The Infinite Loops Guide To... Agency
"The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity." ~ Amelia Earhart
1. Jimmy Soni | Imposter Syndrome? Do it Anyway
“Every single person you think is successful, also believes they are the imposter. That is totally, it's a fact of life. When you go and really peer into the lives of the people who are the greats […] Maybe not now, but at some point in their lives they thought they were gigantic imposters, and some of them still do, and they still do it anyway.”
More from Jimmy: The Courage of Creative Risk (EP.214) | Make Things, and Be Playful (EP.108) | Unleashing the Future of Publishing (EP.157)2. | Persistence is Overrated
“It's the difference really between being persistent and tenacious. Persistence will just keep running and running and running on the same path, whereas if you are tenacious, you'll find a side door if you need to. You will leap into a different area. You will try a different avenue. So these are people who are tenacious rather than just persistence, because persistence will have people giving up, hitting against walls, trying to force things that aren't going to happen, and tenacious people will find [...] avenues for ways of things to work.”
More from Dr. Gurner: Ultra Successful (Ep.176)| Five Paths to Peak Performance (our synthesis)3. Julie Fredrickson | Adjust Your Programming
“And the set of programming, I assume that I came in even straight out of my mother was human that was evolved to survive as an animal on the Savannah. And then it turns out a lot of that programming wasn't particularly useful. I have to go through and learn a whole set of histories and experiences, and I had to become a playable character in my own life. I had to develop my own agency. And so this idea that we are all programmed is true. We're all programmed not only by our biology, but the books we read, the people we talk to, everything is adding just a little bit to our programming.”
More from Julie: “Circumstances change. Humanity doesn't. Plan accordingly.” (EP.181)4. Todd Goodwin | Don’t Label Yourself
“I just don't label people. I also think that a lot of the time, a lot of the time, diagnoses, while useful for categorizing things like, ‘What species is this weed growing in my garden?’ It is very disempowering for a lot of people because there's a lot of baggage that goes with diagnoses, and a person can identify with, ‘I'm an addict. I have major depressive disorder. I'm an anxious person. I'm a smoker.’ Whatever. And then when their identity gets tied up in the unhealthy behavior, it makes it much harder for them to change their behavior because the identity is going to dictate the behavior.”
More from Todd: “Revelation is not Resolution” (EP.175) | Hypnosis: Separating Myth From Reality (EP.164)5. George Mack | This is a Game
“And that seems to be the fundamental stack that creates high agency […]
A, this is just a video game. I can change this.
B, I've got some kind of skill to be able to do it.
And C, if not, I will eventually figure it out.
And D, that determinism that they will not quit.
So it is a weird mix of different things paired together that you immediately know it when you see it.
Which is why everybody who's listening to the podcast now can immediately go, ‘Oh, I know who'd I call to break me out of [a] third world jail.’
And I'm willing to bet, typically, they aren't the most academic person in their group. Typically, they're not the most athletic person. It's something else of those combination or factors that we discuss there that those people have.”
More from George: The Game of Life (EP.195) | Marketing, Mental Models, and Technology (EP.114)6. Michael Garfield | What World Do You Want?
“We all assume that, ‘I'll just be happy if I get this, and so how do I get that?’ And that kind of thinking tends to promote suffering of yourself and of others. If you start by being like, ‘What world do I want? Because I can assume that I will make it closer to that world if I start in a clear vision of that thing,’ I think that that's a really useful […] I do think that learning how to get better at reallocating our attention, and at telling stories that excite ourselves and excite other people, is a far better way to engage with the daunting complexity of the world that we have made for ourselves.”
More from Michael: Play the (Mind) Jazz (EP. 246)7. Mike Maples, Jr | Prepare for Surprise
“The best founders that I work with, I've noticed that about them. That every time they engage with the world, they're prepared to be surprised by something because only by being surprised will you ever find the breakthrough. Breakthroughs have never happened yet, they've never been discovered. So if you're trying to discover the undiscovered you have to be surprised ultimately. So people who show up in the world wanting to be surprised often find that clue in a discussion that the average entrepreneur wouldn't find.”
More from Mike: How To Become a Pattern-Breaking Founder (EP.233)8. Derek Sivers | The Choice You Commit To is the Right Choice
“If you're ever wondering what is the right decision, ‘Should I do this, or should I do that? Should I live here, or should I live there? Should I take this job or that job?’ that just the act of choosing one and wholeheartedly committing to it makes your choice the best choice. It is your commitment itself that can make any choice the right choice for you that you can... because they're all parallel worlds, you pick one, and by committing to it and making the best of it, it makes it the best choice.”
More from Derek: How to Become a Picasso (EP.185) | Just Do The Thing (EP.186)8. Jack Raines | Travel
“I think there's this idea that people have of going to Europe or whatever and finding yourself, and I think that's a load of shit. I don't think you can go find yourself in a nightclub in Budapest or anything like that. But something that I did realize is once you get out of your home environment, for me, getting out of Atlanta and going to... I didn't know anybody in Barcelona when I got there, that was my first stop. It kind of separates the parts of you that were a byproduct of your environment, where you fit in and the social hierarchy of where you are. And then the stuff that's left is what you actually like. So I don't think you find yourself when you're going in hostel-hopping, but you do get a lot better idea of what stuff you did was actually stuff you wanted to do or what stuff you value.”
More from Jack: The Authentic Path (EP.170)Explore previous instalments of our ‘Guide To’ series: Getting Sh*t Done, Leadership, Failure, Communication, Creativity, and Happiness.
I love these hints you send to me. They are the perfect length and target 🙏🏼
A lot of painful gymnastics going on in #8