1: Ever heard of the “effort paradox”?
It’s the reason most New Year’s resolutions fail.
We “overcommit to a bunch of lofty aspirations,” Anne-Laure Le Cunff writes in her book Tiny Experiments.
“The human mind has a love/hate relationship with effort,” she notes. “We are drawn to the idea of it, yet we would rather not have to put in actual effort.”
We think we will be happier if we overcome a big challenge.
So “we tend to select difficult paths precisely because they require more effort,” Anne-Laure writes.
“Even if it means we are more likely to fail.”
2: The good news? There is a better way.
Instead, we can make a pact with ourselves: “An actionable commitment we will fulfill for a set period of time,” Anne-Laure suggests.
A pact is like an experiment. We also commit ourselves to action. Not stagnation.
When we embrace “an experimental mindset,” Anne-Laure writes, we adopt “an attitude of openness and curiosity, a willingness to learn with a sense of receptiveness, and a lack of preconceived notions.”
We seek out something we are curious about.
“From exploring a new hobby to learning a new skill,” she suggests. From “gauging a potential career path, or trying out a new routine.”
“A pact can be easy, such as two weeks of daily stretching,” she notes. “Or it can be more ambitious, such as creating a digital illustration every week for the next three months.”
Pacts help us “test our assumptions,” Anne-Laure writes, “when it comes to our work (e.g., blocking two hours for reading and creative thinking on Mondays for a month), our health (e.g., going to bed at the same time every day for a week), or our relationships (e.g., date night with your spouse every other Saturday for six months).”
3: Why do pacts work? Because they focus on action. Rather than on how we feel.
Because we can’t force ourselves to feel motivated.
“Action seems to follow feeling,” psychologist William James once observed. “But really action and feeling go together; and by regulating the action, which is under the more direct control of the will, we can indirectly regulate the feeling, which is not.”
Making a pact is about doing. Not planning.
“That’s why ‘I will learn how to code’ is a flawed pact,” Anne-Laure writes, “but ‘I will code every day for a hundred days’ is a great one.”
We don’t say: “I will write a book.” Instead, we commit: “I will write every weekday for the next six months.”
Instead of “I will run a marathon,” we say “I will run every Sunday for six weeks.”
Because one action begets another. Which builds momentum. Not motivation.
We “just need to get started and trust that we will naturally build confidence through repetition,” Anne-Laure predicts.
More tomorrow!
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Reflection: Am I falling into the effort paradox by aiming for dramatic change, or is there a smaller pact I can make that will help me move forward?
Action: Choose one simple, actionable pact to try for the next week—focusing on consistency and process instead of big ambitions.
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