Success comes down to who can handle the boredom
“People talk about getting “amped up” to work on their goals. Whether it’s business or sports or art, you hear people say things like, “It all comes down to passion.” Or, “You have to really want it.” As a result, many of us get depressed when we lose focus or motivation because we think that successful people have some bottomless reserve of passion.”
But “really successful people feel the same lack of motivation as everyone else. The difference is that they still find a way to show up despite the feelings of boredom.
This means that “the greatest threat to success is not failure but boredom. We get bored with habits because they stop delighting us. The outcome becomes expected. And as our habits become ordinary, we start derailing our progress to seek novelty. Perhaps this is why we get caught up in a never-ending cycle, jumping from one workout to the next, one diet to the next, one business idea to the next. As soon as we experience the slightest dip in motivation, we begin seeking a new strategy — even if the old one was still working.” (1)
Instead of giving up when we feel the boredom, we should reflect on WHY we feel the boredom. Is it the familiar nature of it — the lack of new? Is it because we feel we have mastered the topic? Is it the repetition? Or because we don’t know how to proceed? Or the goal feels too big to achieve? Or something else?
How might we tackle each of those…?
The familiar: Even the familiar is never the same. Are we giving it our full attention to see the small changes that are occurring? Are we recognizing and celebrating small wins? How can we shift our focus from the known to the unknown areas that surround the familiar?
Mastered the topic: As the expert in a topic, how can we share this expertise with others? How can we move from a contributor on the topic to becoming a multiplier — someone who enables others to gain this skill and lead the topic.
The repetition: Are we aware of the value of repetition? As we are gaining new skills, it helps us grow. As we have mastered a topic we can perform it autopilot bringing focus, certainty and calmness to our day. Conversely, identifying repetitive tasks holds value too — they can be automated to free up time.
Stuck on how to proceed: Are we looking for the one correct next action? Trying to avoid mistakes? We can embrace the uncertainty and risk of failure by defining a few small experiments. The results of failed and successful experiments help us understand how we might best move forward. Overtime, the sum of learning helps us find the right path forward.
The goal feels to big: We often set ourselves ambitious goals. The North Star that ignites action. But if it is too far ahead, it can lead to paralysis rather than action. What is one tiny step that we can take to move towards it? We can start by boiling some water for a cup of tea, instead of boiling the whole ocean.
Feel the boredom. Stick with it. Reflect on its cause. And use it as fuel for your actions and success.
1) Source of quote: Book “Atomic Habits” by James Clear
