The hard choices and the cost of Inaction

“The hard choices. Often what we fear doing or saying; these are often what we need to do. The challenges and problems we face will never be solved with comfortable conversations, whether it is in your own head or with other people. So I encourage you to ask yourselves where in your lives right now might defining your fears be more important than defining your goals.” — Tim Ferriss

I can relate this quote to many situations in my life over the past 3 years, and in fact, really over the last 33 years. Have you heard the Steve Job’s quote about connecting the dots going backward? I can trace my life, my education, and my relationships back to a hard choice (a fear) I made to study abroad my last semester in college.

I can trace my life to a hard choice I made to attend graduate school immediately after that semester abroad. I can trace my life to a hard choice I made to move to New York City, and I can trace my life to a hard choice I made to quit my full-time job just 2 1/2 years ago.

The hard choices are not easy, and the hard choices may not always be fun. But the hard choices make us grow, they make us more confident and they make us learn.

“Humans are very good at considering what might go wrong if we try something new. What we don’t often consider is the atrocious cost of the status quo, not changing anything.” — Tim Ferriss

I often think about this. The cost of in-action is really the highest cost there is. Once you become comfortable, it’s easy. Why would you want to make yourself uncomfortable? That doesn’t sound like fun right?

I’m not telling you that you should not be happy with what you have. You definitely should! It is important to be grateful for your life and what you have been given. But if you want to make a change in your life, and you want something more or something different than what you have today; you are going to have to add some discomfort into your life.

And what causes discomfort? Well in my opinion, it’s fear. Fear of the unknown. Fear of failure. Fear of what could happen. And fear of regret. That’s why actively seeking out discomfort is so powerful, it’s the only way to overcome fear.

Fear Setting

We usually talk about goal setting, but we never talk about fear setting. We put it into our brains that we have all of these goals and dreams we want to accomplish in our lives. But what is holding us back? It’s fear.

Have you been wanting to ask for a promotion, to ask someone out, or quit your job and travel? It all comes down to a fear about what will happen if we make that jump and actually take action.

In this video, Tim Ferriss introduces the idea of fear setting. He gives you a concrete exercise on how you can write down your fears about what changes you want to make in your life, and what you can do do about it. It all comes down to the cost of inaction, what happens if you don’t make a change. You can continue to maintain the status quo and remain comfortable, but the status quo is not going to bring any significant change.

So you should ask yourself, if I avoid this action or decision; what might my life look like in 6 months, 1 year, 3 years? For Tim, came to a crossroads at one point in his life and wanted to take a trip to London and step away from his business for a period of time. He asked himself the question of what would happen if he didn’t take this trip, and and he realized that inaction was no longer an option after going through this exercise he gives you. So let’s go through the exercise.

Step 1: Define, Prevent, Repair

Visualizing and writing down the worst case scenarios that you fear. He created a written exercise that he calls Fear Setting.

It consists of 3 sections. Write down what the fear is, what you can do to prevent the fear from happening, and what you can do to repair the fear if it does end up happening.

The define step could be anything. Asking someone out, quitting a job, asking for a promotion. It could be anything.

What happens now is that we define what we are afraid of and what we can do to keep the fear from happening. You are writing down the worst things that could happen if you take that step. In Tim’s case it was “Getting depressed in London” during his trip, and his prevent was he “could take a blue light to starve off depression.”

When we do this, we can put our mind at ease because we know what can do to conquer the fear. But if the worst case ends up happening, and the fear comes to life, we also need a plan; so Tim then wrote down for his repair as “could fly to Spain and get some sun.”

Step 2: “What might be the benefits of an attempt or partial success?”

If you attempted whatever you are considering, might you build confidence and develop skills, emotionally, financially, otherwise. What might be the benefits of a base hit?

This step is super important because it starts to make you realize what the benefits are of overcoming your fears. Each step along the way is going to help your grow. Even just writing this article is an incremental step towards a much longer term goal. I am developing my thoughts, I am growing my reach, and I’m figuring out what I really want to say.

Step 3: “The Cost of Inaction”

The last step is to write down what happens if you do nothing. What is the cost of doing nothing? What will happen in 6 months, 1 year, 3 years if you just keep going down the same path. What will happen if emotionally, physically, financially. If you avoid this action or decision, what will do you see happening in the future, and is this where you want to see your future headed?

When Tim looked at his life and indecision, it painted a terrifying picture. At the time he was self medicating, his business was going to implode, and his relationships were falling apart. So he decided that inaction was no longer an option for him.

So Now What?

Those 3 exercises make up fear setting. Then we look at it and we rate it. So in Tim’s case, if he took the trip he was risking a 1–3 in temporary or reversible pain, for an 8–10 of positive or life changing impact. He predicted the outcome would be so much more beneficial to his life than if he did nothing, that it became impossible for him to do nothing and maintain the status quo.

That trip to London became the basis for his book and his life over the next year and a half.

He continued this exercise and he can trace all of his biggest wins and all of his biggest disasters averted back to doing fear setting at least once a quarter. Some fears can be very well founded, but if you plan for them and make calculated risks, great things can happen.

At the very end of the video, Tim talks about his interaction with Jerzy Gregory. Gregory believes that “Easy choices, hard life. Hard choices, easy life.”

I can definitely relate to this. If we make hard decisions, if we overcome our fears, we can do anything. So what are your fears and are those fears keeping you from inaction?