3 is a magical number.
With the number 3, you can effortlessly break down the most complex systems in the world.
With the number 3, you can make impossible goals seem so easy a child could do it.
Here. Let me show you.
Let’s say I’m a Business man and I want to increase revenue from $100,000 to 1,000,000.
With the number 3, we can break down this goal easily.
Step 1 something goes in:
- product or service
Step 2 something happens that increases revenue:
- Increasing cost of service, Lower cost of services, increasing sales volume
Step3:
- 1,000,000$ 🎉
Every single goal that you can ever have can be broken down into this 3 step simple plan.
How?
The answer lies in systems.
Every system is basic in nature:
In -> stock/buffer -> out
A stock is the foundation of every system. A stock is storage, a quantity, and accumulation of material and knowledge. In other words, a stock is like a bathtub.
Goals are outputs.
They are flowing out.
They’re at the end.
In other words, a goal is the sum of the inflow + stock.
So in order, to reach your goals you must determine what must enter the system.
Then, figure out the stock or what needs to be accumulated in the middle part of the system that will then lead to the goal.
Essentially, to reach your goal you need to know what inputs you need and and how these inputs need to interact with one another.
It’s that simple.
You have the outflow already -> which is the goal now reverse engineer the system.
People like to think down-top but I think top-down is much more efficient, effortless, and simpler because with this mechanism of thinking you can deduce exactly what you need and waste time on extra stuff that doesn’t matter.
Let’s say you want a partner, the formula is as follows:
Step 1 inflow:
- Meeting people(Guys, women, whoever)
step 2 stock:
- Accumulation of trust
- interaction → dates
step 3 goal reached:
- Partner attained
How do you make money?
step 1 inflow:
- product or service
step 2 stock:
- convince people of product or service value
step 3 goal:
- people give you money
How do you get good at sports or programming or any other skill?
Step 1 inflow:
- Skill you want to learn
step2 stock:
- Practice
step3 goal:
- being good at skill
It’s simple but not really because you need to deduce the steps that are most likely to accelerate you to your goal and I don’t know what your goal is. (if you want me to help email me at kye@apac.ai)
If you can understand the dynamics of stocks and flows or how they behave over time you can understand a good deal about how respond to certain actions.
Stagnation
This is what system people call an equilibrium.
An equilibrium just means in a state of equal ness.
In an equilibrium, inflows and outflows are moving at the same pace and the system’s overall behavior is the same over a period of time.
This is not ideal if you have a goal.
Because when you’re optimizing for a certain outflow or goal you’re going to need to experiment with inflows and the stock and see in what manner of interconnectedness does the inflows match up with the goal.
Some general principles are:
- As long as the sum of all inflows exceeds the sum of all outflows the level of the stock will rise
- as long as the sum of all outflows exceed the sums of all inflows, the level of the stock will fall
- If the sum of all outflows — the sum of all inflows the stock will not change and the system will be in a state of equal-ness or equilibrium. The rate of equal-ness is proportional to the level it was at when the 2 sets of inflow and outflow became equal
- We can fill a bathtub by both increasing inflows and decreasing the outflow rate. (keep this in your head 😊 , it’s a secret trick
- Stocks take time to change because flows take time to flow.
- Stocks can act as buffers, delayers(delaying flow), momentum manipulators, and many other primary functions. (It’s important to determine which stock function is the most likely to flow towards your goal)
Example → industrialism cannot proceed faster than the rate at which factories or machines can be built and the rate at which human beings can be educated to run and maintain them.
Seems simple right?
Action Step
Write down any goal you’ve had on your mind down in this 3 simple step format.
Remember, start at the goal or the outflow and walk backwards through the system.
Like Goal → stock → inputs
Do this every time you have a goal no matter the size big small colossal it doesn’t matter, over time you’ll start to see how easy it is to accomplish your goals or even create systems.
Share this blog edition with friends or family and help rely on eachother as accountability partners.
Conclusion
Every goal or system can be divided into 3 parts:
- Inflow → stock → outflow/Goal
The way you reach goals is by reverse engineering or walking backwards from the goal/outflow to the stock and then to the individual inputs needed to flow back through the system that end up molding into your goal.
3 is the God number for the reason that it allows people to simplify extremely complex goals or systems.
But, why waste time figuring out which inputs and which stock function you need when Athena can figure that out for you!
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