How to Avoid the Paradox of Success
Greg McKeown
#1 Podcaster, Author of 2 NYTs bestsellers: “Effortless” and “Essentialism”
Dear Essentialists,
Many intelligent, ambitious people struggle to figure out what the priority is for them at this moment - and for a perfectly good reason.
It's a reason I call the paradox of success, and it can be summed up in four predictable phases.
- Phase one. We have clarity of purpose, enabling us to succeed in our endeavor.
- Phase two. When we succeed, we gain a reputation as a go-to person, and we are presented with increased options and opportunities.
- Phase three. When we have increased options and opportunities, it leads to diffused efforts as we get spread thinner and thinner.
- Phase four. We become distracted from what would otherwise be our highest level of contribution.
The effect of our success has been to undermine the clarity that led to success in the first place.
One easy way to combat this cycle is to start a "said no to" list.
It's simple to do. Just write down the things that you've said no to.
This will have a couple of benefits.
First, it will be empowering to discover you can say no.
Second, as your list accumulates, you'll be able to evaluate whether you are pleased with that decision.
The idea isn't to say no to everything. As always, your goal is to say yes to the essentials and no to the nonessentials. Then you can reinvest your time, attention, and energy into the most important things.
A 1-Minute Strategy for Avoiding the Paradox of Success
- Make a "said no to" list.
- As the list grows, evaluate how you feel about saying no.
" When you say yes to others, make sure you are not saying no to yourself."
- Paulo Coelho
In gratitude,
Greg
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Chief Executive Officer
1yGreg McKeown This is useful, thank you for posting :)
Experienced Team Leader | Trade Facilitation, Digital Transformation and Customs Modernisation Advisor I Speaker | Executive Director, Economic Development Consultants Ireland (EDCI)
1yKate Moylan
AI Certified Consultant | Expert Educator | Content Creator 🔥 Delivering BIG Ideas 💡 BIG Content 🤖 & BIG Results ✅ through AI
1yBrilliant reminder that everyone needs to be aware of. Thanks for sharing this powerful message, Greg McKeown. Continue being awesome.
Totally agree with the view shared here and this may explain partly why the mass resignation and early retirement to being an entrepreneur like home baker etc phenomenon! We need to be careful not to fall into this trap otherwise we are prevented from reaching our full potential!
CEO/President at Executive Leadership Performance,LLC.
1yReally great advice Greg. Love how you frame it the paradox of success.