1: The research is clear. When we feel our lives and work are a calling, good things happen.
We “experience greater overall subjective well-being or happiness as well as greater career success than those who view their work as a job or career,” Dan Sullivan and Benjamin Hardy write in 10x Is Easier Than 2x.
A calling is defined as “a sense of purpose, [that] we’re doing what we are meant to do,” Dan and Ben note. “Research has found a consistent link between feeling a sense of calling and heightened levels of career maturity, career commitment, work meaning, job satisfaction, life meaning, and life satisfaction.”
One key strategy to help us find our calling is to identify what Dan calls our “Unique Ability“–which is “the purest and most honest expression of ourselves,” the authors write. “Our Unique Ability is how we create value and wealth that is unique and specialized. It’s our radically unique way of doing what we do, such that no one else can compete with us even if they wanted to.”
2: Developing our Unique Ability is an iterative process.
o Doing so allows us, or forces us, to let go of our prior 80 percent, which frees us to explore our curiosities and interests further.
o It starts by being “increasingly honest with ourselves and other people,” Dan and Ben write, “about what we most want for ourselves and our lives.”
o Then, we consider and develop our 10x vision for our future. We intentionally expand our thinking exponentially about what we can be, do, and have. What excites us? What energizes us? Where do we see potential for never-ending improvement? What, the authors ask, makes us “unique and different from everyone else on this planet?”
o Next, we further clarify our ideal future selves and what we will be doing. We want to be very specific: “What context are we in? What mission are we fulfilling? What is the cause we are passionate about? What Unique Ability do our future selves have, which they are utilizing to dramatically impact and advance what we most care for? What are the unique standards our future selves live by and have normalized, even though it may seem unfathomable and unrealistic to the current version of us?
o Then, we use the 80-20 rule to clarify the essential 20 percent that creates 80 percent of our results. Once we clarify the essential 20 percent, we make a decision to focus 80 percent of our time and attention to develop greater Mastery in this critical area.
This process allows us to create what author Robert Greene calls “Mastery.” Our ability to trust ourselves and forge our unique path he calls the “X factor” of Mastery: “Mastery is not a function of genius or talent,” he observes. “It is a function of time, and intense focus applied to a particular field of knowledge.
“But there is another element, an X factor that Mastery inevitably possesses, that seems mystical but is accessible to us all. Whatever field of activity we are involved in, there is generally an accepted path to the top. . . But Masters have a strong inner guiding system and a high level of self-awareness.
“Inevitably, these Masters,” Robert writes, “as they progress in their career paths, make a choice at a key moment in their lives: they decide to forge their own route, one that others will see as unconventional, but that suits their own spirit and rhythms and leads them closer to discovering the hidden truths of their object of study.
“This key choice takes self-confidence and self-awareness—the X factor that is necessary for attaining mastery.”
There is a difference between doing something well and doing something uniquely well. “If it’s not unique, innovative, and uninhibited self-expression, then it’s not true mastery,” Dan and Ben observe. “Mastery and uniqueness are inseparable.”
Developing and expressing our Unique Ability is the path to achieving the highest levels of Mastery.
3: “A word of warning when it comes to defining your Unique Ability,” explain Dan and Ben. “It’s much, much bigger than anything we specifically do. . . There’s danger in defining our Unique Ability based on a specific skill, such as writing.”
Why? Because making a 10x jump often requires us to evolve our Unique Ability.
“When our identity is what we do, then what we do becomes hard to abandon, because it means quitting who we are,” explains decision-making expert Annie Duke in her book Quit.
Dan and Ben add: “Our Unique Ability is the unique way we approach what we do when we’re living at our best. It’s not tied to any specific activity, although we can frame it that way strategically and thoughtfully if we’d like.”
Ben defines his Unique Ability as, “Connecting with truth, internalizing and being transformed by it, and teaching it in such a way that it transforms those who hear it.”
Unique Ability involves pushing the boundaries of ourselves and what we think is possible. “The scariest and most exciting thing we’ll ever do,” the authors write, “is our truest selves, holding nothing back, and with no apology. This is how we develop in our Unique Ability. . .
“If it doesn’t feel like we’re radically exposing ourselves, then it’s not Unique Ability.
“If it’s not transforming us rapidly, it’s not Unique Ability.
“If it doesn’t feel like play and raw creativity, it’s not Unique Ability.
“If the rabbit hole doesn’t go far down, it’s not Unique Ability.
“If we’re not innovating, breaking rules, and changing boundaries for what ‘reality’ means in a particular discipline or craft, then it’s not Unique Ability.”
More tomorrow!
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Reflection: Dan and Ben prompt us to consider: “What about me? What is my Unique Ability? What is the unique value I provide to others, which no one else can? What is the 10x jump that excites me most, which requires me to go all-in on my Unique Ability to realize? What’s the 80 percent of my life keeping me busy but unproductive, because it’s keeping me outside my Unique Ability.”
Action: Journal my answers to the questions above.
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