Knowing The Next Right Thing To Do
Level 4: Serious Player
Dear Future Guardian,
How do you know if you're doing the right thing?
I've been writing a lot lately about identifying your best course of action to increase the chance you get what you want in life ...
And that has necessarily led me to this point.
What do we do NOW, today, tomorrow, such that we are at least certain to increase the likelihood of getting what we want, even if what we're doing doesn't feel certain.
I think we often define our decision to put our resources based on that outcome we desire. That is, we draw direct connections, direct lines from where we are now, what we are doing right now, to the outcome we think we want.
Think about it like this.
Let's say I want to be making $10k/mo.
I think it's very easy to fall into the feeling, the trap perhaps, of thinking that the action I'm taking right in this particular moment has to seem to me directly connected to making that money.
That's how we think about getting what we want.
We've got to be able to see that direct connection to feel like the actions we're taking in the moment are getting us there.
That's why when we see someone doing something getting them $10k/mo, we start to think "damn I should be doing that thing right now."
It's not just that you're drawn to someone else's idea of what could make you a lot of money, it's that you're also not entirely sure exactly what you should be doing in the moment to create certainty that you'll get what you want, so you end up doing the actions which seem and feel most obviously and directly like what you want.
It always comes back to certainty and uncertainty.
When you're stepping into the field of growth, doing something new, where there are many personal unknowns you will necessarily always experience uncertainty. And so one of your default reactions and motivations is going to be to seek certainty.
Following someone else's direction on how they make $10k/mo is one way to feel like you've achieved certainty.
This leads to a constant cycle of looking at what you're doing right now and changing what that is in order to latch onto certainty of getting what you think you want, only to inevitably (because it came from someone else, not you) feel like that's not the thing, so you then seek the next hit of certainty.
And a big part of why we end up taking that route is we don't really know the best thing to work on in the moment which will increase the likelihood we get what we uniquely want in our lives.
Funnily enough, even if the action we take inherently has an uncertain outcome, if we believe that process is taking us toward what we want, that instills enough certainty to keep moving through uncertainty.
This continues to get more complicated,
Because even if you are clear on what you want, if you focus on not quite the right things, but things which appea* to be along the path of you getting what you want, you can still run into this same dynamic.
OR you might pick the next right thing, and still feel this,
Where you try something, but in the trying, in the action taking, it doesn't feel like you are getting any significant outcome. It doesn't feel like you are getting more of what you want in life, or increasing the likelihood of getting what you want in life.
And it becomes easy to think that the path you are on or the thing you are doing is not right.
So we must unravel all this.
Along the path of getting what you want in life are numerous, probably incalculable and ever replenishing, limiting factors which effectively "stand in the way" of you getting what you want in life.
We talk about those as constraints.1
Like a kinked hose. Our ideal outcome is a fully flowing hose, watering our garden or what have you. But between where we are now (the spigot) and where we want to be (the watered garden), are many many kinks in the hose stopping the flow
If you are currently employed, but you would rather be living a life where you only answer to yourself, you work a few hours a day, and you make more than enough from this time effort to cover all your needs and then some ...
You've got a lot of constraints to solve between where you are now and the life you want to live.
Extreme example of course,
But my point here is to define that every action you take to put pieces in place, solve problems, increase the chance of getting the life that you desire, these are all efforts to solve constraints in one way or another.
But if you are currently employed, and you think "I'm going to own a coffee roaster, and one day own a series of coffee shops and roasters," and the first thing you do is buy a building that you can build out a coffee roaster in, that effort will change absolutely nothing about your current life and situation.
There are a ton of other constraints between where you are now, and when owning a building is going to be useful.
It's not enough to solve constraints.
Because solving constraints which don't contribute to the NOW is just burning resources with no return. And in many ways sunk costs you into committing to solving ALL the constraints until you start seeing resources coming back from all the effort.
It's not just the resources though.
There's another dynamic at play which makes solving the most immediate constraint important ...
The shifting nature of reality and life.
If you take the route of piecing things together by solving constraints which are not immediate, then you are sinking all your resources into something with no return until you finally solve your immediate constraints ...
By then you might discover that you don't even want to run the business you thought you were building.
However, if you focus on solving the most immediate constraint, that will have an immediate impact on your life, increase the likelihood of getting what you want, but it will also tell you new things about yourself.
As you knock out immediate constraint after immediate constraint, you'll be confronted with new and interesting choices and new and interesting understanding about yourself which you previously couldn't have known if you didn't walk that path.
Knocking out the immediate constraint is not only the best way to leverage your resources in the short term, it's also the best path towards self discovery and understanding.
Getting the life you want isn't just about imagining all the things you want and then working toward them blindly, it's about evolving as you walk the path to constantly re-understand what life means to you, what YOU mean to you.
Because it's through this path,
With receptivity,
That you'll discover the truth of the life you really want to be living, but quite possibly can't see in the moment.
Quite possibly can't ever see in the moment.
Life is far more complex, rich, and dynamic than any of us can ever independently realize I think. It's through movement and change and contrast and Engaging the Field that we discover the magic of life.
It's almost like life is not the things around us but the spiritually static energy created by our friction moving through them.
And then there's that dynamic ...
Of working on things that feel like they aren't doing enough, or aren't going fast enough, or feel like they aren't doing much at all for us.
This was one of those ideas which "I always knew" but rejected out of hand for years. Because the path forward which allows the life you really desire and thrive in to emerge is one that is slow and deliberate.2
It's one which asks you to take one small step and then stand back and observe.
It's one which does NOT appear or feel like you're going to be spending your time directly on the thing that will get you that goal and that life you think you want.
I spend my day writing words and pulling out all the perspective and understanding from these philosophies and principles of TGA and it's never felt like any word, sentence, article, letter, email, or whatever I've written has ever been going to get me anything directly.
Other than the satisfaction and fulfillment of living my best life.
Which ... happens to be the kind of life I want to be living.
When I stand back and let go of all the things I think I desire and allow myself to realize the present life and moment are everything I've ever really wanted in my soul and my bones, I can make every moment of effort and time spent on my work be all that it needs to be.
It's almost like what I really want is the thing that comes out of just focusing on the most immediate constraint and letting go of the future - even though I still think what I want is the life I'm working towards building.
But, in letting go of trying to make something from my actions now, I stop choking the sprouts and allow them to become something all on their own.
I don't think it's possible to make you understand what I understand from all this.
I can only open a door and show you a glimpse through my perspective. That might be obvious, but I also feel it necessary to say that, both for MY clarity (so I can let go), but also to acknowledge those of you reading thus far going "yea ok buuut ..."
So with that,
I'll at least share with you, to answer "what should I do next?", why the most immediate constraint is what you want to focus on, and how to identify your most immediate constraint.
If the spiritually static life emergence doesn't move you, the strategic and tactical application of this below will still probably be appealing:
Why the most immediate constraint
Before we can ever get into the what and why of the most immediate constraint, we have to know what it is we ultimately really want.
I'll tell you two key things to understand about this:
The first is that I advise against perfectionism. It's better to pick something and move forward in action. Even if you are wrong, as long as you keep present self awareness (which you are doing already by reading this), you can adjust course as you move.
Accept that what you want may very well change. Let go of needing the outcome to look the way you think it should look. Because the truth of life is it's never going to look in the future the way you think it will look from your current vantage point.
The point of those two ... points ... is to acknowledge that many of you reading this will spend a lot of time trying to figure out what you want and trying to craft the perfect plan to get there.
All at the expense of the action you could be taking.
Rather than seek perfection, pick a direction and go, and then trust yourself to pay attention to the outcomes you see from action and to be able to tell, after each step, whether what you want is what you still really want, and whether the way to get it is what you want, and whether that's all still the direction you ought to be heading for yourself.
Pick a direction. Trust yourself. Go.
It's necessary because you can't figure out your most immediate constraint if you don't have a direction. If you don't have an outcome you're trying to engineer there's no path to determine the throughput and the constraints along the way.
If you've been in TGA long you'll have heard or read about how we always want to know where we're going and where we are now so we can devise accurate directions for getting from here to there (the 'ole Google Maps analogy).
And you may have also seen me write about how it's not the endpoint that matters most, it's that we need the directions to see the next best step.
The Most Immediate Constraint3 is the Next Best Step4.
And it's also why after taking the step, your path could very well change. Because, in reference to what I've written thus far, when you spend resources on your most immediate constraint, it ideally releases resources or brings you new resources, and that can easily change the game.
(Because we're always, whether we realize it or not, making our decisions and our plans based on the resources we think we have available to us)
And like I said before, you can have a path with a lot of constraints on it, and solving random constraints on that path can be a waste of resources if they are not immediate constraints.
Let's see if we can unpack what constraint identification looks like.
I'll use myself as an example.
If I want a life as a writer where I can just send an email to a list every day and make a living that way, some constraints include - an email list of people who pay attention to me every day, stuff to sell to that list of people that they are inclined to buy ongoing (and/or enough people so that I can be sure I'll make enough consistent sales).
That's a fine start, I need people to send to and stuff for them to buy.
But the constraints break down further.
"An email list" sounds like a constraint, but if I decide needing an email list is the next most immediate constraint to solve, I can start to see constraints within that constraint.
For example, I can't grow an email list if I don't have an email service provider through which to build the list
(Side note, I can refute that claim, as emails could be collected on a spreadsheet. But this is almost a separate topic of identifying whether something I think is a constraint really is a constraint or not - for now let's stick with it, because even if I collect on a spreadsheet I still need to be able to email the list)
So, I can start asking myself how will I capture the emails, how will I send the emails, how and why will people read the emails, and these start to reveal further questions which need to be answered and possible constraints which need to be uncovered.
How will I send the emails and will people read them?
I know from my experience and skill with email copywriting that if I construct my list in a way where I email people daily with the right things, I can hook in a highly consistent readership.
That leads me further on constraints ...
Can I email daily? Will I enjoy that?
Will people read my emails daily?
So I might look at my whole situation and think, there's no sense putting effort into building an email list if I can't even email daily and enjoy the process.
So I might identify that as an immediate constraint, because if I try emailing daily for a time period and I don't like it or can't do it or find it to be untenable, etc, then there's no use spending resources elsewhere.
That's not a bad assessment. And a fine example of breaking down the pieces to figure out what I might test next.
It's certainly better than if I sit here and try to figure out what to sell to an email list that I don't even have which I'm not even emailing daily.
I could spend a bunch of time trying to figure out things to sell and spending time making things to sell, but if after spending all that time I still had no one to sell to ... that's some obvious wasted resources in the short term isn't it?
If I decide that question ... "can I email daily and will people read those emails?" ... is my most immediate constraint, I can kind of check that by asking, what resources will be freed up / created if I solve that?
Well,
In this example I'll have confirmed that the path of emailing daily is viable or not. That potentially saves me a ton of resources by not committing to something that may or may not work for me. I'll also potentially confirm whether my style and message is something people want to pay attention to, which does the same.
And it would set me up to be in a position to immediately capitalize on new lead gen. Rather than expending effort creating a bunch of leads that I can't then email daily.
Let me recap:
Trying to identify my most immediate constraint.
I identified what I wanted - the ability to email a list daily and sell enough of something in order to make a living just emailing daily (the idea being that this model fits into the life I want to construct).
I then asked myself what constraints might be on that path:
Emailing daily. Having a list. Having new leads. Having people who pay attention to the emails. Having people who buy from me.
And then I just imagine tackling each of those constraints, and ask 'what if.' What if I figure out something to sell? Gaming that out sounds like spending a lot of resources without immediate return.
Ultimately I back into 'can I even email daily?' Because if I can't then all the other constraints "solved" are wasted resources.
I'll tell you an outcome from this …
Because I just pulled that from my life,
I went through that process.
And what I found was new information from taking the action and other related actions which completely changed the equation for me.
The new information which came about from Engaging the Field5 made that initial path not make sense (at least for now).
But it was all very worth the effort because the actions in Engaging the Field with what I perceived as my most immediate constraint both saved me a ton of resources AND revealed truths I didn't realize until I was doing things.
(And now I actually have shifted my focus to writing here and Substack and moving forward from these points, because constraints I solve here are far more impactful to me in the now while also increasing the likelihood I get what I want)
See how that works?
In other words, you're gonna spend your time/money/energy/reputation/influence on SOMETHING, you might as well spend it on the most immediately thing that's going to increase the likelihood you get what you want.
Spending resources that don't immediately free up other resources or get you new resources makes that harder (though sometimes it's necessary, but we do our best to make our resource management as efficient as possible since they are all limited.)
How to identify your most immediate constraint
(I just walked through an example, but I'm gonna break it down a bit more here)
The idea is, we're taking the goal we're trying to solve for, and then breaking it down into as many constraints as we can identify, and then moving as close to us and the resources as possible to determine what the next most immediate constraint is.
One good test I've found for this is, when considering a constraint, I can ask myself if I solve this constraint, will I still need to answer more questions in order to determine the effectiveness/usefulness of that “solved” constraint?
For example, in the email list idea, one constraint is - do people want to regularly pay attention to what I write, and then a later constraint from there is, do they want to buy? If I start by seeing if people want to buy something, even if I answer that question I still can't tell if this is a good route for me to take because I can reason this - if people won't even read the daily emails whether they buy or not won't matter.
So then we back into figuring out whether people want to read the daily emails - which is really also, do people want to listen to what I have to say about a topic?
You might think I have to make an email list and get a few hundred people on it in order to solve that problem, but that's not necessarily true - there are other ways to answer that question.
As a short example, I could run some low cost ads using Laurel Portié's methods to see if there's a subject I can garner interest with. The benefit of testing the "is there interest," theory that way is I can use the established momentum there to lead into an email list.
Point is...
It's all just identifying anything along the path of the ideal outcome you're trying to engineer, and then backing yourself into the constraint you identify as closest to you and your resources right now.
Managing Resources
You can think about it in terms of risk v reward as well. If you're using resources on the bet that you get a return of resources, by betting less resources in the beginning, you both risk less in the loss (if it doesn't pan out) and also leave more resources available to test different options.
There's a popular clip of Jeff Bezos floating around where he talks about how, if you have a 1 in 10 chance of getting an extremely outsized return on your effort (say 1000x), you should always take that, because the return far outweighs the risk.
But this is a limited thought process. If you have a 1 in 10 chance of making a 1000x return, and you can take all 10 chances, then that math might work out for you.
If you only have enough resources to take 3 of those chances, then the math doesn't work. You try 3 times and you don't get 1000x, now you're out of resources and can't keep trying.
However,
If your steps, your attempts, your tries - if they at least return back your resources to you ... you can keep going no matter what.
Think infinite game perspective - the point isn’t to win, it’s just to not lose.
So identifying your most immediate constraint isn't just about the thing closest to you which you can do to move forward, it's also about doing this in the context of resources. It's about identifying the constraint closest to you which not only could reveal new resources or return resources to you, but which also costs as few resources as possible.
That's why one of our prompts in figuring out your constraints is The Rear View Mirror.6
The Rear View Mirror says, if you're trying to figure out how to solve a problem right now, look back on what you've done. If you've solved this problem before, or achieved the outcome you're after (perhaps in a different way), then one of the best things you can do is just to repeat what you know already works.
Because you use a lot less resources repeating what works than trying something new.
This brings us all the way back to one of our core principles - Function over Form.
When trying to identify your constraints, and especially your most immediate constraint, the one you most likely want to focus on ...
You want to get to the heart of the function you're solving for as soon as possible.7
It's very easy when trying to figure out what to do that you ... well, get focused on "the what."
In my email list example, it would be very easy for me to be blinded to the possibilities of solving the ultimate problem of what I want in life and how I want to live, if I get stuck focused on the email list as the way to do it.
Recall a few paragraphs ago, where I suggested one perspective on solving that problem involves growing an email list, and that even though it looks like that's part of what has to be done in order to figure out my constraints, the answers could be achieved without even touching email.
And that's because I broke down the constraints out of the what and into the why. The what being email, the 'why' being all the reasons I might use email.
In the above case, why I'd use email is because it's a fantastic structure for communication, relationship building, and selling. And the ultimate function*questions I need to answer are "will people listen to me?" and then "after listening to me will they buy from me?"
(And without going into further detail, there are many subtle layers to both of those which start to get worked out as you solve your most immediate constraint and move forward in action)
But just notice - the constraint to answer when broken down into it's function doesn't have a "what" attached to it.
Can YOU think of any other ways I, the writer, might be able to tell if people will read my writing other than getting them to subscribe to my email list and email them a bunch?
(Yes that’s a cheeky question, thank you and you’re welcome)
Let's bring it back to the original question from the top, and then I'm going to bring an example of someone who is NOT me ...
"How do I know if I’m taking the right action?”
If you find yourself asking that,
Ask yourself what you are really trying to accomplish and why. Hopefully you know the outcome, and you've started to break down into constraints, and you're walking backwards to find the constraint your closest to, the one which doesn't need any further questions answered and which unlocks other things ...
And ask yourself why for each of them. What is at the heart of it all? What are you ultimately trying to do and why?
Seek the answers to those questions which create more questions which you may be able to easily and simply test.
An Example
This article has been brewing for awhile but the current iteration was sparked from a reader responding to a long in-depth article case study I wrote as a breakdown of R3 in Email Marketing, over on Man Bites Dog.
Ultimately this reader found something interesting and valuable in the article and asked me "How can I use what you wrote about to help me now?"
They may have been thinking that an email list would solve their current problem. This is a common reaction when you see something that "works" out there. But context is important. In order to directly leverage the tactical applications I discussed in the strategy of email in that example, you really need to have an established email list, or to be at least already be growing a list that you're looking to leverage.
This reader didn't have that. It was a case of looking far down the road and seeing a constraint, but one that if solved would have contributed nothing to their current position.
They might end up with an email list eventually ...
Lots between here and there, now, though. So spending resources trying to figure out email marketing in the present would just be wasted resources.
So we had to backtrack to where they are now and what they are really trying to solve.
They want customers, but they don't have any. The simplest thing would be to talk directly to someone who gives them money to provide the service.
They don't have anyone they can talk to right now who will pay them right now to do that.
So therefore we step down again and say, the best thing to do is just figure out how talk directly with the right people.
Now we're getting closer and closer to the most immediate constraint. It does no good to have an email list if you aren't talking to people to begin with.
Tools to Help
Now in come the prompts we've devised which can help you shorten your paths to finding your most immediate constraints and figure out how to solve them.
Remember a few details.
We must know at least what we are trying to solve for. Even if it ultimately ends up not being what we want, if we're solving immediate constraints and moving forward we'll reveal new understanding we currently are missing.
We must respect and be careful with our resources. The most immediate constraint should return resources, reveal new resources, and hopefully require as few resources as possible to solve.
We must think about the function of what we're trying to solve. Ultimately the most effective answer could take a different form. If we're blinded by form, we won't be able to see this, nor will we be able to move forward and solve our constraints effectively
I've already mentioned The Rear View Mirror. So I'll just link to that article again here for your reference. Always consider The Rear View Mirror ... there's little sense in trying new stuff if what already works will solve the problem.
Via Negativa. Instead of asking yourself 'how can I move more' try asking yourself 'how can I sit less?' If you're thinking you need to do more of something, try reframing it into doing less of something else which gets you the intended outcome (function).
Raising the Floor. One of our foundational concepts. Rather than trying to reach for more, just improve on your 'worst' results. Applies across the board. You might think one of your major constraints is earning a certain amount per month - instead of trying to earn that amount per month, you might just look at your worst month and figure out how to improve on that.
The Three Lists. This is a process of clarity in your daily actions which can help reveal things about yourself and your day to day life which are very hard to see. It's a reflective personal mirror tool. When trying to figure out your most immediate constraint and solve it ... your answer might be sitting in blind spots which The Three Lists can help reveal.
Lastly,
REFLECT.
None of what I've written above is going to be any use to you unless you Engage the Field with it. If you're in The Arena, come to calls with this. Go through the process of reflecting and taking action to figure out if what you're doing is your most immediate constraint.
If you're not in The Arena, comment below. What are you taking action on right now? Is it your most immediate constraint? Is it not? Not sure?
Perfection is irrelevant. Action is what matters - that's what we're here for.
Be Useful. Be Present. Love the Journey.
, CMO The Guardian Academy
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This really resonated with me and reminded me of the tools at hand to just do the next step. Thanks for your insights as usual very valuable.
An excellent musing on how to define and do the next right thing by embracing uncertainty and dancing with adversity.