Throughout the process, however, I realized that what I was really fascinated by was Why people do what they do and What is it about the successful people that allows them to achieve success. Again, I saw hard work and sacrifice because that was the lens I had grown up to expect until I discovered the Behavior Design lens. I came across behavior design/lifestyle design when I came across the 4 Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss. Here was a guy that was just as driven, who worked just as hard (or harder) but he had managed to set up systems to allow him to be more efficient and still do what he wanted. I was also turned on to Ramit Sethi author of I Will Teach You To Be Rich. Ramit had studied under Behavior Psychologist BJ Fogg at Stanford. He laid out a behavioral format that would make it easier to save (something that I wanted to do but didn't have the passion to work hard for). So I continued down the rabbit hole and found everything I could on BJ Fogg and realized that his theory of B=MAT (Behavior is equal to Motivation, Ability, and a Trigger coming together at the same time. See my earlier blog posts for a full description) was the holy grail for me to achieve the results I had always dreamed of.
This framework allowed me to realize that when I had failed at saving money or eating properly or going to the gym regularly, it wasn't because I didn't want it bad enough, it was because real life go in the way or I had made it more difficult on myself than it had to be. If I put in a little time and effort into planning out how I would actually achieve my behavior based on B=MAT, then I would drastically increase my success and I would also have a tool to help me discover what went wrong if I failed temporarily.
Knowing that there are reasons why I failed, and being able to see them also allowed me to come up with solutions. This method and mentality is so empowering! Now I know that any of my goals and dreams are just a matter of time and application of behavior design instead of tedious work that may or may not lead me to my goal.
I may not be able to play in the NBA (a goal hindered by injuries and a little bit by a lack of talent and athleticism...I'm going to stick with the injury story though) but I can still impact everyone I meet and with Behavior Design, I am implementing strategies and systems daily that are moving me in the right direction.
I am excited to continue this journey I hope you are excited as well. I have linked up the references I talked about in this post on the Book Club page if you want to check them out.
Have a great week!
Andrew
twitter @andrewzimbd