Simple Guide to Life

I know what I would rather do. The flip scares me.

The second you commit to changing direction, fear is going to show up. Big, loud, fire-breathing fear dragons. "What if I fail?" "What if I run out of money?" "What if everyone judges me?" "What if I'm too old?"

People tend to not change until their fear of staying the same outweighs their perceived fear of changing. So we use Tim Ferriss's fear-setting framework to systematically break those fears down:

• Define every worst-case scenario, and rate how bad it actually is.
• Prevent: all the steps you can take to stop them happening.
• Repair: if they somehow still happen, every step you could take to get back to where you are now.
• Compare that to the cost of NOT flipping. Of staying the same for the next year, 2 years, 5 years.

On closer inspection, those fire-breathing fear dragons almost always turn out to be slightly overweight, sunburned lizards trying to find the beach.

Turns out most "catastrophic" scenarios are preventable, repairable, and way less likely than your anxious survival-triggered brain insists. Because spoiler alert: you're probably not gonna die, you're just gonna make a better pancake.

Quick gut check

3 yes-or-no questions. Does my current career let me live by my top 2 or 3 values? If I stay where I am for the next 5 years, can I reach the lifestyle I actually want? Am I using my Skills, my Strengths, my Interests and my Mission, all together?

If you answered "no" to even 1, that's not a feeling. That's data about your life telling you which direction needs to change.

The full walkthrough is in my favorite article I've ever written, Boogying with the Boogeyman, part 2 of chapter 3 of the guide.