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Avoiding the work does not mean you are lazy. It means the step in front of you is too steep.
Show Notes
Avoiding the work does not mean you are lazy. It means the step in front of you is too steep.
Featuring: John Steinbeck
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Chapters:
(00:00) Resistance means the step is too steep
(00:25) John Steinbeck stalls before writing East of Eden
(00:45) Shrinking the step to one page a day
(01:04) The resistance is a measurement problem
(01:20) Shrink the first move until starting takes no effort
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One mental model each day in a few minutes. Habits, business, building products and thinking clearly. From Dru Riley, founder of Trends.vc.
"Divide each difficulty into as many parts as is feasible and necessary to resolve it."
René Descartes
Each day I read one of my rules: "Resistance is a sign that the step is too steep."
When you procrastinate on a project, the instinct is to blame your discipline. But avoiding the work does not mean you are lazy. It means the step in front of you is too steep.
In 1951, John Steinbeck sat down to write East of Eden. The scale of the book terrified him. He delayed starting, paralyzed by the mountain of work ahead.
Whenever he thought about writing an epic novel, a sick sense of failure stopped him cold.
If you have ever stared at a blank screen, you know that stall.
His breakthrough was shrinking the step until it was impossible to avoid. He knew that looking at the whole mountain makes you freeze:
"Write just one page a day, that is all. Be aware of it only as a single page."
Chopping the monolith into a single daily slice dissolved the dread.
The book was finished in a year.
When a project feels overwhelming, you back away. The resistance is not a character flaw. It is a measurement problem.
Your brain stalls when an large outcome pretends to be a single task.
Monoliths invite avoidance because they offer nowhere to start.
Separate preparation from execution. Shrink the first move until starting takes less effort than putting it off.
Once an outcome turns into an atomic sequence, the resistance disappears.
What stalled task could you split into two startable steps?