When you blame procrastination, laziness or a lack of motivation for your failure to achieve some of your goals, you might be right. However, if you were able to accomplish great things in the past, yet struggle to move on to bigger targets, something more insidious might be the culprit.
“The Big Leap” by Gay Hendricks offers an explanation for why you might be struggling: the fear of feeling good, which manifests as self-sabotage. I know this sounds implausible - who in their right mind would be afraid of happiness? - but as you entertain the thought, you will realize the author might just be on to something.
Let’s explore what self-sabotage is and why it could be holding you back, as well as what you can do to push past it to unlock achievements you previously only dreamed of. I’ll also mention why the Stoics might have stumbled upon the same conclusion as Hendricks without verbalizing it in quite the same way, so keep reading till the end for that.
P.S.: While this is not a review of “The Big Leap” per se, this post WILL help you decide whether reading this book is worth your time and energy (spoiler alert: it is).
The Upper Limit Problem
The main takeaway from “The Big Leap” is that all human beings are plagued by the so-called Upper Limit Problem, which causes them to self-sabotage just as they are on the brink of achieving something big. In the words of the author:
“Each of us has an inner thermostat setting that determines how much love, success, and creativity we allow ourselves to enjoy. When we exceed our inner thermostat setting, we will often do something to sabotage ourselves, causing us to drop back into the old, familiar zone where we feel secure.” -- Gay Hendricks, "The Big Leap"
It sounds pretty far-fetched that someone would - even subconsciously - try to limit the amount of happiness they feel, but there is an explanation for this: the protective role of our ego.
As you might remember from our discussion on cognitive biases, our brain is wired to protect us from harm and suffering in ways that were suitable for our hunter-gatherer ancestors, but which backfire if you are a modern human living in the 21st century.
The same mechanism is at play here: when we hit our upper limit, our ego is causing us to self-sabotage because it is trying to shield us from the even greater suffering it perceives would result from our success.
In other words, as you go about your life, your ego is always making a trade-off behind the scenes to choose the least amount of pain between two options: that of failing in the moment (being unsuccessful or unhappy) and the one it believes hides behind every notable accomplishment (usually some form of deep guilt or shame).
This explains why surpassing your upper limit problem is such a tough nut to crack: it literally puts you in a conflict state with your ego. So why is this even an issue in the first place?
Why does this happen? What are the reasons for Self-sabotage?
As Guy Hendricks explains, the origins of the upper limit problem can usually be traced back to an event in childhood when we acquired one or more of the following beliefs:
that we are deeply flawed and thus do not deserve good things;
that by being successful we are betraying our origins and leaving the people from our past behind;
that it is immoral to outshine others through our achievements;
that we are a burden to others and any success we might have will only increase the strain we put on them.
If any of these resonate with you and you want to see an example of how one could have acquired such beliefs, the book contains stories of real people who have confronted these issues and have managed to identify their root cause. (Hint: it’s usually due to someone else making you feel guilty for something you couldn’t possibly have done.)
The surprising forms self-sabotage takes in everyday life
Hendricks identifies 5 instances in which self-sabotage commonly occurs in daily life. They are:
1. Worry
especially about things we have no control over (Stoics, does that sound familiar?), because it prevents us from enjoying our success for fear it might be taken away from us due to some risk we’ve failed to predict.
2. Criticism and blame
because pointing out other people’s flaws distracts us from appreciating their better features and having a good relationship with them.
3. Deflecting (for example compliments)
because focusing on our shortcomings gets us back to the comforting “still not good enough” state we’ve grown accustomed to.
4. Squabbling or other arguments
especially when racing for the victim position by always attempting to one-up the other person by showing how our suffering is larger than theirs. Similar to #2, this one is just trying to convince ourselves of the misfortune of our relationships because it confirms our wrongly-held belief that we do not deserve to be loved.
5. Getting sick or hurt
I have to admit I’m skeptical about this one, but we keep seeing research into how the mind and our emotions impact our physical self, so this might also be legit. Also, note that this doesn’t mean every illness is caused by the ULP and the author isn’t trying to imply that either. He is only referring to what he calls “diseases of unfulfillment”, which are difficult to diagnose correctly, such as chronic fatigue syndrome.
6. (Not from the book) Procrastination
I would also add procrastination to the list, since it also stems from the fear of failing on the task at hand, rather than laziness, like most people believe.
Now that we’ve identified the predictable ways in which self-sabotage might manifest in your life, you probably want to know how you can stop, or at least lessen your tendencies towards it. We’ll get to that soon enough, but there’s one other thing worth mentioning from the book before we move on to solutions:
Taking your Big Leap is not only a matter of defeating self-sabotage; it’s also a question of operating in your Zone of Genius.
The book mentions that at any given moment in time, each of us operates in one of these 4 zones:
The Zone of Incompetence - everything you are not good at doing and for which you have no innate ability;
The Zone of Competence - everything you can do well, but that other people can do just as well;
The Zone of Excellence - everything you can do better than most other people;
The Zone of Genius - everything you do that nobody else can do to the same level; those things that are uniquely suited to your abilities and talents and for which Robert Greene would say you have achieved ‘mastery’.
Hard work and motivation can get you from the Zone of Competence to the Zone of Excellence, especially if you have some affinity for the task. You’d be forgiven for thinking that more of the same over a long stretch of time will eventually get you to the Zone of Genius.
As the author explains, on the road that takes you from your Zone of Excellence to your Zone of Genius there be monsters:
“For successful people, this zone [of excellence] is a seductive and even dangerous trap. […] The temptation is strong to remain in the Zone of Excellence; it’s where your own addiction to comfort wants you to stay. It’s also where all your friends, family and organization want you to stay. You’re reliable there, and you provide a steady supply of all the things that family, friends and organizations thrive on. The problem is that a deep, sacred part of you will wither and die if you stay inside your Zone of Excellence.” -- Gay Hendricks, "The Big Leap"
In other words, you have a duty to yourself to find a way into your Zone of Genius.
(Since this post is already getting long, I won’t mention the questions you should ask yourself to explore what your Zone of Genius might be. You’ll have to read the book if you’re curious about those.)
How does self-sabotage keep us from reaching our Zone of Genius?
Realizing that self-sabotage comes from a fear of success holds the key to understanding why it is so difficult to make the leap from the Zone of Competence into the Zone of Genius.
To better illustrate this, let’s examine Paul's situation, who always dreamed of being a writer, but decided to pursue a career in real estate instead. (If this sounds vaguely familiar, it’s because I’m riffing on Paul, the “real estate novelist” in Billy Joel’s “Piano Man” - a song I believe perfectly summarizes the bittersweet tragedy of never pursuing your purpose.)
Paul is reasonably content with his life, can provide for his family and save for retirement - if you met him, you’d think that by all accounts he’s a successful member of society. You’d even think that on most days, he’s happy.
What you wouldn’t guess is that Paul frequently looks at his picture-perfect life only to ask himself “is that all?!” and to conjure up an image he’d had about himself when he was younger: that he’s putting the finishing touches on a manuscript while his smiling face looks back at him from the billboard outside, where it gracefully sits advertising the first volume of the trilogy.
The image dissipates in an instant as he tells himself such a thing could never happen; he doesn’t have time to write a manuscript considering all his obligations. What’s more, his family would suffer tremendously if he ever were to quit his high-paying job to pursue something less demanding in order to create time for writing.
Why might Paul talk himself out of taking the big leap and finally writing that novel? Why would he come up with every excuse under the sun, when it’s glaringly obvious to anyone on the outside that none of them have legs?
The answer is simple, yet hard for him to verbalize: fear.
If he’d actually sit down every evening to write 500 words (which means he’d have a first draft in around 3 months considering the average length of a book), then he’d actually find out if he has it in him to be a writer or not. He could publish the next New York Times bestseller or fail spectacularly or anything in between.
While rational Paul would really like to know which of those outcomes would materialize, his ego begs to differ and spurs him yet again to watch TV instead of sitting down at his desk.
What does his ego stand to gain if Paul never writes his novel? Everything. Because it allows Paul to always justify his lukewarm happiness with the phrase: “if only I had written that book, my life would have been perfect.” He’d never be truly content in life, but he’d also never have to face the possibility of failing at his most treasured goal. He’d forever save face with himself because there would be an explanation for why he never achieved stellar success: he didn’t have time to try (otherwise it would have been a sure thing).
How to Stop Self-sabotage and spend more time in your Zone of Genius: 2 Actionable ideas from the Stoics (and one from yours truly)
The bad news, as you’ve already figured out, is that all of us are prone to self-sabotage. (You might have even thought of some personal examples while reading this post.)
The good news is that you can train your happiness muscle and strengthen your tolerance to things going well. If it’s a skill you can learn, it means it is within your power to improve your situation immediately and start living a better life (and living more in your Zone of Genius).
While I wouldn’t say that the Stoics had identified the upper limit problem as such, they did land on some helpful practices and behaviors that could help you push past it. They also had an intuition of the Zone of Genius, which is why they urged everyone to live in accordance to (their) nature. (Let’s face it, the Zone of Genius is simply a fancy nickname for your life’s purpose.)
Here are some Stoic practices that will get you closer to making the big leap:
Focus only on what is within your control to avoid unnecessary worry. This will leave more brain power available for spotting opportunities and acting on them. As an added bonus, you’ll be in a better mood.
Practice voluntary discomfort. Do things that are out of your comfort zone to train yourself to see that you can “survive” much more than you give yourself credit for, including more happiness and success.
And an additional one that you can start executing on today:Keep an experimentation mindset. When you identify something that you’re postponing out of a fear of failure, commit to doing it for a couple of days as an experiment. Reframing this change as temporary will sneak past your ego’s defenses and you’ll have made one more step on your way to fulfillment. More often than not, you’ll notice that the change sticks for longer than the initial experiment.
Phew, that was a long one! Congrats on making it this far! I hope you learned something that will help you push your upper limit that bit higher and get you closer to the happiest possible version of yourself.
There are few more learnings from this book I’d like to share, which didn’t fit into any of the previous sections. If you’re already too excited to read the book, then feel free to go do that and skip this part.
Otherwise, here are some more nuggets to ponder:
A few more insights from The Big Leap that didn’t fit anywhere else
- The existence of the Zone of Genius highlights one other overlooked fact: that no amount of hard work will allow you to exceed someone who puts in the hard work, is motivated AND has an innate talent for that particular activity. If you are not operating in your own Zone of Genius, they will outlast you every time.
- It is more important to focus your time and energy into developing your talents, rather than correcting your shortcomings. This is exactly the opposite of what school teaches you - if you’re bad at math, but excellent at writing, you get to spend more time improving your math skills, rather than furthering the writing skills you’re already good at. Let’s be clear, I’m not suggesting it’s a good idea to fail high-school because you’re bad at math and you’re gonna make a living off of your writing. Sometimes the outcome - e.g.: getting into your school of choice later - justifies the effort. I’m just advocating for doing what you have to do, while not forgetting to feed your talents.
- Splitting your activities into the 4 zones allows you to tackle them more rationally. Allow me to explain: it is irrational to spend your time and energy doing the things you are bad at, when you can pay someone to do them for you. I can guarantee that if you focus on those activities where you operate in your Zone of Genius and avoid the others, you will generate the highest amount of impact both for yourself financially and for society at large.
- One could argue that it’s immoral to deprive someone of their chance to operate in their Zone of Genius by denying them the opportunity to work on something you are bad at. Case in point: if you hate cooking, but John is a great chef, why don’t you pay John to worry about your dinner, while you write that novel that John can buy and enjoy at the end of his workday?
- Can you imagine what levels of global happiness, productivity and creativity we could collectively unlock if everyone made an effort to allow themselves and others to only operate in their Zone of Genius?
P.S.: There’s another book with a similar theme - “The Happiness Advantage” by Shawn Achor - which posits that you need to be happy before you can be successful, not the other way around. You might want to look at that next.
