grow
3. Role model the way

A comprehensive meta-analysis on social skills found that personality does not correlate with “political skill,” which is how researchers often refer to influence or your ability to understand others and get them to act toward objectives. This skill predicts how well you do on tasks, your belief in yourself to do a good job (self-efficacy), and how positively others view you.

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Great leaders ask a lot of questions. Remember, people support what they create. When people get to contribute ideas, they have mental skin in the game. They want to back the ideas they helped shape.

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If you want more influence, remember: Ask and ask often.

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That’s why it’s important to master the habits on energy and productivity. People who score high in those categories tend to have more influence. It makes sense, right? If you’re more energized and on the path toward accomplishing your goals, you’re probably more willing to help others.

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The good news is that it’s easy to change this situation simply by demonstrating sincere appreciation for those you seek to influence. Since so many people feel ostracized, unappreciated, or undervalued, when you show up and give genuine praise, respect, and appreciation, you stand out.

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High performers challenge the people around them to rise to higher levels of performance themselves. If you could follow them around as they lead their lives, you would see that they consistently challenge others to raise the bar. They push people to get better, and they don’t apologize for it.

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The second area where you can challenge others concerns their connections with others—their relationships.

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High performing leaders call out anyone who is being inappropriate, rude, or dismissive of someone else on their team. High performing parents do the same thing with their children. They just don’t let bad behavior slide.

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What’s important to note here is that high performers are explicit in their expectations for how people should treat each other.

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“That’s too bad. You could have been good. A lot of students here need someone like you—someone willing to stand up for what they believe in. You could do a lot of good at the school, and you could learn to create good art and writing here. You have too much talent and potential not to use them in a creative endeavor. Just think about that. And if you ever think it’s a good idea to come back, let me know and I’ll be here for you. You don’t seem the type to quit anything.”

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What made her so remarkable? It comes down to three things: She taught us how to think. She challenged us. And she role modeled the way to influence a team to perform with excellence.

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But what I’ve found with high performers is that they think about it much more often and specifically in relation to how they are seeking to influence others. Meaning they aren’t just seeking to be a good person in general, as you would typically think of a role model—

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It’s less “I’m trying to be Mother Teresa” and more “I’m going to demonstrate a specific behavior so that others will emulate that exact behavior, which will help us move toward a specific result.”

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“How can you bring what made them so amazing into your company and your own leadership style? How can you be a role model to your people the way these two were to you?”

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further. “Juan, I’m just wondering if you could perhaps one day be just as good a role model to her as she is being to others and as your role models were to you. What would that look like?”

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“What if our real ability to be truly influential is our ability to be influenced?”

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6. Demonstrate Courage

1. Honor the struggle
2. Share your truth and ambitions
3. Find someone to fight for

I tend to get snarky about this. When someone posts their first diary-like video on social media like this, we are expected to applaud and say, “Oh, what courage!” If someone shares an idea during a brainstorm meeting, “Oh, what courage!” If a kid finishes a race, even if he comes in dead last, “Oh, what courage!”

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Sharing ideas during a brainstorm meeting at work is your job, so if you don’t get a hug for your courage, be satisfied with “great idea.”

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I speak up for myself even when it’s hard. I respond quickly to life’s challenges and emergencies rather than avoid them. I often take action despite feeling fear.

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is that high performers report taking action despite fear much more than others do. This fact shows up in our interviews and coaching sessions as well—it seems all high performers have a real sense of what courage means to them, and can articulate times when they demonstrated it.

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This happens to all of us. The more we do something successfully, the more comfortable we become with it. That’s why it’s so important for you to start living a more courageous life now. The more actions you take facing fear, expressing yourself, and helping others, the easier and less stressful these actions become.

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I think of courage as taking determined action to serve an authentic, noble, or life-enhancing goal, in the face of risk, fear, adversity, or opposition.9

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To achieve excellence requires hard work, discipline, routines that can become boring, the continual frustrations that accompany learning, adversities that test every measure of our heart and soul, and, above all, courage.

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When we learn to see struggle as a necessary, important, and positive part of our journey, then we can find true peace and personal power.

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Engage them wholeheartedly. Even when you feel overwhelmed, choose to go for a walk, focus on your breath, and consider the problem rather than avoid it. Look the problem in the eye and ask, “What is the next right action for me to take right now?” If you aren’t yet ready to take that action, plan. Study. Prepare yourself for when the fog lifts and you are called to lead.

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But for anyone who doubts or diminishes you, forget about it. Don’t bother trying to please them. Live a life that is yours. Don’t seek the approval of the doubters. You’ll find no lasting joy in seeking acknowledgment from others. If it comes, it’ll never be enough. So the only path left is to express your own truth and pursue your own dreams.

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Recently, I worked with an Olympic gold medalist. I asked, “When did the biggest gains come in your career?” She said, “When I finally started voicing my dreams to do this. Suddenly, people started pointing me in the right direction. They told me what to do, what skills I would need, who I should talk to, what equipment the pros used, who the best coaches were. I learned that if you open your mouth and shout from the rooftops what you want to do with your life, sure, some village idiots will show up and shout back all the reasons why you can’t. But all the village leaders come over and want to help. Life’s great that way.”

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The most important thing in connecting authentically with others is to share your true desires with them. They don’t have to approve or help or even brainstorm with you. This isn’t about them. This is about you having the courage to open to others just as the universe remains open to you. Try it. Each day, reveal to others a little bit more of what you’re thinking, feeling, dreaming of.

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This habit doesn’t take shape by a single momentous conversation with everyone you know. You don’t have to sit everyone you love down and tell them all the reasons you’ve been holding back from them and from life. You don’t have to shoot a video explaining your entire life and philosophy. Instead, just make it a daily practice to be sharing your thoughts and goals and feelings with others. Every day, share something with someone about what you really think and want in life.

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We will do more for others than for ourselves. And in doing something for others, we find our reason for courage, and our cause for focus and excellence.

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Who needs me, and who will I fight for the rest of this year?

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Pitfalls to avoid

Have you recently thought that some of the people you work with are idiots and that your ideas are always better? Yes, that qualifies. Not asking your team to review your big presentation and find its errors or omissions because you “got this”? Uh-oh. Getting cut off in traffic, then racing ahead to cut that guy off just to show him who’s boss—yep. Arguing your point over and over to your spouse even though they have been clear about their position and are not budging? Check. Failing to review your work because it’s always good enough? Dang. Minimizing someone else so you look better? Oops. Discounting another person’s ideas because they haven’t put in the time you have? Anything here seem familiar?

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You begin developing a more open and test-oriented mindset by flipping the earlier examples: To avoid thinking you’re superior to others, deliberately seek others’ ideas for improving anything you do: If you could improve on my idea, how would you go about it? Ask this question enough, and you’ll discover so many holes in your thinking, any sense of superiority begins to melt away in the harsh light of truth. Learning is the anvil on which humility is forged. If you find that your thinking is not being challenged enough or your growth has topped out, hire a coach, trainer, or therapist. Yes, hire someone. Sometimes, your immediate peer group can’t see beyond their knowledge of you.

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To avoid thinking you automatically deserve people’s admiration or compliance just because of who you are, where you came from, or what you’ve accomplished, remind yourself that trust is earned through caring for others, not bragging about yourself.

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Instead of believing that people don’t understand you and that they are to blame for the fights and failures in your life, take ownership of your actions by reflecting on your role. After a conflict, ask yourself, “Am I distorting this situation in any way to make myself feel like the misunderstood hero? Am I spinning a story to make myself feel better?

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So how can you avoid performance-sapping dissatisfaction? I suggest a big-picture reminder: Life is short, so decide to enjoy it. Instead of discontent, bring joy and honor to what you do. I promise you’ll start feeling more alive, motivated, and fulfilled.

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If your aim is to maintain high performance, please, allow yourself to feel the wins again. Don’t just hope to arrive somewhere someday and finally feel satisfied. Strive satisfied.

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Intense hard work sustained for too long becomes workaholism, creating work-home conflict, which hurts the well-being of the workaholic and the family members.19 That’s why I’m so passionate about alerting you so you don’t fall prey to obliviousness. You don’t want to be that person who is blindsided by what should have been

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Here’s the difficult mindset shift you’ll have to make once you hit high performance. It will feel in some ways like the antithesis of what you’ve been doing, like a dangerous and opposite approach, but it’s vitally important: Slow down, be more strategic, and say no more often.

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“Yes” got you into the game. Taking on a lot and pursuing a lot of interests helped you figure out your “thing.” But now that you’re succeeding, more yeses can start hurting you. “No” keeps you focused. To help you discern between the yeses and nos, you have to start thinking much more strategically. Strategic thinking means stripping things down to the essentials and planning their accomplishment out over months and years. This is hard, but you have to weigh opportunities differently now, measuring them against a much longer horizon. You can’t think just about how flashy something is this month. You have to be executing against a plan—your five moves—that’s already in place for the next several months. If the new thing you want to commit to doesn’t strategically move you toward your end goals, it must be delayed. Most opportunities in life that are really worthwhile and meaningful will still be here six months from now. If that’s hard to believe, it’s just because you’re new to success. So slow down; say no more often; be more strategic.

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In a world fraught with concerns about overwork, it turns out that working on our confidence might just be the save.

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High performers tell me it’s because when you are more confident, you are more willing to say no and more sure of what to focus on, which makes you more efficient and less prone to distraction.

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What I found was that high performers simply thought about things that gave them more confidence than others, more often did things that gave them more confidence than others, and avoided things that drain confidence more often than others did.

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In one way or another, all the top thirty high performers spoke about the competence-confidence loop. They credited their current level of confidence to their years of focus, learning, practice, and skill development. In fact, twenty-three of the thirty referenced these types of things first when discussing confidence. And not one mentioned hitting the lottery at birth with tons of confidence. They didn’t talk about general self-esteem as in “I like myself,” or “I feel good about me.”

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Living in congruence with the best of who we are is one of the primary motivations of humankind.

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If you can summon that curiosity and talk to enough people with that intention, you will gain confidence. At least, that’s what high performers have shared with us. High performers’ confidence, then, comes from a mindset that says, “I know I’ll do well with others because I’ll be genuinely interested in them because I want to learn.”

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