1: “Peak performance isn’t something we win,” Steven Kotler writes in his brilliant book The Art of the Impossible.  

“There are no fixed rules, no established time frame for the contest, and the field of play is as big or as small as we choose to live our lives.”

Peak performance is what philosopher James Carse calls an “infinite game,” Steven notes. There are “finite games” and “infinite games” … continue reading

1: Author Steven Kotler is a skier.  

“I started skiing when I was five years old and have never stopped,” Steven Kotler writes in The Art of Impossible: A Peak Performance Primer. “As a result, every time I head into the mountains, I am making a choice (autonomy) that is aligned with my passion and purpose.”

This week we’ve been exploring the importance of autonomy to drive peak performance. … continue reading

1: Imagine it’s 9:30 am on a Wednesday morning. We are sitting at our desk. We receive an email from a colleague: “The waves are good!”

We stop what we are doing. We close our laptop. We stand up. We go change into our surfing gear. And we run to the beach.

This happens regularly at the outdoor retailer Patagonia, where the corporate headquarters sits on the Pacific Ocean, and … continue reading

1: The year was 1977. Edward Deci and Richard Ryan were young psychologists at the University of Rochester. On the day they met, Edward had just become a clinical practitioner, and Richard was still a graduate student.

Both men “shared an interest in the science of motivation, which led to a long conversation, which led to a fifty-year collaboration that overturned most of the foundational ideas in that science of … continue reading

Getting better at getting better is what RiseWithDrew is all about.

Monday through Thursday, we explore ideas from authors, thought leaders, and exemplary organizations. On Friday, I share something about myself or what we are working on at PCI.

This week we’ve been exploring my proven goal-setting process to make 2023 the best year of our lives.  

In his terrific book The Art of the Impossible, Steven Kotler identifies three … continue reading

1: Is a well-crafted to-do list, executed daily, the secret to achieving our life’s purpose?

This week we’ve looked at the first two types of goals Steven Kotler outlines in his powerful book The Art of the Impossible: massively transformative and high, hard goals.  

Today, we turn to “clear goals,” the third and final type of goal.

Each type of goal corresponds to a different timescale. A massively transformative … continue reading

1: Yesterday, we discovered the mission statement for our lives.

Our Massively. Transformative. Purpose.

Now what?

High, hard goals.

“Big goals significantly outperform small goals, medium-sized goals, and vague goals,” says Psychologist Gary Latham, considered one of the godfathers of goal-setting theory along with Edwin Locke.  

High, hard goals are Gary and Edwin’s technical term for big goals. Which are the second type of goal Steven Kotler outlines in … continue reading

1: Yes, the research is clear: Goal-setting improves our performance.  

But there’s more to the story.

“Simple as the idea of goal setting might seem, there’s trouble in the particulars,” Steven Kotler writes in his brilliant book The Art of the Impossible. 

“What the research shows is that not every goal is the same, nor is every goal appropriate for every situation and—most important—the wrong goal in the wrong … continue reading

Peak performance. That’s our goal.

To perform at the highest levels, we must tap into four cognitive abilities: motivation, learning, creativity, and, most importantly, flow, Steven Kotler tells us in The Art of Impossible: A Peak Performance Primer.

Yesterday, we looked at the importance of intrinsic drivers to maximize motivation. We engage in activities and behavior when intrinsically motivated because we find them interesting and internally satisfying. Intrinsic … continue reading

1: “Human flight is an ancient dream. It took us five thousand years to go from the first winged human cave drawing to the Wright brothers putting their Kitty Hawk launch into the record books,” one of author Steven Kotler‘s mentors told him. “Yet we didn’t stop there. Next it was transatlantic flight, then space flight, then the first lunar landing,” Steven writes in his book The Art of … continue reading