System life
How to organize life to cope with uncertainty and achieve results without burnout
Semyon Kolosov

Dedicated to my wife Nastya,

without whom I would never

have dared to write this book…

Translator Anastasiia Maltseva

Illustrator Kamila Udachina

© Semyon Kolosov, 2024

© Anastasiia Maltseva, translation, 2024

© Kamila Udachina, illustrations, 2024

ISBN 978-5-0060-2540-0

Created with Ridero smart publishing system

Introduction

About the author

Let me introduce myself. My name is Semyon Kolosov. I will briefly tell my story so that it will become clear who I am and why I wrote this book. I live in Moscow and work at red_mad_robot. I started my career in the company as a manager, then worked as an operating director in a design laboratory and now I work at Verno by red_mad_robot in the same position. We are engaged in solving business problems through consulting and training. I have a wife, a child, an apartment, an iPhone and photos from traveling on social media. It wasn’t always like that. I was born and grew up in the small town of Novogrodovka. It is located in the east of Ukraine and has a population of 14 thousand people. My dad is a retired miner, and my mom works in the Department of Social Protection of the population. In 2006, I graduated from high school and went to Donetsk to study as a computer systems engineer at Donetsk National Technical University. In 2011, I graduated and started working. I worked as a system administrator in an auto repair shop, then provided the Internet to apartments. In 2012, I got a job as a filling machine operator at a plant for the production of infusion solutions. My future wife and I rented an apartment on the outskirts of Donetsk. She worked for an insurance company, and I had night shifts at the factory. Then a more or less stable and adult life began.

This went on for 1.5 years. Even before that, my life began to resemble Groundhog Day, and I was thinking about drastic changes. I wanted to move somewhere to completely change the situation to a more promising one. I even started to develop a relocation plan. And I mean a serious structural plan, not just a set of abstract steps. To do this, I started studying planning, which led me to the topics of time management, goal setting, thinking, risk management and etc. But there will be no beautiful story of how I ran from war to the great success. Although the aggravation of the situation made its own adjustments, and I had to step into uncertainty faster than I expected. Therefore, I know firsthand what it means to get out of the comfort zone. In 2014, I moved to Moscow. Without citizenship, connections, work experience and skills, I found the job I had always dreamed of. I learned everything myself and now I’m doing what I love in one of the most modern cities in the world. In red_mad_robot, I went from manager to COO. I launched new services, built business processes and was a mentor for managers. Today I participate in the creation of programs for pumping soft skills and building digital practices. Every day I communicate with talented and hardworking people who want to change the world. For 8 years I have been studying management, psychology, the brain and different types of thinking for my own development and training of others.

Over the years, I have built my own life management system, developed by experience and proven in practice. I treat life like a manager always and everywhere. Whether it’s going to a hike or developing a digital service. I have my own system of processes, tools and approaches. I analyzed what influenced my development and what hindered it. I have gathered the most valuable things together and I want to share them with you. This is not a silver bullet, not an authentic idea or rules for a successful life but rather a set of well-known tools grouped into a sequence of processes that provide me with clarity, flexibility, productivity and development. That is, my subjective view and experience on the organization of life. When I communicate with people, and they find out about it, they are divided into two types: some twist their finger at the temple, others ask to teach them to do the same. I am always happy to help people and share my knowledge. In the book, that’s exactly what I’m going to do.

About the book

How the idea came about

It all started with the fact that I often began to hear from colleagues and friends: «Semyon, when are you going to write a book?» Where did such questions come from? Firstly, I read quite a lot: I can read several books a month. At work, I am mostly surrounded by people who also read a lot. red_mad_robot has a strong corporate culture that is focused on growth. The company is full of activities for the exchange and generation of knowledge. We often discussed books there. We argued a lot and exchanged opinions. Sometimes my point of view did not coincide with the author of the book, but was welcomed by colleagues during the discussion. Almost always such a discussion ended with a joke that it was time for me to write my own version of the book. Secondly, people often point out that I tell interesting stories. Probably, this allows me to do a broad outlook and life experience. I am only 33 at the time of writing the book, but various events and decisions allowed me to collect a good amount of experience that tested me for strength and pumped my soft skills. Thirdly, I have accumulated a lot of information about the organization of life from incoming sources that I have ever read, watched and listened to as well as the results of my research on this topic, which were transformed into notes, presentations and speeches. I shared them with people, they kept them for themselves and later gave a good feedback.

Thanks to these factors, for the first time I began to think that I had knowledge that could be recorded and shared with people. The idea took root after a dialogue with my friend Yana Djibouti. She said she didn’t have time for anything, although she had no problems with time management. She’s like Richard Branson, only the female version. She has an infinite number of interests, hobbies and projects. I told her about my task management system. She liked it and asked me to teach her. In a couple of phone calls, I explained everything to her, and she began to implement it. After a couple of weeks, she said that it became much easier for her to control everything, and she started to have more time. Although there were still many questions, and not all the tools were involved, the conversation ended with the fact that it would be cool to make a course or write a book on the topic of organizing life. We even came up with a few names. The current title of the book «System Life» was also among them. So, there was an idea. There were a lot of fears and barriers to start, but more on that later. I was also helped by the desire not only to share useful experiences, but also to show that anyone can write a book. So that people who are afraid, waiting for signs, knowledge or status, start sharing knowledge. That it is not necessary to launch rockets, own a multibillion-dollar marketplace or a unicorn startup to make your own or someone else’s life better. I coped with my barriers myself, but I spent a lot of time on it. I hope this book will be a support for you, help you organize your life and start something new.

How to read this book

I wanted to write a book that you can start reading from any chapter. I wanted it to be small, and to have everything you need. So that at any time you can turn to it, get benefits and not read other books. When I started writing, I realized that it was as impossible as to make a project quickly, cheaply and efficiently. This simply cannot happen. Life is not a goal, but a process. System life is an integrated approach in the form of a continuous cycle of six processes: analysis, planning, management, optimization, reflection and training.

The cycle of system life

The content of the approach is so large that it can be endlessly studied and experimented with details. You can even understand it in your own way and create your own approach. I tried to select a sequence of six processes in order to catch on to groups of tools and approaches within each. Each chapter is about a separate process that is interconnected with other processes. If you don’t start reading from the beginning, you won’t understand what’s going on. You will also see references to previous chapters and other books. You can always go back to the previous chapter, but it’s better not to switch to the recommended books right away. Read the book to the end, figure out how the whole approach works. Then you will be able to plan further studying of the materials more effectively for yourself. Otherwise, diving into the details of other books may take you in the wrong direction.

I’ve read a lot of non-fiction books. Somewhere I sighed that it was written beautifully in the book, but it doesn’t work that way in real life, and somewhere I found useful insights. Some motivate, others instruct, others teach life, and others show research. There will be nothing like that in this book. I’m not going to motivate you, teach you life and give a bunch of evidence that it works. I don’t see the point in giving banal advice. Everyone knows that smoking is harmful. If a person is shown studies proving the harm of smoking, then he will agree, he will be sad, but most will not quit. Therefore, I don’t see the point in stuffing the book with hundreds of footnotes that no one reads. My goal is to explain how and what processes need to be started in life in order to build a life management system that I use. To make it easier and more organic. Without a thousand proofs, psychological violence and persuasion. So that motivation starts working naturally, and not under the whiplash.

Having received the template of my approach, you will be able to string all the other knowledge and experience on it. You can attribute almost any book to one of the processes and make a list for pumping it. For the sake of this approach, many details had to be sacrificed. Therefore, we will go through some topics at the top level, and I will show you what other books you need to read to understand them. I made a choice in favor of the overall picture before diving into the details of individual fragments. So, anyone can go from the general to the particular and go deeper where necessary. Such a process seems to me more logical and clearer. At the end, you will receive a list of 60 books that will improve your life and make it more systematic.

It is best to read the book step by step from beginning to end. Mark what you already know and where there are blind spots. You can attach notes, write on pages, highlight text, fold pages and etc. Do everything that will allow you to get more benefit from this book. After reading it, take a fresh look at the approach of system life from above, update the blind spots that need to be worked out first. What processes need to be fixed, what tools can be implemented, what knowledge is missing. After reading it, you will already know what to do next. «Just repeat after me» will not work. Although I think the approach is universal, but when you start using it, it will be yours. It will evolve and adapt over time. The main thing is to understand how it works and not to lose these processes in life. Their launch in any form will have a positive impact on your life. Since the basis of my approach is common sense. And here I tried to collect it not only from my own experience and knowledge, but also from the experience of my friends, colleagues and authors of other books. When you understand the meaning and principle of the approach, you will be able to use any tools and implement new processes for yourself. I want to give you a fishing rod, not a fish. So that you can learn to think in a systematic way and be able to get any fish in any conditions. And understand what needed to be studied and implemented for a bigger catch.

I am not an omniscient teacher; I am an ordinary person who wants to share his experience to save your time and effort. I will be glad to receive any feedback about the book and make my approach even better. I am sure that there are still many approaches and knowledge that I have yet to study with you. It’s easy to find me on social media. So, press like buttons, subscribe to new videos, and let’s go!

Introduction

Perhaps the world is a trash can

into which a burning lighter is thrown…

A. Nikonov

After 2014, two thoughts became ingrained in me. The first is that the world is unstable, and anything can happen. The second – tomorrow may not come. I automatically accepted that there is no safe place anywhere, there are no guarantees, and no one knows what will happen next.

How can this be described? In the 1990s, Stefan Garros, a doctor of behavioral sciences, described an unstable, constantly changing model of combat operations with the concept of VUCA. This acronym combines four concepts: «volatility», «uncertainty», «complexity» and «ambiguity». In the 2000s, this concept gradually moved into the business sphere, and over the last decade we have seen that these four words are a description of our world. People began to understand and accept the VUCA world. Even books and approaches for survival in it began to appear. But the pandemic has made its own adjustments to the level of instability. Today we are dealing with an even more complex world than VUCA. The writer and futurist James Cascio described our world with the abbreviation BANI: «brittle», «anxious», «nonlinear» and «incomprehensible». As soon as we began to get used to the fact that everything was changing quickly, life switched to a new level of complexity. Impermanence has become fragile. Any system can break down, even if it looks reliable at first glance. Uncertainty has given rise to anxiety. The endless stream of changes, information and discoveries drives us into chronic anxiety. No one is sure of the correctness of their decisions and there are no guarantees. Complexity has been enriched by non-linearity. Cause-and-effect relationships stop working. There is no point in predicting the future. Look at what is happening with forecasts in the economy and in politics. The ambiguous became incomprehensible. More and more discoveries are being made that refute many years of knowledge. We’re learning more and more that we actually don’t know anything. The most interesting thing is that you can’t get off our planet. All that’s left for us to do is only to accept that there is no stable world anymore. Outside the window is a stressful and constantly changing world, which tomorrow may be called a new abbreviation. The only way to live is to adapt! Learn to live in a new dynamic system, rebuild the management of life and accept this uncertainty. Such a peace gradually came for everyone. And each person must adapt to their current situation. Everyone should learn how to plan their movement, react to changes and change plans along the way. We all took off on a rocket that is being completed during the flight. Therefore, today it is very important what and how you will do. Today, you can’t forget everything and lie on the couch looking for your destiny for half your life. You can’t go with the flow and think you’re going to be lucky. This approach will throw you overboard very quickly today. Everyone decides for himself: take responsibility for his life or play Russian roulette with uncertainty.

In the current reality, just time management no longer works. A more comprehensive approach is needed. Structural, flexible, selective and conscious.

«The world is not so sunny and friendly. This is a very dangerous, tough place. And if you just give up, it will knock you over with such force that you will not get up anymore. Neither you nor I, no one in the world beats as hard as life. It doesn’t matter at all how you hit, but it matters what kind of punch you hold, how you move forward…»

Rocky Balboa

This book is about such an approach. When you do the right things in an organized way, and do not hold punches that can be avoided. It is written to help you take control of your life as much as possible. It consists of six chapters. Each chapter is devoted to one of the processes that are going into a cycle and help ensure system life. The book is primarily about thinking, not about tools. At first it will seem that there is too much information. But as you read, the design will add up to a single picture. In the end, when you can look at the whole approach, everything will fall into place, systematize and become simple. Each person can set up this way of thinking and follow an understandable path to the result. If you know how to drive, then remember yourself in the first lessons with an instructor. If you don’t know how, then imagine that you are studying. Remember or imagine the same feeling and fear when you don’t know what to grab and where to look, threats seem to be everywhere, and stress turns off your brain. The purpose of this book is to make sure that behind the wheel of your life there is a confident driver who does everything automatically, confidently drives a car and guarantees the safety of himself and passengers on any new route.

Review of the book

Chapter 1. Analysis

Before you start moving, you need to analyze the current situation. In this chapter, we will figure out how to do this, what resources, barriers and opportunities you have. What goals seem important, and how to understand which ones are really important. Let’s analyze self-realization, values, skills, root causes of problems, and what you lack to achieve your goals. When we analyze the current situation, it is important to treat it correctly and tune in to the start. To do this, let’s figure out how motivation works, how to properly prepare and strengthen confidence.

Chapter 2. Planning

When it becomes clear what we have in the current situation, and there is the right attitude, you need to plan your route. This chapter will be about how to set goals correctly and plan their step-by-step achievement. How to prioritize, set tasks and assess risks. Let’s analyze what to do in conditions of uncertainty and how to apply Agile approaches in life.

Chapter 3. Management

When the movement along the route has begun, it is important to manage yourself correctly and use time effectively. In this chapter, we will set up our digital self-organization system. We will analyze the most effective tools and techniques of time management, learn how to make decisions, relax properly and make useful habits.

Chapter 4. Optimization

There will be obstacles, mistakes and time wasters along the way. In this chapter we will talk about how to optimize processes, automate routine, configure tools and space for rational usage of resources. I will share my experience and approaches that allow you to optimize anything.

Chapter 5. Reflection

After each iteration, you need to consciously stop and summarize everything. In this chapter we will talk about the benefits of retrospective reflection. How to properly reflect and draw the right conclusions to improve your path and yourself in the future.

Chapter 6. Training

When you get to this chapter, you will already know what you should learn and in which direction to develop. Here you will learn why learning is just beginning, how to study properly and what skills to develop in order to always be flexible and in demand.

Chapter 1. Analysis

Prologue

Do what you can with what you

have and there where you are…

Theodore Roosevelt

Why do we start with analysis if we can start doing it right away? After all, they shout from every corner: stop thinking, don’t be a coward, take it and do it. They say that all the boundaries are in our head, they advise us to believe and visualize. To answer this question, read two tasks:

1. Two planes were flying at the same speed. One plane was in the air for 2 hours, and the other for 4 hours and flew 1400 km more than the first one. How many km did each plane fly?

2. Imagine that you have come up with a teleport at an affordable price. Anyone can get anywhere in the world instantly. What work do governments need to do because of such changes?

The first task is standard. If you have been studying at school for a long time, then it will even seem like a difficult task for you, but for a student with a portable speaker, it is simple. The main thing is that the problem has a clear «given», accurate input data, there is an exact answer and an algorithm for solving using specific formulas. You take it and decide. The second task is non – standard and abstract. There is not a single correct answer in it. There are many alternatives, components and uncertainties in it. It is immediately unclear how to approach her.

The same about ambitious goal and the whole life. Life is a constant process of replacing some goals with others with increasing complexity. This ensures movement along the path of life without a destination. Growing from goal to goal gives pleasure from this process and makes you happy. There is a starting point «A» (your current situation) and a final point «B» (your goal). When you set yourself a goal and know what you need to do to achieve it, then this is a simple task. You don’t even have to read books for her. You just need to do it. Apply the well-known formula, as in the problem about airplanes. When you set an ambitious goal that you have not previously achieved and do not know how to do it, then this is a complex abstract task. Difficult goals give a strong result. The path to a difficult goal is always working with the future and what you do not know, do not know how, do not expect. Therefore, you can’t just take a step from point «A» to point «B» because you start going with what you have in the current situation. Neither with a case of money, nor with extra hours in the day, nor with someone’s help. Just what you have – and go ahead. Analysis is the starting action in any process that will allow you to build a reliable foundation for a bridge from point «A» to «B». If we do not know how to get to point «B», then this does not mean that we will read the tea leaves and learn to believe in the great success. We will analyze and try to get our «given» in a difficult task. This will help you plan not in a vacuum and build on real data. The main task of the analysis is to understand where we want to go, and what is there for this. Analysis gives awareness and reduces rapid irrational reactions to events. This allows you to plan the shortest route. And also see the possibilities that can simplify and speed it up.

«The main thing in chess is not how many moves ahead you think, but how you analyze the current situation…»

Garry Kasparov

For myself, I have identified important groups of resources and opportunities that are important to analyze at the beginning. These include: the spheres of life, environment, skills, motivation and mindset. I noticed that the changes in these groups began to have a positive effect on my life. And I have also repeatedly seen how problems in these groups prevented people from changing their lives for the better. Then we’ll talk about each group in more detail. Fasten your seat belts, we’re starting.

Spheres of life

To analyze the current state of life, you can use the pop tool «Balance Wheel». Don’t rush to close the book. It’s not what you think. The balance wheel is used by different coaches, it has become boring to everyone and seems a bit childish. But no matter how cool and smart you are, this tool clearly shows the situation and raises questions about itself. More than once I observed the reaction «Oh, c’mon, why do we need this wheel anyway» when people filled it in. And then they could not tear themselves away in reasoning about what this wheel consists of, and what kind of assessment should be put there. It doesn’t matter in what form you do it, even if it’s just a list. The grades you set are important. For example, I just use columns, as in the equalizer in the player.

Balance equalizer

The main goal is not to balance the wheel, but to see your life settings. So, you can make an upper-level slice to move from the general to the particular. How to set a preset in the equalizer and make more subtle settings? For example, you select «rock» and the sliders fall into place. Then you tweak it for yourself and get a sound that suits you. So, let’s use the concept of «Balance equalizer», not «Wheel». And we will also agree that our goal is to see the current state of the spheres of life, and not to balance them. I don’t believe that the wheel can be balanced in general. It will change over the course of life, as values and the concept of happiness will change. Therefore, it will look different in different periods.

You know perfectly well what to do. Take a piece of paper or an online service. Draw 10 columns: «health», «energy», «time», «family», «love», «finances», «friends/environment», «career/business», «hobbies», «development». This is the base, and usually it is enough. Once it was decided that the balance of these spheres would make life happy. All people are unique and think in their own categories. Therefore, the wheel format raises questions again. Everything that you consider an important part of life, you can add as a new column. For example, I add «recreation», «sports» and «nutrition» separately. They are included in the «health» by default, but it is important for me to see and record the assessment separately. There is no need to delve into and come up with what is included in each item. If it’s hard to figure out, then divide one item into two different ones. When the columns are ready, then evaluate each sphere on a 10-point scale, where from 0 to 3 is a complete absence or minimal satisfaction; from 4 to 7 is an average degree, something has already been achieved, but not ideal; from 8 to 10 is maximum satisfaction.

It is important to identify fundamental problem areas. To improve anything, you need to understand what is wrong there now. Then fix it, achieve stability and then further growth. Very often, after watching enough successful posts or seeing an imbalance in the balance wheel, people immediately think about high goals and begin to take rash actions. For example, they buy a gym membership, and then it gets dusty on the table since there is a lot of work, no strength, etc. It’s not their fault. This is how our brain works. It doesn’t understand the past and the future. It perceives thoughts about a beautiful body as if you already have a beautiful body. Gives you a kick, you do harsh things, and then comes up with an explanation to save energy. At such moments, the owner of the fitness club rejoices and pumps the sphere of finance in the balance wheel at your expense. If you didn’t know, then fitness clubs know about this mechanism, and this is their earnings model. You buy a subscription and don’t go there. Just send your money and that’s it. It’s perfect. By this I want to say that before you aim at a big goal, you need to patch holes in fundamental things.

If you have from 1 to 3 on the balance wheel in the areas of «health», «energy», «time», «finance», then starting to move towards a big goal is like bailing out water with a bucket in a boat with a hole. It is always necessary to solve fundamental problems first in order to be in line for new changes. Evaluate your spheres of life, highlight the areas with the smallest ratings. Then line them up in a list from the most important to the least important. The top 4 must include: «health», «energy», «time» and «finance». If you have bad grades there, then forget about everything else for now and concentrate on them. Without them, you simply will not be able to start and finish the job.

Environment

Everyone knows the proverbs «tell me who your friend is, and I’ll tell you who you are» or «two peas in a pod.» They are most cheerfully known as «London is the capital of Great Britain». Every second person utters them, but has never meaningfully thought about his environment and its influence. The environment is one of the strongest factors affecting you. Each person pays attention to social connections with 150 people. Real social connections, not all 600 friends on a social network. The figure of 150 was confirmed by the evolutionary psychologist Robin Dunbar back in the 60s. In his theory, he calls all 150 people friends, but in fact, real friends are about 5 people. Then there are 15 people of friends and acquaintances. They make up your close circle of friends.

Model of a person’s social environment

At each level, you spend time communicating, giving emotions, energy and thoughts. And what is important – you also get them from the environment. Someone is charging you and supporting you. Someone is just crying to you or complaining about life. Someone wants to discuss gossip or impose their interests. Someone has not achieved anything themselves and does not want you to achieve it. Someone is genuinely happy for you, and someone smiles into your eyes, and then discusses with their friends what an asshole you are.

Until 2013, I myself had never thought about the environment. I’ve always been surrounded by my best friends. We had common interests and each other’s support. We studied, worked, had a cool vacation and made music. It was a great time; it was a separate life. Then some left Donetsk, and some lived far away. We rarely saw each other, and messengers were not so popular then. Most of the time I was working. I went to the factory, where most of my entourage were factory workers. There were a lot of cool guys there, but the composition of the shifts often changed, and I rarely crossed paths with them. Then I just got into the universe of workers, where many people think that no one can achieve anything on their own, that everywhere there are small salaries, the bosses are assholes, they all pumped themselves into cars and apartments, and the president does not worry about our well – being, and we are simply used as slaves. There were shifts of 12 hours, so I listened to this attitude to life and the world almost around the clock. I couldn’t not communicate, but I didn’t support anyone either. I thought that if I don’t think so, then I just listen to them like a radio, and it doesn’t affect me. One day, in another conversation with my wife about buying an apartment in Donetsk, I caught myself thinking that I also began to think so. That everyone is to blame for me, and apartments cost a lot of money, and you can’t earn money on them in an honest way. I just felt that I was becoming like these people at the factory. Whose goals in life do not go beyond a bottle of cognac on the weekend. After that, I just got sick of work, and I wanted to change everything. Country, city, job, everything to completely reset. So that Will Smith «flashed» me a device from «Men in Black», and I forgot all about these times.

Then I started getting interested in moving to Moscow. Thinking about all relocation options, laws, documents, housing, etc. At the same time, I got into a shift with a new chemist, Evgeny Kazakov. We immediately got along, became friends, and I found out that he also wanted to leave. We quickly joined forces on the issue of relocation. We sat in the airlock for 7 hours every shift and discussed moving options. I remember looking at Moscow job offers and admiring big salaries of 25,000 rubles. We can say that getting to know Zheka saved me. From the «hands are beginning to give up, let it be what it will be» mode, I switched to the «I will do everything to achieve what I want» mode. Every day at 6 a.m. I went to the bus and wanted to come to work as soon as possible to discuss with Zheka what information I found and what he did. When everything came true, I clearly understood that you can get anything you want. The main thing is to do something, try and not stop. This situation has changed my thinking and attitude to difficulties. One person was then my positive environment. Imagine if there were 12 of them. Who would support and believe with me. This does not mean that my wife, parents and friends did not support me. I just didn’t tell them about my plans and was constantly at work.

There is a famous statement «Crab bucket theory». It says that the crabs put in the bucket will pull down the crab that starts to get out of this bucket. Therefore, the sooner you meaningfully analyze your environment and remove all the crabs from there, the sooner you will feel changes for the better. Unfortunately, often in our environment, negative energy comes from those closest to us. Our parents, relatives, friends do not believe in us, question our success and abilities. There is one way to deal with this. If there are crabs among friends and colleagues, then such communication should be stopped as soon as possible. You don’t have to call them or write: «get out, bloodsucker, we don’t communicate anymore.» Just smoothly exit the communication and reduce it to zero. If such people are among parents, friends, relatives, then you need to agree that they do not say anything negative to you and do not complain. The main thing is to clearly distinguish requests for help from meaningless whining. From experience, I am sure that a small part will succeed. The rest will have hard work, difficult decisions or psychological stability. If you have such friends, relatives or family members, honestly and politely explain your thought once or twice. Explain that you are uncomfortable and you don’t know how to react. If nothing changes, they ignore you, continue bombarding you with dirt and negativity, then this means that they don’t care. They just satisfy their needs by communicating with you. Like, who, if not you, will listen to them? Stop this communication. It won’t lead to anything good.

«A person will be more willing to manipulate other people for the sake of getting support than he will agree to stand on his own feet to wipe his own ass»

Frederick Perls

Many will say that I am cruel and suggest cutting off communication with relatives and friends. Yes, that’s what I suggest, if there is nothing positive or neutral in this communication. Only you need to try to break not the whole connection, but the line of negative communication. But if it doesn’t work out, then it’s better not to communicate at all than to spoil your life. Or you can be among the lucky ones who will learn not to take everything personally and ignore the negative. I have seen many times how people spend years on painful or toxic communication. This is a step to nowhere. The question is very sensitive, because often people themselves do not understand that they are in a negative environment. No need to act hastily. Always try to help, but if everything is to no avail, then there’s nothing else for you to do except for either to endure or to avoid negative influence. Choose what is the lesser of evils for you.

Analyze your environment for energy, value, and needs. It sounds mercantile, but this is the only way to assess the situation soberly. You need to understand what this communication with a specific person is giving to you. For example, you communicate with someone because you have common interests, it charges you, you relax, get knowledge or give knowledge, and you like it. Write down a list of all the people with whom you communicate the most. Next to each in several columns, write: how long have you been communicating, what kind of need do you fulfill (why do you communicate with them, what do you like about it), what kind of energy do you get (how does it affect you), what have you learned or can learn, what topics were talked about last time. Then make a plan to strengthen and expand communication with good people. With whom you are comfortable communicating, they are ready to support you, share their experience and sincerely rejoice for your success. Try to make changes in your life to spend more time with positive people. Also make a plan to get rid of bad contacts. And do not forget that for someone you are also a close environment. Your behavior also affects other people’s lives. Let this influence be positive.

Skills and qualities

We carry out any activity with the help of competencies. Competence is a set of skills and the ability to use them to perform certain tasks. In simple terms, you have your own skills and qualities that help develop current and new skills. Which allow you to perform roles in different situations. In the analysis, our task is to understand what is the arsenal of skills and qualities at the moment. After all, remember that no one will give you an Iron Man costume. We have only ourselves. So, it doesn’t matter what you think about your skills, you need to analyze yourself for superpowers and growth points. You don’t need to focus on what you don’t know how to do, but you want to. Maybe you don’t need it. We’ll figure this out later. For those who think that they don’t know anything and can’t do anything, I’ll say right away: there are no people who can’t do anything. Up to the current age, you received different experiences, adopted other people’s attitudes and existed in this world. All people have the potential for development and degradation. You definitely have superpowers. You just don’t know about it yet or have never tried to find them. Until today, your skills have provided you with different functions for different roles. For example, driver, manager, parent, salesman, pilot, etc. All these are roles, and each needs its own skills. Looking ahead, we can say that life is a set of projects in which you need to play different roles. The path to your goals also consists of projects. If you haven’t reached the goal yet, then most likely you don’t know what projects it consists of, or you haven’t completed all the necessary projects. At this stage of the analysis, it is necessary to deal with what is there. To make it easier, start with the current activity. Write down the activity that you are doing now, that you like, and that you are doing well, in your opinion and the opinion of your friends, acquaintances and relatives. For each activity, write down the skills that you already use and which are needed for its execution. Write down what you know. If you don’t know what you like, then skip it. Fill it out later. Interview your friends and acquaintances. Ask them the question: «What do you think I’m doing well?». You can learn something new about yourself and very pleasant. If at this stage you already know the skills you want to develop, then write them down. It is important that they are dictated by the goal, and not because it is now in trend, or the son of a mom’s friend can do it, but you can’t. If you have encountered a problem and could not solve it, then write down what skills were not enough for this. Also write down your achievements at the moment with an explanation of what helped you do it. Forget about your emotions and opinions. Imagine that they put a gun to your temple and forced you to praise yourself. Write down everything you can praise yourself for. Any, even the smallest achievement.

«There are no irreplaceable, there are unique…»

GROT

The qualities you possess are no less important. They can be the seed from which you will grow the necessary skills. It is important to admit to yourself and describe your qualities as honestly as possible. What do you consider strong qualities and weak ones. This is a subjective assessment, but we need to start from something. Qualities help to form flexible skills or, as they are commonly called, «soft skills». Harvard scientists say that flexible skills account for 85% of a person’s success in the profession, rigid ones account for only 15%. Today, flexible skills are a trend, but we will talk about this in the chapter about training. Therefore, honestly describe your qualities. Without checking with a list of good and bad qualities. Just write what you consider to be the strong and weak qualities of your character. There is no purpose to praise or scold yourself. You need to take a picture of your character and understand what can already be used for growth, and what needs to be tightened. Correcting qualities is difficult. Most of them were formed in childhood, some more thanks to life experience. To change the qualities, sometimes you may need the help of a specialist. Most often, nothing needs to be changed, and the help of a career consultant puts everything in its place. But for now, just finish reading this book. Most likely, the next few chapters and a little consistency will solve your problems.

Mindset

I used to often hear that you are what you think. I don’t agree with that. You can think as much as you want, but you will never do it. In order to change something or decide on something, there must be a certain mindset. Mindset is a type or way of thinking. We can also say that this is a person’s worldview. In principle, it depends on him how and with whom you will move towards the goal, what will be the reaction and actions in case of difficulties and mistakes. Your confidence, attitude, courage and speed of change depend on it. You’re not what you think you are. You are what you do. To do the right thing, you need to put things in order in your way of thinking. To do this, you need to analyze your thoughts. The American psychologist Carol Dweck devoted a lot of work to the topic of mindset. She is an expert in social psychology and developmental psychology. She has a book, which in the original is called «Mindset». We have translated it as «Flexible consciousness». It explains that success in various spheres of life is not just a special talent or ability. Basically, this is the result of how we look at life. The idea of the book is that there is a «growth mindset» and a «fixed mindset». In short, the first is cool, and the second is bad. Carol’s book contains many examples from sports, business and personal stories that explain the role of a growth mindset for success, and how a fixed mindset contributes to failure.

Without abstruse books, it is clear that a positive attitude is good. Who would you go to Everest with? With someone who believes and longs for victory? Or with a pessimist who constantly whines and sees negativity everywhere? You will say that believing and longing is not yet done – and you will be right. Just attitude is not enough. Your installations are important, the firmware of your thinking.

Fixed mindset settings assume that every person has a certain set of skills from birth, whether professional, social or other. Such people usually think that:

• I was born this way so nothing can be changed;

• Abilities and intelligence are transmitted by genes, not everyone has them;

• I would be able to, too, if I had the capabilities like his/hers;

• Failure is bad, I will be ashamed of what people will think;

• Why take it on if I don’t know how to do it;

• It is not for me because it’s very difficult.

And other thoughts like that. People with a fixed mindset like phrases like «yes, what are you getting yourself into, it’s not for you», «what if», «yes, I’ve already seen a lot who didn’t succeed» and so on. The image of such people is well shown in the second verse of Kasta’s song «Way higher». Its meaning can be described roughly as «Dry bread at home is better than roast meat abroad.» I think this phrase was invented by the most important boss of people with a fixed mindset. Of course, it is better that there are no such people around you. Surround yourself with people who will pull you up. Life is already full of people who want to pull you down.

People with a growth mindset are diametrically opposite. The mindset of growth is based on the fact that any skill or competence can be developed. That everything can be achieved if you figure it out and act. People with such a mindset will think like this:

• Nothing is predetermined, everything depends on me;

• If you try, you will definitely succeed;

• Mistakes are not scary, it’s an experience;

• You need to learn new things in order to use new approaches;

• I don’t care what people think, I’ll try;

• I can achieve anything, it’s a matter of resources and skills.

It turns out that all people are divided into a kind of pessimists and optimists, confident and insecure people. Most people who call themselves «pessimists» or «skeptics» are afraid of failure. Therefore, they choose comfortable pessimism. There are no trials and problems in pessimism. As well as there is no growth and development. Many people usually say that they are not pessimists, but realists and just soberly assess the situation. That they have already had experience, and they know how it will be. Therefore, it is better not to go into something that you do not understand, it is better not to take risks. Such people are not confident; they did not draw conclusions from the failure and gave up. They usually work well for those who are confident. Insecure people are easier to manage, give loans, use for their needs. Some pessimists even understand this and try to get out with the help of silver bullets: courses, trainings and marathons. They are taught there to visualize, look for motivation, say «yes» to everything and praise themselves in front of the mirror. But it doesn’t help, because it doesn’t change the mindset.

«A pessimist is first of all a homeless person. To be an optimist, you need to work hard»

Mario Corella

To make steps towards growth, you need a growth mindset. To change the mindset, you need to work hard on yourself. It’s funny that every person has a growth mindset from birth. Look at the children, they are super confident. They try to get up and walk. They fall, but they get up and go. No one develops learned helplessness; no one thinks that it is painful, shameful and scary. They just do it. They just don’t understand a lot of things that adults understand. But look at the omniscient adults, most are not sure about anything.

«Everyone knows that this is impossible. But here comes an ignoramus who does not know this – he makes a discovery»

Albert Einstein

Before graduating from university, I was such a child with a growth mindset. Thanks to Mom. She has always said since childhood that I am the best, and I can do anything. I never thought about the fears of failure and did not doubt myself. But after university I acquired pessimism. When it turned out that no one needed a diamond like me without work experience, I became more and more pessimistic. I didn’t know what to do. I was feeling blue and I was ready to accept any job. Working at the factory, I stopped believing that I could achieve something. I didn’t even think about what I wanted, and I didn’t make any plans for life. Finally, my wife did not let me get bogged down in this swamp. Sometimes her critical thinking can’t stop in time, and she may start to worry, but she has always been against pessimistic views. She is exactly the person who knows how to enjoy life and enjoy the moment. She was probably assigned to me so that I wouldn’t go crazy for unknown merits in my past life. She was just talking to my negative thoughts: «Why do you think that? What facts are your thoughts based on?» I immediately rushed into the argument, explained to her that she did not understand anything. But every time it turned out that I had no arguments. I was just winding myself up with negativity and generating problems that might not have happened. I was engaged in forecasting and was sad. Then I was captured by a fixed mindset. I was afraid to solve difficult tasks, I wanted to justify my inaction with barriers and to absolve myself of responsibility.

Our brain contributes to the consolidation of a fixed mindset. It always overestimates threats, underestimates opportunities, and downplays the resources you have. Therefore, it is very important to analyze your mindset for parasitic thoughts. They limit growth. They keep you from taking a step that can change your life. Although this step doesn’t have to be big. It may be microscopic, but you will not dare to take it, because you are afraid of even a small risk. All people are biologically equal, but they develop differently. There are no genes of genius and super intelligence. There are only your thoughts that limit or trigger actions. You can continue to complain that something is not given to you. Or you can just start learning something new, try, experiment and improve yourself. If you notice a fixed mindset in yourself, then urgently understand this topic. Better put my book aside, read «Mindset» by Carol Dweck and then continue. Without the growth mindset, useful information will be blocked, there will be no trust in it, and you will be forever looking for a silver bullet. System life is an exoskeleton for the growth mindset. You just need to start implementing it, and you will see that you are also capable of a lot. The whole book is written so as not to give you precedents for fixing a fixed mindset. So that you approach any changes, challenges or problems boldly and do not feel fear. Without any «what if, what if», etc. So that there is no doubt about achieving the result, and there is confidence that you will not give the back.

Motivation and vector

Today, the Internet is full of videos and articles about how to look for motivation. Supposedly there is «you» and your «goal», but there is no motivation. You really want something, but you don’t do it. You would love to, but there is no motivation. And the puzzle does not add up in any way, and the movement towards the goal does not begin. There are many definitions of motivation. I like it when motivation is called a natural emotional state that encourages action. Because the key word here is «natural». Whatever definition you come across, the essence of motivation is the same – if you don’t want something, then you won’t do it. And if you want, then you will do it. Of course, if there are no insurmountable or time constraints. This is all you need to know about motivation and its nature. You need to figure out what you want and why, and not look for a button that will kick you in the ass so that motivation is revealed. If motivation needs to be sought in a special way, then how can we watch TV shows without it, spend money on junk food or go to the dentist. Everything happens by itself. Invisible forces are activated, prompt to action and do not calm down until there is a result. These invisible forces are called stimulation and motivation.

Incentives stimulate, not motivate, that’s the big difference. Incentive (Latin. stimulus) is a stick of an elephant driver or a sharp metal tip on a pole, which is used to drive a bull. In scientific terms, it is a strong motivating moment; an internal or external factor that causes a reaction, an action. In physiology and psychophysiology, this concept is identical to the concept of irritation. Everything is clear here. The stimulus is like a stick that hits us on the back. It causes pain and discomfort, from which you want to run away. And motivation is the desire to satisfy the significant needs of a person. Otherwise, we can say that these are the true desires of a person. What exactly he\she wants. These processes are not a secret development of information gypsies or a method of unscrupulous coaches. They exist exactly as long as people exist, and are conditioned by basic human needs. What was the main human need when people ran with clubs through forests and lived in caves? Protect yourself, survive and continue the race. This task was carried out and is being carried out by the instinct of self-preservation. In every person, it manifests itself in the form of escape and curiosity. Escape is an incentive to avoid danger, and curiosity is a motive to learn and master new things for adaptation and survival. In a group, the instinct of self-preservation through social interaction moves a person up the hierarchical ladder, to power, or down, under the protection of those who are stronger. In order for the species not to become extinct, it is necessary to reproduce. We are not animals for whom reproduction is just an instinct. A person needs to make an impression and be impressed by others in order for reproduction to happen. The instinct of self-preservation at these levels forms the basic needs of a person. They have not gone away, but they have changed with the development of the world. Today, instead of needs, the designation «basic values» is more suitable. In most cases, the basic needs of all people are closed. Basic human values have come to the fore. Such as money, status, image, development and psychological comfort. These are all the same basic needs, but in a different form. For example, money performs the function of security, and image and status describe a place in the social structure and help to delight people. Attitudes to basic values change throughout life depending on age, health, qualifications, life experience, family and other circumstances. The same person at 18, 30 and 50 will prioritize life differently. Usually there are 2—3 main basic values that influence the choice of lifestyle, environment, work and hobbies. If the aspiration is based on the closure of basic values, then the motivation will be natural. If you do something because you are afraid of losing basic values, then it is an escape from discomfort. That is, an incentive. It is often possible to find the designations «motivation from» and «motivation to». It’s all about the same thing.

It is necessary to analyze motivation, since most people are stuck in the zone of dissatisfaction with the comfort zone. Basic needs are fulfilled, there are not so many annoying stimuli, but there is no motivation either. It’s like a comfort zone, but the awareness of how it should be does not allow you to enjoy what you have. The parable about the dog on the nail describes this condition well.

One day a man was walking past a certain house and saw an old woman in a rocking chair, an old man reading a newspaper was rocking in an armchair next to her, and a dog was lying on the porch between them and whining, as if in pain. Passing by, the man wondered to himself why the dog was whining.

The next day he was walking past this house again. He saw an elderly couple in rocking chairs and a dog lying between them and making the same plaintive sound. The puzzled man promised himself that if the dog whines tomorrow, he would ask the elderly couple about it.

On the third day, to his misfortune, he saw the same scene: the old woman was rocking in a chair, the old man was reading a newspaper, and the dog was whining plaintively in its place. He couldn’t take it anymore.

«Excuse me, ma’am,» he said to the old lady.

– What happened to your dog?

– To her? – asked the old lady. – She’s lying on a nail.

Confused by her answer, the man asked:

– If she’s lying on a nail and it hurts, why doesn’t she just get up?

The old lady smiled and said in a friendly, affectionate voice:

– So, my dear, it hurts her enough to whine, but not enough to move from her place.

Many people are also in a situation where everything is fine, they want to do even better, but there is no motivation to act. Or not good enough, but it has not yet reached the incentives when security will be affected. A person does not act for three reasons: he does not want to, cannot, or does not know how. If, after quoting Andrew Grove from the book «High-Performance Management», the last two reasons do not seem so complicated, then only the first one remains. Your desire.

«If this person’s life depended on doing this job, would he be able to do it? If the answer is positive, then this person has no motivation; if negative, he is not capable»

Andrew Grove

Being bombarded with information noise and society, a person cannot consciously think about his desires. Why dig if you can already see what you need. You can see what kind of people are trending, and who everyone loves. Therefore, someone is happy, and someone makes unsuccessful attempts to motivate themselves for other people’s goals and googles «how to overcome procrastination.» Procrastination was invented by the same people who are taught to look for motivation in violent ways. Why come up with such a complicated word for the process when you can’t find the strength and energy for a job that you don’t want to do? It’s not procrastination – it’s you who don’t want to do something, don’t know how, can’t do it, or can’t avoid it. Deal with desires – there will be no problems with motivation, procrastination and purpose. There are a number of factors and processes that help to maintain motivation, but this will be discussed in detail in the goal setting. If you have no motivation, then there are no desires. If there are no desires, it means that you cannot distinguish, see, recognize, and accept them. You can’t focus on your desires, admit to them, or get confused among the desires imposed by society. Everyone runs – and I want to, all bloggers – and I want to be one, etc. Ask yourself: what are your desires? What do you want? What basic values are important to you? The more times in your life you ask these questions, the more you will think about the right aspiration. Instead of thinking about what to do or what to love more than just going to work and ordering food. Understand your desires, look for them, dig deeper. And then motivation will be your energy, and not a third force that you need to look for somewhere and never find.

The primary task is to get rid of the actions that you do because of the incentives as much as possible. You need to get into the comfort zone to start working with motivation. For example, because of the incentives, I did homework, went to university and hated work. I managed to get rid of the stimuli in the following way. It’s not a fact that it will suit everyone, but it worked for me. When I still didn’t understand what motivates me and where motivation comes from, I used a technique that I now call «Marty». This is a character from the movie «Back to the Future». He was constantly provoked «to dare», and he got involved in various challenges to prove that he could do anything. I’ve done something similar. When I was sitting at home in Donetsk and thought that I had to get up for work tomorrow at 5 in the morning, I asked myself 3 questions: «Do I deserve this?», «Why am I doing what I’m doing, and what will it give me in the future?» and «What do I really want?». I understood that I had brains, abilities, family and friends. Does it have to be that I work at a factory and live in an apartment with my grandmother’s repair? Stupid people tell me what to do, fine me and teach me about life. I don’t sleep much; I don’t see my wife and friends. I considered the situation as a threat to the security of my meaningful life, and there were no questions that something should be changed. I was afraid of losing a meaningful and controlled life. Therefore, in this way I motivated myself to break into changes in order to prove to myself that I could.

Motivation is a different thing. In 2011, I graduated from university and realized that no one needed me and my diploma. Everyone needs work experience and real skills to do something. For a long time, I resisted admitting to myself that 5 years of training were useless for my professional activity. What does it mean that I studied for 5 years, and now I have to study again to how a cool job? Then I tried to start from something based on fashion, demand and money. I tried to learn programming and understand marketing, but everything went by. Nothing worked. At some point I gave up and just started doing what I like. My weekends did not coincide with my wife, and more often I spent them alone. Then I was engaged in music, so I was interested in sound engineering, creating electronic drums, video editing and photography. At night at work, I read articles about different programs, and on weekends I made drums and different effects for videos and photos. I slept for 4 hours, got up and studied again. There were no problems with motivation and procrastination. I was just enjoying myself and didn’t think it wouldn’t bring me money. I just did what I like, as successful coaches’ advice. I always laughed at these words, but, funnily enough, it turned out that way. Gradually, because of the music, I became interested in cover design, delved into the study of Photoshop, then web design, then layout of landing pages, and so on. As a result, I realized that I like creating websites. My focus has shifted to web development and design. After some time, I already knew about the basic engines and could make a landing page. The desire to move to Moscow appeared due to the availability of vacancies in web design. After 2 years, I got the desired position. I was the head of the website development department, then switched to mobile applications at red_mad_robot, became the head of the project office of the design direction, participated in the relaunch of the direction as an operating director, organized a dream team, and then moved to the educational direction of Verno by red_mad_robot. If they had told me in Donetsk in 2013 where I would live and what I would do, I would have twirled my finger at my temple. Initially, I wasn’t going to do all this and didn’t even know it was possible. I just started doing what I like, and that brought me to the current state of affairs. I was just doing something and developing in it. This does not mean that if you love football, you can get up from your workplace, send your boss to hell and go to the football academy. It’s also «do what you like». Everything needs to be done correctly and without sudden movements. We need a safe environment, not an exit from the comfort zone to starve and sleep on the street. The processes in this book will help you to act rationally and save the time I spent then.

Vector

Your desires create not only motivation, which is the fuel of movement towards the goal, but also determine the vector of your goals. By vector I mean what many call the mission of life, destiny or vocation. Here is the same story as with motivations. Everyone is looking for their purpose in different ways, going through a bunch of articles and videos on how to find it. And still no one can find it. If you have a lot of fundamental tasks, you are in debt or there is no energy, then everything is simple if we are talking about the vector. You need to get rid of the stimulating conditions in order to get back on your feet and stabilize the situation. Then you can activate motivation, choose an ambitious vector, start the path to a dream and to great deeds. Consider that solving fundamental problems is like a slip before a sharp start. A journey of a thousand steps begins with a single step. Our task is to prepare the legs so that they can do it. The system life can be applied both to the slip and to further movement. Why do I call it a vector and not the meaning of life, a global goal, mission or vocation? I believe that there is no vocation. We were not born to be happy and successful. We are people whose goal is to get maximum pleasure and avoid pain. Stimuli help to avoid pain, and having fun has become a new difficult task for a person. To get it, you first need to understand what is delivering it to you. We no longer get pleasure from the fact that we don’t have to hide in a cave from predators, get food and do a bunch of other dangerous things of primitive man. These pleasures have lost their value. As in the law of diminishing marginal utility.

«As a certain maximum of saturation of the need for this good is reached, its usefulness for the buyer begins to decrease. This is because each additional unit of subsequent purchases of this good brings the consumer relatively less satisfaction than the previous ones»

For example, for a person without a car, the marginal utility of the first car purchase is higher than the second, the second is higher than the third. The tenth car may stop pleasing at all, and you will want a helicopter. Now you need to get new pleasures. Even more status, love, admiration, and so on. It’s difficult to get them, we can’t stop wanting them, and the modern world promises that a quick result is possible. Even they offer to learn English in 2 hours. Therefore, we are looking for our destiny to realize our super talent and potential. This is really very important. Especially when a person does not know, does not notice and does not look for his potential. Because he doesn’t want to, can’t, or doesn’t know how…

«The biggest misfortune in life is a mismatch with one’s own potential»

Yuri Bykov

But there is no ministry of talents in heaven, where a person sits and distributes abilities. There is no such thing as putting human embryos in front of them and saying: you will be a driver, you will be a musician, you are a born manager, you are a designer, you are a CEO, and you will transfer turtles across the road in Australia. Only you won’t know about it right away. You will search for your vocation for years, buy courses and marathons. All healthy people are biologically equal, but they develop differently, in different conditions, with different resources and their own solutions. People’s values are formed over a long period of time. If you do something, then you like it. If you like something, then you do it and improve. Not for profit, but for pleasure. Time passes, and you become a pro. Other people look at you and think, this is a genius, this is a pro, I would like that. Often in such situations they talk about the 10,000 rule. It says that in any field you can become an expert in 10,000 hours of practice. Violinist students participated in this study. Those of them who spent 10,000 hours on practice, became world stars. This is how they prove that you are not born genius, but become one. But in this context, the study is not entirely appropriate. I have no doubt that a person will become a pro in any business if he spends 5 years practicing it. Only a person should have the desire to spend so much time doing it. Then there will be natural motivation and enthusiasm. Someone will say that he knows how to do something well, but he doesn’t like doing it. Someone doesn’t know what they like. This is totally fine, only few people know that.

«And today, not everyone can see tomorrow. Rather, not only everyone can see, not everyone can do it»

V. Klitschko

We need to experiment and rely on values. For example, I’m good at getting on well with people. I could be great selling bricks or vegetables on the market. But I don’t like this job, I don’t want to waste time on it. No matter what mountains of gold the skill of 10,000 hours spent on it promises. You need to look for a job or hobby in what you really like. Perhaps not straight away. Any related or similar activity will do. The main thing is to fulfill your desires. If your desires are fulfilled, then your values will be satisfied. And the puzzle will work out. Do not confuse it with a pretentious expression: just do what you like, and there will be success. For example, I like football in addition to music. I am young, but I will not build a football career anymore. At the age of 33, football players are already finishing their careers. How do I do what I like? I can create a football website, open a school, organize competitions, create a startup or sell sporting goods. All this is an activity that I would enjoy. I always thought I was lucky because I always knew what I wanted. But in fact, I only thought so. The desire to share knowledge in education or solve the problems of companies in consulting was a discovery for me. Moreover, I didn’t like education before, and complex problems scared me. Therefore, I made a conclusion for myself. First you need to understand your values and start trying everything one by one. If you try correctly, then desires will quickly make themselves felt, even if you do not fully understand your values and first try things randomly.

The problem is that there are other people’s values that confuse us. Society demonstrates and imposes other people’s values on us. For example, the values of prestige and status. For the status, you need expensive clothes, a car and a bought place in a queue for a new iPhone, so that everyone can see what a rich person you are. But if this is the case, then why does Warren Buffett drive a cheap car and have breakfast in McDonald’s, even though he is a billionaire? Something doesn’t end up here. But for him, status and prestige are not his values. Watch a documentary about him and you will understand everything. You can read Mark Manson’s «The Subtle Art of Indifference». This will help to start a fight with other people’s values. At least, it will reduce the weight of some familiar, but useless values. Today we live in a society where people don’t want to be happy, they want to be happier than others. For everyone to watch and admire. The conveyor of show-offs works at the speed of light, and it is very difficult to stop it. In such a culture, there is no time to analyze your values or look for an emotional response in your activities. Even if you wish, it is difficult to stop and make a conscious analysis. This is how we get people who take out a loan for an iPhone for 1,800 $ instead of training, which can change their lives. Don’t do that. I hope this chapter becomes a speed bump for your thoughts to slow down and analyze the basic values.

«A person can go beyond his own limits only by relying on his own true nature, and not on ambitions and artificial goals»

Frederick Perls

How to analyze your values?

The process is not easy. Not everyone can immediately catch the tendency for an emotional response from actions or thoughts about them. There are courses and books on the topic of finding your talents. They will help you delve into the topic and find new ways to get to the basic values and desires. Below there is a list of questions that will help you activate the necessary reasoning about your values.

1. Remember the moments when you were happy and experienced positive emotions. What was it about?

2. Remember when you were passionate about something that you lost control of time.

3. Remember when you did something during fatigue or in very uncomfortable conditions. What was that? Why did you find the strength?

4. What successes, deeds, results do you consider your achievements? What are you most proud of?

5. From what deeds, events or communication do you experience a surge of energy?

6. What do you not get tired of? What can you do at any time?

7. What kind of job or profession do you like? Why?

8. What is the most important thing for you in life? What are the principles of your life?

9. What does your ideal day and life look like? Where do you live, with whom, where do you work, what do you do in your free time?

10. What things do you want to have? Why do you need them? What needs are being covered?

11. What do you do in your free time? Why this one? Why do you value a hobby, and what does it give you?

12. What kind of business would you open? What value would you like to bring to customers?

13. In what field would you like to become an expert? For what?

14. What do you pay attention to when choosing a place of work? What prompted you to choose this profession and this field?

15. What goals do you want to achieve in the near future?

The answers to these questions will not give you a ready-made list of your values. This is just the tip of the iceberg, but you can already notice repetitions and trends of what you really like. Write down the answers in any form, compare them with the list of skills «what do you like to do» and «what do you do well, according to friends». Get more intersections or add to the list. If there are no obvious leaders, then you can try the «inner child» and «billionaire» techniques. Remember your childhood. When you didn’t think about success yet, but were sitting on your parents’ neck and doing what you like, without unnecessary thoughts. For example, in addition to football, I have always been fond of creating something. I liked to disassemble alarm clocks, tape recorders, toys and other things. From them I collected incomprehensible new mechanisms. Alarm clocks were a special buzz, they have a lot of details, and it’s very difficult to put them back together. My parents even had demands that I should not be given simple toys, otherwise I would be upset that they did not understand. Getting a computer in the ninth grade, I was sucked into the world of video and photo editing. Back then there was Paint and Movie Maker. I made shots with monkeys from videos, inserted the faces of classmates there and brought them to school on discs to laugh. I created maps for Counter Strike and installed everything where you can create something. In fact, nothing has changed now. I am driven by all the same processes. Only instead of alarm clocks, there is business, innovation, education and digital services. Although as a child, when asked who I wanted to be, I answered that I wanted to be a stuntman. I just really liked Jackie Chan. Remember what you could play for hours, what you did, what you dreamed about. Maybe then your desires were blocked by adults, they did not give you something to try, or there was no opportunity. Try to remember and find similar mechanics in adult activities.

If you don’t want to remember how poems were told on a stool as a child, then imagine yourself being Tony Stark. Imagine that you already have everything. You bought all the iPhones, houses, cars and islands. You showed it to everyone, got millions of likes and tons of envy. What will you do next? We dismiss charity and travel; these are endless affairs. Most likely, a dead end awaits you here. It turns out that people dream, but are not ready for wealth. Most of them can’t immediately answer what they will do. But if you think carefully and longer, then desires will begin to manifest. When I began to understand my desires and build my development vector around them, I began to get more pleasure from work, and it became easier for me to organize my life. I got rid of the focus and set priorities. Everything became clear.

I have devoted a lot to the topic of motivation and the definition of the path vector in this chapter, although the questions are to some extent philosophical, not practical. But it had to be done. It doesn’t matter how fast you’re going if you’re going in the wrong direction. Don’t worry if you’re not sure where you’re going yet. Just go through the stages of the system life and adjust the vector in time, if necessary.

Root cause analysis

You need to approach this stage when you have analyzed the current situation in terms of: spheres of life, environment, skills, motivation, values and thinking. Similarly, it is as if you gathered at the foot of the mountain with a team and analyzed the resources before climbing. We laid out all the backpacks, tools and provisions in front of us. We looked at the team, its attitude, skills, strengths and weaknesses. Since you have seen more details, everything has become even more complicated. There are not enough canteens for water, backpacks have holes, equipment is taken from a flea market, and half of the team has no idea what climbing a mountain is, and the skills to shoot stories will not help in any way in a difficult situation. It turns out there’s still a lot of work to do before you start climbing. What to do? First you need to patch up all the gaps to start your journey with confidence, not at random. Why is it necessary to dig into problems at such an early stage? If it is already clear that we have, and you can start planning. But life is not a fictional example from a book. If you have health problems, then there will be no energy to do anything. If you are getting by from paycheck to paycheck, then stress will hold you back from changes. If you have a toxic environment, then you won’t even be able to start thinking about new goals. You can’t make a «whoosh» so that everything changes quickly by itself. In such cases, it is necessary to solve the basic problems first. Look at all the spheres in Maslow’s pyramid. Where are there more problems or shortcomings in it? If at the first two levels, then solve these problems first, and then proceed to improve all areas further at the levels above.

Maslow’s pyramid

The good news is that you are not the only one with such problems. Many people have them, and most solutions already exist. If there are live examples who have coped with similar problems, then you can too. The main thing is to get involved. When you see that you will succeed, you will believe that everything is possible. You will see a new horizon of problems, but it will not be so scary anymore. It is convenient when you place the entire analysis of the current situation on a large sheet or a Miro board. To see the full map of the current situation from above. Mark all problem areas, undesirable situations, people, qualities, and so on the map. Everything you associate with the problems you want to get rid of. Then we need to solve the problems. How to solve any problem? The algorithm is simple. Find the problem, come up with a solution and implement it. Root cause analysis helps to find the root of the problem. Often people mistake the symptoms of a problem for the problem itself and endlessly solve them. Endlessly bailing out water from a boat with a hole. It is right to solve problems so that they no longer arise and do not create new problems. This can only be done if the root problem is found and solved.

To find root problems, you can use RCA (Root Cause Analysis). This method helps to look at the problem comprehensively, see the connections and find the root cause of a specific negative situation. There are many methods for such analysis. The most famous are «Five Whys» and «Ishikawa Diagram». I suggest using the «Five Whys». It has a clear logic, and in the future, it is easy to modify for any needs. It was invented by the founder of Toyota – Sakiti Toeda. Initially, the method was intended for solving production problems. Asking the question «Why?» five times at the site of the problem, the original source of the problem was determined, and the solution was found faster. To find the root causes of problems, we will need to ask ourselves this question a lot more than five times, as well as work with cause-and-effect relationships. We are not soulless machines in production, so an important feature of the process is honesty and objectivity to ourselves because you have to admit unpleasant things to yourself.

«A fool who has admitted that he is a fool is no longer a fool at all»

Fyodor Dostoevsky

Our task is to postpone emotions, value judgments and accusations. Even in a quote by Dostoevsky, there is no need to cling to the first word. You are not a fool. You are a brave person who is not afraid to admit inaction, mistakes, fears or ignorance. This is the only way to find the cause in cold blood and make sure that it is the root cause. I got acquainted with this method when I came to work as a project manager at red_mad_robot. Every Friday we had a meeting with the team, where we exchanged case statuses and discussed projects. At one of these meetings, I told the status that we do not have time to get the money, since the client cannot sign the documents on time due to a problem on their side. Creative Director Max Desyatykh asked me why. I replied that they had a problem with electronic document management. He asked me again why. I told him more details, and he asked again. These were my first weeks in the company, and inside I was just boiling with anger. I was thinking to myself, why are you bothering me, what are you trying to achieve. I explained to you that they have a problem, and we can’t influence it. But in the real world, I admitted that I couldn’t answer any further, and Max asked me to find out. The next day I went to sort it out, playing a game of whimsy with the client’s manager. It turned out that the problem was with the signatory, he went on vacation. In just one call, the manager found a person with the right to sign, and the documents were signed. I could have done it right away, but I didn’t ask a couple of extra «why» and didn’t make any progress in solving the problem. And the client, no matter how cool he is, does not need to solve other people’s problems. Today I remember this story with a smile and I myself demand from my team to get to the root causes and find out the most complete picture. This helps to look ahead, analyze in more detail and immediately generate solutions on the spot without unnecessary steps. I have tried many root cause analysis methods for myself. With the team, we experimented with different methods in project management. But I use the «Five Why» method most often. It has acquired its own nuances, layers of detail and designations, but the essence remains the same as in the original. Be sure to adopt it in your work, so as not to be like Vasily in the parable below.

Vasily asks his master:

– Why do you pay me 5 cents, and Boris 5 rubles?

The master in response asks Vasily:

– Aren’t they hauling hay away there by any chance?

– I don’t know.

– So go take a look.

Vasily returns and says:

– Yes, hay.

– And from which meadow?

– I don’t know.

– So go ask.

The employee comes again and responds:

– From the Konstantinovsky meadow.

– And what kind of hay mowing, the first or the second?

– I don’t know.

– Go and ask.

Vasily comes back again and says:

– The first mowing.

– And how much do they sell?

– I don’t know.

– Ask, please, – says the master.

Once again, an employee comes and answers the question:

– 5 rubles each.

– Do they bargain?

– I don’t know, – Vasily declares for the umpteenth time.

At this moment Boris enters and says to the master:

– There the hay was brought from the Konstantinovsky meadow, the first mowing. I asked «how much?». They said 5 rubles each. I haggled until 3. Buy and unload it?

The gentleman turns to Vasily and says:

– That’s why I pay you 5 cents, and Boris 5 rubles!

Boris figured out the issue in more detail, gathered information, made decisions, benefited, received money, will buy himself a Mercedes. Vasily limited himself to one question, he only has enough for vape. Vasily needs to sit down and ask himself the question: «Why am I being paid 5 cents?». Then analyze the root causes and identify the root. Having solved it, Vasily will embark on the path to his 5 rubles. Later, he will be able to ask himself the question – «Why do they pay me 5 rubles?» – and walk to his Mercedes. Train the habit of not making decisions based on superficial information, but ask questions to get to the truth.

The task of root cause analysis is to identify the root cause or complement the integrity of the picture by visualizing a model of the problem (phenomenon or desire). The visual model helps to identify cause-and-effect relationships, hidden causes, dependence of causes and root nodes of causes. It is better to use Miro or a similar service to make it easier to edit your scheme. Try to stick to the basic rules:

1. First, the problem or undesirable phenomenon is written down that needs to be resolved is recorded;

2. Then, using the «why» questions, we build a tree of the causes of the problem from top to bottom, while it is possible;

3. Any branch ends with a root cause or an immutable cause;

4. The cause of the problem may be problems of a lower level, which have their own reasons;

5. When you answer the question «why», then try to rely on the facts and indicate the reason for what is written in the rectangle above. Avoid value judgments, emotions, and objects unrelated to the problem;

6. A tree can have many parallel branches, several of the following reasons can come out of one reason;

7. The reasons can be connected by the node «and»/«or». If the causes are connected by the «and» node, then you need to eliminate all the causes included in the problem in order to solve it. If through «or», then only one can be solved;

8. Some reasons may be similar to each other or be the cause of other problems from neighboring branches. Note similar reasons to highlight them in a group of reasons.

The easiest way is to consider the method on a real example. When I worked at the factory, I was not satisfied with my salary. What would the root cause analysis look like: «I have a small salary.»

Example of root cause analysis

The example is vital and simple, but very difficult to analyze. I have repeatedly run through this chain of reasoning in my head when talking about buying my apartment in Donetsk. I ran through, but I didn’t do anything, because it’s very hard to notice and admit to yourself that you don’t know how to do anything. The scheme is branching into two branches: «1» and «2». We immediately discard the «2» branch, since we cannot influence the company. Branch «1» is divided into three more branches: «1.1», «1.2» and «1.3». The «1.2» branch does not give anything. The decision on it is very labor-intensive and long. Branches «1.1» and «1.3» lead us to two main root causes: «No knowledge and experience» and «Fear and self-doubt». The reason «I didn’t do anything to find out» is more indirect. These are more symptoms of fear. Thanks to the analysis behind the first layer of the search for the guilty and justifications for inaction, we see which problems are really important to solve. Moreover, it is clear how to solve them. There are many ways to learn new skills and gain experience. It is more difficult to increase self-esteem and overcome fear, but it is also known how. It is difficult to argue with this and give the brain a chance to explain why it is not necessary to do this. For example, I did not take into account all possible branches, but left only the most important. In real analysis, there can be very huge schemes with a large number of branches, which allows you to consider all the causes and highlight the connections.

Above, I briefly outlined what the method is. If you have never done such an analysis before, then watch the video or read articles on the Internet. There are many detailed explanations and examples on the web. The method is quite easy to learn, and anyone will figure it out without any problems. To analyze my situations, I use the RCA+ (Root Conflict Analysis) method, which was developed by Valery Sushkov. He is one of the developers of the tools of modern TRIZ (Theory of inventive problem solving) and the Technology of Systemic Innovative Thinking, as well as the co – founder of the European TRIZ Association and the International Business TRIZ Association. This method also builds a tree of reasons, but the principle of operation is significantly different from the “Five Why” method. I was lucky to get on a course with Valery Sushkov. There I learned about his method and immediately started using it. If the “Five Whys” is too simple for you or does not work to find root causes, then search the web for information about RCA+ or Goldratt’s Theory of Constraints. It is better to watch the video and practice right away, since it is very difficult to explain them in text. But this is already an advanced level for solving complex problems in business. “Five Whys” will be enough for you.

The task of the last section on analysis is to convey to everyone that root cause analysis is a mandatory step for all types of problems. Always get to the root cause. This way you will be able to deal with real problems, not with symptoms. You will be able to focus your efforts by spending less resources. The questions «why» and «what for» are among the most important ones in life. They embody a meaningful approach to life. These questions can be used not only to find reasons, but also to make informed decisions, filter desires and maintain motivation. We’ll talk about this further. Take the analysis very seriously, do not neglect it. The brain will always come up with an explanation for any phenomenon, will try to save resources and lead you according to an understandable scenario. Culture, people and lack of time – everything works against the process of recognizing the root causes. Root cause analysis is your protective shield against interference and a companion of system life. It all starts with him, and then he will come in handy more than once. Where else will you find such a powerful free tool that produces clarity for you and saves resources.

Outcome

Einstein was once asked how he would spend an hour of his time solving a very difficult problem. He replied that he would spend 55 minutes thinking about the problem and 5 minutes solving it. There’s no reason not to trust Albert. Any actions or decisions should start with analysis. This will protect you from premature anxiety, wrong decisions and unnecessary actions. Regularly stop the flow of information and urgent matters, as Neo stopped the bullets at the end of the first «Matrix». Do an analysis of the current situation in order to unload the mind, make a revision of life and load back only the most important.

«Reason is the ability of expedient action as a result of objective analysis»

V.E. Mikhaltsev

Update the resources you have, understand what barriers and problems prevent you from getting what you want. The strategy and speed of your movement towards changes and goals depends on this. Analysis is the foundation for the shortest path to the goal. It is important to understand the comfortable state of all spheres of life, your strengths and weaknesses. Meaningfully feel motivated and strengthen the growth mindset. Your environment should promote development and positively influence all spheres of life. And most importantly, you need to know the true causes of your problems and results. Highlight problem areas and find root problems. Most of the problems you can’t solve because you don’t want to or don’t know how. If you are reading a book, then everything is «OK» with the desire. Now you only need to get the necessary knowledge and try it out. If you understand in detail the problems and causes of the current situation, then a solution may arise already at the analysis stage. The problem may not be a problem at all, or there will be no need to solve it. Remember, everyone in the world is against you stopping and figuring everything out. The swift current will always carry you forward, so that you do not have time and energy for this. It’s hard to resist, but it’s possible. This requires a systematic approach, where analysis plays a fundamental role. Conscious life and development are impossible without it.

Chapter 2. Planning

Prologue

Everyone has their own plan until they get hit in the jaw. Then many people, like rats, stop and freeze

Mike Tyson

In the first chapter, we analyzed what we have to start moving. In the second chapter, let’s move on to where and how to start moving? To figure this out, you need a planning process. Today it is fashionable to hide behind the VUCA-world, so as not to plan. There are no guarantees anyway, and no one knows what will happen. Therefore, there is no point in planning. Yes, no one knows what will happen. Before Tyson, Field Marshal Moltke said that in a battle, the battle plan is the first one to die. But that doesn’t mean you don’t have to plan. It is better to start moving according to the plan and deviate than to start moving at random. No matter how scary the VUCA world is, no one bothers to make a plan for a year, quarter, week or day. It all depends on your ability to adapt in the first collision of the plan and reality. The shorter the planning period, the more likely it is that the plan will come to fruition. Because there is more clarity. But at the same time, the shorter the planning period, the more negligent we treat it. We are sure that we will solve everything quickly on the go, and it’s not worth bothering. Has it ever happened to you when you woke up on your day off and didn’t know what to do? Why is this happening? You knew it would be a day off, so have a rest. But you haven’t planned what you’re going to do. As a result, you need to strain yourself, come up with leisure and sort out options. Usually, you end up watching TV series and whining that you didn’t do anything over the weekend. Then a working week starts, and everything looks like a circle that never ends. Most people are busy doing things, not implementing plans. They just don’t have time to stop and ask themselves the question: why am I doing this? What goal does this bring me closer to or what problem does it solve? Because there is no clear goal and plan to achieve it. And when it is not clear what to do, the brain suggests doing what is clear and simple. Many will say they have a plan. It’s in the head, and they follow it. They can even list out loud: «And this must be done, and this …". If you ask them, «Why? What is the deadline and the output result?», they have nothing to answer. Planning is not thinking what you want to do, it is part of a system of self-organization in the form of specific processes. It is very important to learn how to transform a strategy into a process, and a process into a description of specific work actions. Without this, you can only do harm and accelerate the squirrel in the wheel to the speed of light. Fasten your seat belts. We are starting a chapter that will upgrade your knowledge about goal setting and planning.

There are no guarantees

Before planning, you need to take vitamins for thinking in the form of the text below. So that the update of the growth mindset accelerates and gets deep into your mind. Reading about the VUCA world, we seem to understand that there is uncertainty, and this is the norm, but we do not consciously accept it. Because certainty is a drug for our brain, and it’s not easy to do without it. We want to be sure that our company will not be closed during the pandemic, the working meeting will go well, the bank will not go bankrupt, the developer will not disappear, there will be a guarantee of work, we will have enough money to survive the crisis and so on and so forth. We want everything to be clear, stable, predictable. We want to organize everything, get guarantees, insure ourselves, avoid difficulties. We cannot stand uncertainty, and we begin to break down when it is unclear what will happen next. So strong that it is impossible to tolerate it, and we start having anxiety. Research has proven that we tolerate pain more easily than uncertainty, because pain is understandable to us. For example, the uncertainty that everything is going well at work has a worse effect on health than dismissal. No one is to blame for this. This is how our brain works. Look at the SCARF social behavior model (Status, Certainty, Autonomy, Relatedness, Fairness), which was developed by David Rock. It explains the five main goals that our brain perceives as critically important:

1. Status – a sense of respect caused by a position in the hierarchy;

2. Certainty – the ability to predict the consequences;

3. Autonomy – a sense of control over what is happening;

4. Relatedness – a sense of security next to others;

5. Fairness – the perception of a fair exchange.

Everything is quite logical. With the help of these goals, our brain fulfills the well-known instinct of self-preservation. From the second point it is clear that the brain wants confidence, and considers all the unknown stuff to be dangerous. It must know what any action will lead to, and will do everything to avoid uncertainty. But there is no certainty! If it were, we could say with 100% certainty that the ruble would not devalue, there would be no self-isolation, a war would not start, a meteorite would not fall to the Earth, etc. We try to make predictions, but there is no certainty anymore. If there had been, then 10 years ago you could have said: «I want to be the manager of a virtual influencer on a social network,» but no one could have imagined that such a thing could be. And no amount of forecasting would help to predict it. No matter how much we strive for certainty, we will never be able to get it. The brain wants what it doesn’t have. Yep, what a paradox. Think for yourself, there is no certainty in anything. Anything can happen, anytime. This has not been news for a long time. Nassim Taleb wrote everything in his books a long time ago. But the task of learning to accept uncertainty is still very relevant.

What to do with uncertainty?

First you need to change your worldview about the future, uncertainty and problems.

1. There is no image of the future anymore. The future has trends, but it is impossible to predict the future just by analyzing them. My wife’s uncle once said: «When we lived in the USSR, everything was clear. It’s like you’re flying slowly and steadily on a spaceship, but it’s clear where you are heading. And now you’re flying on the same ship, but 100 times faster, and meteorites are flying at you. And you only can try to dodge them.» Then there was no certainty either, but there was too little speed to notice it. Today, the speed of the world is regularly increasing and can make a leap in a day. If you are asked at an interview, «who do you see yourself in 5 years?», then you need to leave it or answer with a fictional profession. Let them prove that there will be no such thing in 5 years. Today life is like running in a fog. You can see it up close, but not further than 5 meters ahead. Like a map of the area in a computer game – it opens further when you come to its border.

2. We need to accept the uncertainty. Such a decision will give you the strength to make changes. When you stop looking for certainty in everything, there will be less stress. Most problems arise because you are trying to predict the future. Any prediction is stressful. A forecast describes events that may or may not occur. You can’t guarantee to influence it, but you try to find certainty and worry that you don’t find it. The forecast is your thoughts, as it may be, and the plan is what you will do at certain events. Only now we need to learn how to plan in the fog. To do this, you have 5 meters of visibility. Hang a sticker or poster at home «I accept uncertainty» and start slowly getting used to it. It will be a long way, but without accepting uncertainty, nothing new will happen.

3. There are no problems. There are only situations and your attitude to them. For example, people don’t want to make you feel bad, they do everything to make them feel good. It turns out their «good» can be «bad» for you. Why do people quarrel? Because they have different views on the same situations. For one it is a problem, but for the other it is not. Of course, tragedies happen in life, and everything is pretty clear here. But time does not stop. You also need to be able to relate to them and experience them correctly. It’s a lot of work, but it’s also a situation, and you have your own attitude to it. Animals have no consciousness and no problems. They are not able to give events such a characteristic as «problem». A crow on the branch is not sad that a raven does not approach her, and she is lonely. She doesn’t croak to everyone around that she has problems in her personal life. Only people call dissatisfaction with the situation or mismatch of expectations a problem. All the problems come from the fact that life has become too simple and safe. Now you don’t have to worry about being eaten by a lion or dying of cold in a cave. The brain is sharpened by evolution to search for risks and anxiety, but our life does not give it reasons. Therefore, the brain finds them in any situation, worries, and we call it problems. We avoid them and are afraid. Moreover, they so simply allow us to justify inaction or harmful decisions. Do not perceive problems as an evil force from the outside that prevents you from living. Replace the word «problem» with «undesirable situation» and make it a rule: «A task should be formulated from any undesirable situation.» Then solve it or use analysis to figure out why it can’t be done.

«Never explain with malicious intent

what can easily be explained by stupidity»

Hanlon’s Razor

Dependence on certainty can have very bad consequences. If everything is clear in advance, then what will be the motive to develop? When you become financially independent, you become more confident. The future begins to seem certain. This is especially dangerous for those who do not understand their true desires. For them, the comfort zone becomes a breeding ground for degradation. It will be everything, but it will be boring. Like in the joke about the new Russian, who called Christmas tree toys defective. Because they hung beautifully on the Christmas tree and did not, please him. When there is no uncertainty in achieving goals, ambitions gradually disappear. There are tribes of Indians who change their place of residence every two years. Thus, they give the soil a rest, and new locations require new skills and achievements from them to ensure their lives. They did not read books about self-development and did not undergo growth training. They noticed that there is a threat to development in the certainty and comfort zone. They realized that if a person does not learn to cope with difficulties, then he will break down at the first difficult situation, and such times will surely come in every person’s life.

Uncertainty is the beginning of everything new. A place where something happens. Your personal environment for new opportunities in which you grow and gain new experiences. If you do what you know, you don’t move forward. How can you get something new if you act in the old way? Everything new is a risk, and risk is the reverse side of new opportunities and changes. Don’t be afraid of uncertainty, it’s a part of life, and it won’t be any other way. Learn to enjoy uncertainty and notice that you will become happier. In short, you have no choice. Take the time to prepare to realize this and accept the uncertainty. You can wait for certainty and never start, constantly procrastinate and be afraid. Or you can take the first step and competently start moving forward, crushing the uncertainty. The main thing is to understand: while you are thinking, time is passing. It’s not waiting for you. Each of us has minus one day on the counter every day. It is in our best interests to solve it faster: stand still or do something, despite the uncertainty. I’m not saying it will be too late later. I say that you can start enjoying your life to the fullest earlier and do it longer.

Attitude to mistakes

Let’s suppose the previous paragraph gave you a dopamine boost. You imagined how boldly you begin to change your life in conditions of uncertainty. But then you are waiting for mistakes that will eat up dopamine, and therefore enthusiasm. They will certainly be. Even if the plan is ironclad, it is impossible to foresee everything. Any changes are a new experience, which is impossible without mistakes. When I moved to Moscow, the big surprise was the search for housing. We were so focused on the legal subtleties of an official stay and job search that we didn’t find out how the apartment was being rented. Suddenly we found out that if the monthly rent costs 30 thousand rubles, then you can’t just pay this amount and move in. You need to immediately pay 90 thousand rubles. Deposit 30 thousand rubles, for the first month 30 thousand rubles. and for the last 30 thousand rubles. You also need to pay the realtor. The risk that I did not foresee turned into an attraction called «Get out of your comfort zone for 2 weeks.» Negotiation skills, courage for a new one and tolerance for unpleasant work are immediately sharpened. For me, it became a lesson that you need to better analyze the subject area, and added a couple of points to the communication skill. No wonder Nietzsche said: everything that doesn’t kill us makes us stronger. If you do something and there are no mistakes, then you are not doing anything new. You need to try to avoid mistakes, but if they happen, then take them as an asset. This is your valuable experience, your knowledge, which moves you to a higher level. Each new approach to the task you will already do with a new experience, and each time you will go further. Like Tom Cruise in the movie «The Edge of the Future». Any step into uncertainty is a mistake. But not any mistakes are growth. You grow when you make new mistakes. If you step on the same rake every time, then go back to the analysis. Look for the root cause and eliminate it so that you no longer step on the same rake. You should strive to step on a new rake, and not walk on the old ones.

Look at the experiment with clay pots. One group of people was given the task to make as many pots as possible. The second group was told to make perfect pots as perfect as possible. As a result, there were much more almost perfect pots in the first group than in the second. In general, the quality of the pots of the second group was worse than the first. People who didn’t bother, but just performed – achieved a better result much easier! And those who tried to do it perfectly, so that they would be highly appreciated, were in a state of stress and could not even do well. They were afraid of the result, not the action. It does not mean that you need to make as many thoughtless attempts as possible to get the perfect result. You need to grow with every mistake. And if you concentrate on the ideal, then there will always be a fear of making a mistake. Like an anchor that prevents you from starting to move. Allow yourself to make mistakes, love mistakes and don’t blame yourself for them.

«Disappointment is a crystal lens

Fate rewards her favorites with it

So, we are standing at the border

So, something new is already being done»

GROT

Instead of «I’ve made a mistake» think, «how interesting it’s turned out, now I know something new.» As Thomas Edison said, he did not suffer defeats, but simply found 10,000 ways that did not work. Look for people who have made mistakes and learn from their experience. Any experienced person has gained experience through mistakes. Not from books and stories, but from mistakes. You, too, will become experienced only in this way.

In my last job at a marketing agency, not all of my employees and contractors were cool. Almost every one of our projects was a series of disasters. Problems with clients, threats and conflicts. Endless machine-gun fire of project management errors. If you make a list of everything that happened there, you can collect a volume of harmful tips for the profession of a project manager. I wasted a lot of energy and nerves then. I couldn’t change jobs or go on vacation to find my meaning of life in Bali. I hated those mistakes and constant disassembly, because I didn’t know what value they would give in the future. Now I am grateful to that time. I have gained a lot of experience in such a short period of time as in five years of working in a normal agency. Every step towards the goal requires you to master new skills to overcome new challenges. Skills are formed only through experience. To get a new experience, you need to try to do something that you have not done before. Today I aim to get errors in hypothesis testing and any tasks as early as possible. To take the shortest route as soon as possible. I try to complete any step with a clear result which is achievement of the goal by error or correction.

During interviews with candidates for the role of project manager, we spend most of the discussion discussing failures. Having understood what kind of experience a person had and what mistakes he made, I understand what level his skills were, how they were formed, what kind of thinking he had, and how he treated mistakes. Now many have learned to tell what good fellows they are. But not everyone can admit their failures, tell how it happened, what were the reasons and conclusions. What can I say? Not everyone can admit their mistakes and accept criticism. While writing this chapter, my wife sent me a meme about the Russian language. The author was Polina Masalygina. Her linguistic blog gave me hope that our planet can still be saved. She is very cool and makes unusual useful content with a soul. Be sure to subscribe and like her. Immediately I got to the story, where Polina described that personal criticism is the best motivation to change something in life. She posted a video from her long-ago presentation, where, in her opinion, she performed very poorly in public. When she saw herself from the side, she wanted to delete her blog, became very ill and engaged in self-flagellation for a long time. It was one of the ways, but fortunately, today we see Polina’s blog. As she writes, now she is engaged in self-flagellation with knowledge. This is very subtly noticed and shows by a real example that you do not need to be afraid of your mistakes. We need to use them for development.

Therefore, after accepting uncertainty, tune in to the correct attitude to mistakes. Treat them as payment for movement on the uncertainty card. Don’t get upset and don’t be disappointed when something went wrong or didn’t work out the first time. Don’t let the fear of failure or the unknown keep you from moving forward. Only inaction can be ideal. Act, make decisions and take responsibility for them. Believe me, it’s better than standing still all your life and putting likes to those who are not afraid of mistakes to go ahead.

«The best thing to do when making a decision is to do the right thing. The second most effective thing is to do the wrong thing. But the worst thing is to do nothing»

Theodore Roosevelt

Formation of the target picture

After accepting the current realities, you can start planning. But you don’t need to start with a plan. It is always better to start with the formation of the target picture. Descriptions of the end point where you need to come. We know the current situation, the tasks that need to be solved and the vector of our desires. Often desires can be expressed by dreams or vague wishes. At this stage, the desires need to move from an abstract vision to a concrete one. To do this, you need to accept that «desires» and «dreams» are not equal to the goal. Dreams and desires are your fantasies about you and your life in the future. Fantasies make it difficult to focus on the current situation and use resources here and now. Between the dream and the goal, I suggest using the target picture. The target picture is the requirements for your future life and the requirements for yourself. It is needed to structure the dream. The goal is specific actions with deadlines, resources, risks and scenarios of events. Why do we need such a multi-pass as «dream – target picture – goal»? If you have not previously analyzed your motivation – and, accordingly, your desires either – then there is a risk that your thoughts are saturated with fragments of other people’s desires or blurred. Everyone around us owns a business, drives expensive cars, eats in restaurants, travels, builds relationships and is very happy. This is understandable and pleasant to us, we want it. Such things are very easy to desire. It’s easier than figuring out your life, planning goals and solving your problems. If you are asked what you dream about, then you will answer very easily and quickly: a lot of money, never work, a strong family, travel, a house by the sea and everything like that. If I ask you to describe your desired life: «How much money do you need? What will you do? What country should I live in? What will your house be like? How will you spend your time? And why do you need this?» – almost no one can answer it. Because imagining the future is a very difficult task. I want something successful and cool, like everyone else, but it’s not clear exactly what. What difference does it make now that it should be specific? When I have the money, everything will become clear right away, and we’ll figure it out there. Just take my annoying job away from me now, put a couple of million on the account and give me everything that can be posted online in order to be loved and envied by everyone. I often observe how people with such dreams try to take steps to their realization. They read books and take courses to set goals. There they are immediately thrown from abstraction into goal-setting tools. For example, SMART, MOSCOW and the like. Such tools imply that the goal should be clear and specific. But how can a person put down deadlines and specific steps if he himself does not know the details or does not know how to correctly decompose the goal? If a person wants something so much that he tries to pack it into a goal, then it means that he did not have it before. He had never achieved such a goal before. How does he structure an endpoint he hasn’t been to yet? Without training and experience, nothing will work. Therefore, the target picture is a bridge that helps to make the decomposition of dreams more natural and understandable.

The target picture can be obtained in several ways, described below. You can take a dream and describe it in as much detail as possible. Schematically draw on a sheet or in Miro. This is some kind of picture. Just throw out all your wishes in one place. Describe the ideal image of the future. Not just a general description of how you are doing well and have no worries, but describe it in as much detail as possible where you live, what people surround you, what you have, what you do and why. At the same time, everything needs to be verified at once with the questions «why» and «what for» to check that you are describing your desired life, and not ways to stand out from others. You can go from the opposite. Take all the undesirable phenomena, write why you don’t like them, and how it should be ideally. For example, I worked at a factory, in poor conditions, with a terrible schedule, without prospects and enthusiasm. I knew I didn’t want all this. I formulated such an idea for myself that «I want to work in IT, in the field of website development. In a young growing company with a flexible schedule and loyal management. I will have a great team where I will grow. Our projects will help people, win competitions and set the bar for quality in the industry. I will be appreciated, and my career will constantly go up.» I didn’t know the target picture as I wanted, but I knew exactly what I didn’t want and what it needed to be replaced with. Note that there is no specific city, deadline and details anywhere. These are all the same abstract wishlist, but with protrusions that you can cling to in order to start detailing. The purpose of the target picture is to take the first step from abstraction to concreteness. Get all the visible components of your dreams. This will make it easier to move on to the formation of goals. It is also an additional step to verify dreams. Do they correspond to your desires, and do you need it in general? It sometimes happens that the target picture raises so many questions to the dream that you wonder how this dream appeared in your thoughts? There are so many questions that we need to understand further. It is impossible to form a target picture correctly and incorrectly. Any attempt will already clarify the decomposition of your dreams, and it will be easier to set goals. If you can’t make progress in creating the target picture, then this is a wake-up call. How can you set goals, if even at the general level you have no idea what your dream consists of. Whatever goal setting template you are given, you simply won’t be able to write anything there. After all, this level is more detailed than the target picture. If the target picture is difficult, then make drafts, think about the dream, imagine the result, make several versions. Think about it, analyze why exactly this is what you want in this form. And after a few iterations, get your target picture. The main thing is to understand what and how it should be in the future so that you are satisfied. Our path is a route from the current situation to the goal. But the goal is not the end point. There are many of them. Goals are the results that need to be achieved in order for the target picture to be brought to life. The target picture will help you immediately approach planning intelligently and set goals in the right sequence.

Goal setting

After we have figured out where we want to move, the most interesting thing begins. We need to plan how we will do this and set goals correctly. As you may have noticed, for me the goal is the result that will lead me to the dream. That is, to the realization of my desires. I am not talking about the purpose of life, I do not consider the word «goal» as something global. A goal is a tool that allows you to capture the characteristics of a future version of my current situation in order to build a reversible plan to achieve it. For me, the desires themselves and the correct system of how to move towards them are more important. Goal setting is the next stage after the target picture, and it is not the last. Therefore, in this section we will not be preaching about how important the goal is, and say that an aimless life is bad. Many books have been written about this, research has been proven and tested in practice. It will only be about how to organize the goal-setting process so that it produces progress, not stress.

Now I am writing a book about my system and methods, but my relationship with goals has gone through all the typical stages from disappointment to admiration. They developed approximately according to this scenario:

1. Carefree childhood. I’m sitting on my parents’ neck, I’m studying at school and I don’t suspect what awaits me in the wonderful adult world;

2. Then the student years. I just live without thinking about the future. Only worry about being expelled from the university;

3. Graduation time is approaching. I promise my girlfriend a car and wait for the best employers to start fighting to invite me to work;

4. Welcome to adulthood. I understand what exactly Kurt Cobain meant to say.

«No one will die a virgin. Life will fuck everyone»

Kurt Cobain

They don’t give me an opportunity to work, I live in a dorm with cockroaches and I don’t know what to do. I work as a system administrator at a service station, then I connect the Internet to apartments, I begin to hate myself and this life. Not to mention the status of a babbler who promised a car and boasted that everything was under control. As a result, I get a job at the factory, and The Groundhog Day begins;

5. Work, home, work. Goals? What goals? No, I haven’t heard of them. Everything is done either by acquaintance, or by just getting lucky. I live, work, endure and blame everyone around me that everything is the way it is;

6. It seems that something needs to be done. I try to read books. They write about goals and success. But it’s easy to write in books, everything is different in life, so I call BS on your goals;

7. I watch the movie «The secret». Wow! You don’t have to do anything, just visualize the desires, and everything will work out. How stupid it is, I won’t do it;

8. I really want the changes to start by themselves. They say it is necessary to write down the annual goals on paper, burn, dissolve the ashes in a glass of champagne on New Year’s Eve and drink. Yes, I really did it. It didn’t work;

9. They say that it is necessary to write down annual goals on paper. Just do whatever you want, and it will come true. The power of writing by hand will work, and the result is in your pocket. I’ve been writing A4 sheets for a couple of years, nothing happens, I just write out of habit and I don’t believe in it myself;

10. I learn about the methods of setting goals. They advise setting goals according to SMART. So that everything is clear and detailed. So that even the salary should be specified, with a deadline and at the current price level. The goals have become longer, but still useless;

11. Disappointment. No matter how you write down these goals, nothing comes true, everything is useless. I have enough of deceiving myself and keeping my head in the clouds. I will write down real goals, simpler ones that I can really master in a year. As a result, they come true, but they are so small that they look more like tasks, not goals;

12. I’m moving to Moscow, life is getting more complicated. I find a job getting to which takes me about 3 hours. In the subway I start reading books about IT. It’s necessary to become a programmer;

13. I learn about Agile and the word «sprint». Let’s try to set goals for the quarter, not for the year;

14. Well will you look at that! It works better. People, look at how I set goals – I’m a genius! No, Semyon, you’re not a genius. In the book «Just Space» Katya Lengold has already written everything. If you don’t know about this book, then be sure to read and subscribe to Katya. Her book brought Agile approaches into people’s daily lives and shortened their path to the dream. Katya, respect. Keep doing what you’re doing!

15. I read all the books about time management that come across. I start to read books about the brain to avoid thinking traps and make quarterly goals clearer. I find out about the zone of the closest development of Lev Vygotsky. It turns out that you don’t need to strive to get out of your comfort zone, that’s the twist. It turns out that I drank ashes with champagne for nothing;

16. I read and experiment further. I get to the book «Essentialism. The Path to Simplicity» by Greg McKeon. It hits the head of time management with a stick. I understand that the main thing is not productivity, but selectivity. To have time to do more, you need to plan more. There is not enough time to do everything, there should be fewer goals, but they should be important;

17. I’m wrestling with the ways to give up the least important among all the important things. I read about Gestalt psychology and learn more about true desires. It is difficult, incomprehensible, but it seems that this is the only way to set priorities in life correctly;

18. At the time I observe goal-setting at work. Managers make mistakes in goal setting. I collect them, reflect, draw conclusions;

19. An interesting observation. When I decompose work on goals in my task tracker, I notice that sometimes I forget about the goal, but the things I do still lead to it. Then why do they write so much about goal-setting? In Ivan Zamesin’s blog, I read a review of the book «The Theory of Luck» by Scott Adams. There I get acquainted with the principle of «System against goals». This becomes a powerful upgrade of my goal-setting system and finally puts everything in its place. Of course, I also advise you to read the book;

20. I tell my friend Dima Moroz about this. He says, «But there is the OKR method by Google,» and tells how it works;

21. I study OKR. I take all the best out of it and make a simplified version for myself. I’ve been living with this for a year, I understand more and more that selectivity and the system are the most ideal pair for goal setting;

22. I am telling in this book about my final version of the goal-setting system at the moment.

This is a brief history of my relationship with goal setting. I think many people will recognize themselves in the beginning. How the system works for me now, I will tell you further. I am sure that the system is not perfect and can work better. But even now, it also works for others when I help them set it up. Notice, I came to this through mistakes. At each new step, I understood how not to do it, and I did it differently. I learned new things from books and from people, cut off what didn’t work and left what worked. I smoothly moved from the «poke method» to the algorithm. Therefore, take care of your time and do not repeat my mistakes. Let your starting point be higher than mine, so that your final version of the system will be even cooler.

Mistakes in setting goals

Before moving on to the goal-setting system, let’s analyze the main mistakes so that you know the enemy in person. They understood how to deal with it, and why exactly these tools are used. When you understand what mistakes, they help to exclude, you will understand the principles of their work. This will allow you to adapt everything to yourself and improve your own approaches.

«Terminator: I have human anatomy files embedded in me.

Sarah Connor: I can imagine. After all, it makes you a more perfect killer»

«Terminator 2: Judgment Day»

Some errors are components or causes of other errors, but I have compiled just such a list so as not to miss anything and understand the cause-and-effect relationships. It turned out to be ten points – a beautiful number for a paragraph of a non-fiction book. I described the mistakes that I made myself and that I meet most often with other people. I also briefly described how to avoid such mistakes. Do not rush to let the thought «Thank you, cap, this is understandable, but how to do it?» into your head. Next, I will describe my approaches. Even without special knowledge, they will drive you into the framework of an algorithm that will minimize errors. Let’s start our hit parade!

1. No goals.

I’ve met a lot of people who can’t answer what their goals are. They just answer that they want to live well. Usually there is no goal for those who, like a squirrel in a wheel, solve problems nonstop in order to stay afloat. They just go with the flow. They are driven by incentives, so the goals are simple. But if they had ambitious goals, the approach would be completely different. Also, the desire to set goals decreases with the onset of the basic comfort zone. People in the comfort zone experience anxiety and do not develop. Without a goal, it is difficult to understand what is important, since everything becomes important, and it is impossible to determine the priority. The worst option is when a person is depressed or cannot recognize their desires. Such people live in the image of a victim and are happy to stay in it, blaming everyone around. So, it’s easier to come up with an excuse for your inaction and wait for everything to be brought on a platter. I was at the place of the victim and the squirrel. You read my story above. If you are reading this book, it is unlikely that you do not have goals. At least you have a desire for them to appear, and that’s fine. If you don’t have goals, analyze the reason why this is happening. In any case, you have desires and curiosity. If you don’t see them, figure out why. Through books, videos, psychotherapists or the poke method. The main thing is to try. Otherwise, life without goals will kill you mentally and physically.

2. Somebody else’s goals.

In the beginning, I already touched on this topic a little. Usually, they tell me that there are no other people’s goals. If a person wants something, then how can it be someone else’s wish? There is some truth in this. But I would say that there are no other people’s desires, but there are other people’s goals. Today, many people want to work in the IT field. Is it a desire or a goal to get such a profession? Ask such a person why he needs it. He’ll say something like, «well, it’s cool, modern, they pay a lot, cool offices and they have cookies there.» Such a person sets himself the goal of «becoming a programmer». But for some reason, actions are postponed, excuses are invented, and the code is not written. Most likely, this is someone else’s goal, with which a person wants to satisfy his desire for security or status. He wants to have a sought-after and prestigious profession, so that the conditions are better, and he is not ashamed to tell his friends about it. Because YouTube and social networks show such content about programmers that gives the right to think so. They program electric cars there, launch startups and speak at conferences. Everyone has become very successful. Wherever you look, there’s CEO, CPO and a lot of other abbreviations. Any person watches it and wants to satisfy his desire, but with the help of someone else’s goal. It won’t work that way. You need to want what you want and understand why you want it. I had such a situation with learning English. At the beginning of my work at red_mad_robot, I saw a man in the office who spoke on the phone in English, as if it was his native language. Then the thought flashed: «I want it that way too.» Why don’t I, so cool, working in such a company, speak English? Then I met a few more people who call to London and chatter in English no prob. So, in my goals for the year there was a goal to learn English. No matter how I formulated it and decomposed it, no matter what methods I tried, nothing worked. A year has passed, and all the progress that I had was only a dozen new words and that’s it. I made new attempts, but all to no avail. At some point I thought that I was not given, and gave up. At that time, I thought I understood goal-setting. So, I decided: if it doesn’t work now, then there’s no point in trying. It was just someone else’s goal, and I made such a disastrous conclusion about my abilities. My brain didn’t want to lose my status so that I would be worse than others. I was ashamed, and it hurt my ego. Although I have always been a person who has never tried to prove anything to anyone. But so unconsciously there was a goal that I didn’t need. I realized that the goal was someone else’s when I asked myself the question: «Why do I need English?». I wasn’t going to move, it’s not really needed at work, I had enough knowledge for traveling. The answer was – because everyone at work knows it, and am I worse than them? Of course, nothing works like that. The brain wants everyone to love and respect us, but it doesn’t want to do anything. I started enjoying learning English when I needed to do what I like. I translated the lyrics of my favorite bands and read in English at work about UX design, digital product development, management, psychology and education. When I received the information, I needed without waiting for the translation of articles and books, I did not notice any difficulties with the language. Even though I looked every second word up. I slowly formed a habit. It has become the norm for me that I can’t understand everything, but I read in English. Then I was shown the TV series «The Office» in the original with subtitles. Watching all the seasons in the original immediately became a priority goal. Fans of the series will understand. Again, the question «Why?» saved everyone. When the answer to this question appeared, there were no problems with motivation. I was just having fun because I liked doing it. Understand your desires so as not to live by someone else’s goals. The most annoying thing is to be disappointed when you have reached the goal, and you don’t need it. I presented my thesis in university, I know what I’m talking about.

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