To be or not to be an overachiever
I am reading the ‘Foundation’ series by Isaac Asimov, once again. He is one of my favorite science fiction writers. This time around I pondered over the ‘about the author’ page (see picture) more than I had before, as I noticed the scale of Asimov achievements in the literary field. Certain facts about his work are truly mind boggling:
- He wrote more than 500 books..
- ..More than 20 million published words
- A PhD in chemistry, he wrote both fiction and non-fiction on physics, ancient history, religion, mystery, and fantasy
- To match his literary contributions, one would have to write a full-length novel every two weeks for 25 years
- He coined the term robotics
- He almost managed to fool a Ph.D. evaluation board with his fictional research paper (this is not an achievement but shows the extent of confidence he had in his skills to pull off such a stunt)
He is an ‘over-achiever’, and in some ways like the ones we have around us such as Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Ratan Tata etc. And so, I wonder what makes one achieve so much more in their lifetime compared to most of us. Here are some of my thoughts and learnings:
1. Work and Passion are two sides of the same coin. “The only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do.” (Steve Jobs)
2. Free up your subconscious for ideas to grow. “I throw away all of my troubles. My mind is free” (Lorde)
3. Be a life-long student, unabashedly curious. “Arm Yourself With Specific Knowledge. Specific knowledge can be found by pursuing your genuine curiosity” (Naval Ravikant)
4. Go Deep, Deeper. “View knowledge as sort of a semantic tree — make sure you understand the fundamental principles, i.e. the trunk and big branches, before you get into the leaves/details or there is nothing for them to hang on to” (Elon Musk)
5. Make it happen!! “Vision without execution is just hallucination” (Henry Ford)
6. Hitting roadblocks is normal. Create a strategy to overcome them. March On!! “If you’re going through hell, keep going” (Winston Churchill)
7. Embrace failure. “Only those who dare to fail greatly can ever achieve greatly” (Robert F Kennedy)
8. Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good. Have realistic standards. “Diversity is insurance of the mind” (Charles Chu)
9. Don’t expect it to be easy. “By thinking and thinking and thinking till I’m ready to kill myself”, said Isaac Asimov when another top writer asked him about how he gets his ideas.
However, not all is hunky dory for overachievers. They are most susceptible to the “perfectionism trap”. They have a constant need for validation that may diminish their intrinsic feelings of worth. “…It makes for a thin life, lived for what isn’t rather than what it is. If you’re forever trying to make your life what you want it to be, you’re not really living the life you have…” (Moya Sarner)
So is there an answer to this Shakespearean conundrum ? Yes, ofcourse there is — To be a balanced achiever. Isaac Asimov wrote in his 1971 essay ‘The Good Earth Is Dying’ that “What was common sense in a world that once existed has become myth in the totally different world that now exists”. Common sense is our pursuit of happiness but not burning out while chasing overachievement and perfection. It is also common sense to pursue excellence and be completely ok to accept average returns.
(Sources of inspiration for this blogpost: Forbes, Nature, wikipedia, google, Mark Manson, QZ, I,Asimov: A Memoir)
