This concept was life changing for me. I hope it helps you too.
Let's start with a metaphor. It'll be useful by itself.
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MEDICINE METAPHORA
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In medicine, doctors often differentiate between an acute condition and a chronic condition.
Wikipedia covers it reasonably well:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acute_(medicine)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chronic_condition
So let's say you break your ankle. (Ouch.) Why did your ankle break?
If you broke your ankle because the staircase you were standing on collapsed, you landed awkwardly, and then a pile a construction material landed on your leg -- that's an acute injury. Your ankle broke suddenly.
Alternatively, if you have a condition where you have very weak bones because your body doesn't process calcium well, and one day while walking normally your ankle just snapped and broke, that's an injury that resulted from a chronic condition.
In medicine, there's a huge difference in treatment between the two. The first case you kind of shrug and say, "Well, dang, the whole staircase collapsed? Ouch. That's an odd one, some bad luck you got there. Let's put you in a cast, give you some painkillers, give you some physical therapy when the cast comes off, and you'll be back to normal."
The latter case is, of course, far more dangerous. If you've got weak bones and your body can't process calcium, that needs to be addressed. The doctor can cast up your broken ankle and all that, but you're going to break something else if the underlying condition isn't treated.
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DILIGENTER EXAMINARE
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Knowing the difference between acute and chronic injuries in medicine is useful by itself -- oftentimes, if you repeatedly get sick, you've got some chronic condition going on. It can be easy to miss chronic conditions if you only treat the current symptoms.
Sinusutis, for instance -- a sinus infection -- can be acute, meaning you just got unlucky when a common cold or whatever developed complications, or it can be chronic or recurrent, meaning you've got some mix of your sinus passages being shaped in such a way that they're easily infected, and/or some mix of your immune system, lymph system, environment, diet, and lifestyle isn't playing well together.
It's worth looking into this if you have the same injury or illness happen more often than would be normal.
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TACET CONSTANT DOLOR
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But again, that's just a metaphor. Useful, but not the point.
The point is a lot more important.
A lot of us -- pretty much all of us, to some extent, actually -- have things in our lives that cause us harm, go poorly, etc.
We have patterns of living that don't suit us. Maybe it's food usage, time usage, maybe it's how you relate with feelings of anxiety or perfectionism, maybe it's not sleeping enough, or lacking consistency around physical training, or spending too much time with people that aren't good for you, or not enough time with people who are amazing... maybe it's not getting the opportunity to push your limits and see what you're capable of, or maybe it's running at a full sprint too long without taking time to heal up and get to full strength at the end of intense projects.
Whatever, we've all got something.
Most of the time these problems sit in the background, right?
Let's pull two issues out, ones that a lot of Americans struggle with, and ones that I've had both failures and successes in so I can comment personally.
The American Center for Disease Control and Prevention has these stats on Americans being overweight [CDC http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/obesity-overweight.htm] --
"Percent of adults age 20 years and over who are obese: 35.1% (2011-2012)
Percent of adults age 20 years and over who are overweight, including obesity: 69.0% (2011-2012)"
The majority of Americans have no significant savings and live paycheck to paycheck --
"Approximately 62% of Americans have no emergency savings for things such as a $1,000 emergency room visit or a $500 car repair, according to a new survey of 1,000 adults by personal finance website Bankrate." [CNN Money]
"The CFED calls these folks “liquid asset poor,” and its report finds that 44% of Americans are living with less than $5,887 in savings for a family of four. [...] That means that if emergencies arise, many Americans are forced to resort to high-interest debt from credit cards or payday loans." [Time Magazine: http://time.com/2742/nearly-half-of-america-lives-paycheck-to-paycheck/]
Obviously, these are unpleasant places to be. Why do people stay there?
I have, by the way, at various times ate poorly for extended stretches, not done any fitness, and not managed money well.
So let's explore.
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INIURIAS PELLAT EX ANIMO
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Look, even if you're not paying attention to your nutrition and overall health levels, even if you're not constantly thinking about it, in the background you feel it. You know, on some level, when you're not where you want to be.
This is doubly or triply true for anyone who has ever been at a high level in an area and then fallen off -- former athletes that stop doing fitness and start eating poorly have it gnaw at them even stronger than most. But everyone knows, to some extent.
Same with living paycheck to paycheck, or being in debt, or having a year or two pass without your career or finances improving.
It's not bothering you all the time, if you're not thinking about it. But deep down, you know. Of course you know. It's there, silently.
These conditions are similar in a way to having your body process calcium poorly so that your bones are weak.
They're chronic, background conditions.
They don't hurt the same way that a broken ankle hurts... these conditions don't scream at you; they happen slowly and quietly.
But having patterns of poor eating or poor money management do hurt, in two ways. Yes, the chronic condition often gives way an acute injury. If you have very fragile bones and don't get it treated, you'll break something sooner or later.
And just as importantly -- perhaps more importantly -- your whole life becomes stunted to some extent. Little nagging worries in the back of your head are there, gnawing away. There's flashes of anxiety and worries during New Year's, on your birthday, and especially whenever you hit a milestone birthday like 30 or 40.
It's expensive to your mind to have untreated problems in your life. It wears you down. You live less and live worse.
Why not fix it?
It sounds so obvious, and yet...
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DIFFICILES MYSTERIUM
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And this is where the life-changing concept came in for me.
I've had a pretty good run the last 3-4 years. I'd say the hallmark of a really great run is when a lot goes wrong and when luck doesn't hit, and you still make things happen. The things I'm wanting to happen, knock on wood, are pretty much all happening.
And yet, for much of that time I was really miserable.
Allow me to share an example.
Multiple times, I defined out a very precise fitness or nutrition plan and started to have great results on it.
Then, sooner or later, something stupid would happen, I'd fail to adjust (or try to adjust and fail), and my plan would disintegrate.
This hurt badly.
Most of the time these days, I track precisely what I eat in a spreadsheet.
If you're curious, it looks like this:
7-Sep Protein bar x3 450
7-Sep Turkey and cheese ~300
7-Sep Chicken pasta ~500
7-Sep Tuna on salad 240
7-Sep Cheese on salad ~200
I also sat down a while back and worked out exactly what numbers I needed to hit to reach my goals:
Calories for maintenance –
TDEE: ~2500 cal
Weekly TDEE:17,500
Calories for 20% deficit / losing one pound per week:
Weekly TDEE minus 20% deficit:14,000
Daily target for 20% deficit: 2000 cal (equates to losing one pound per week
Calories for losing 1.5 lbs per week (30% deficit)
1.5 pounds per week = 5250 cal weekly deficit = 750 deficit per day
Daily target to lose 1.5 pounds per week: 1750 cal
Ideal target: 30% deficit and max protein: 270g protein (1080 cal), 60g fat (480 cal), 47.5g carbs (190 cal)
Minimum target: *0% deficit and min protein: 180g protein (720 cal), 60g fat (480 cal), 137.5g carb (550 cal)
As soon as I set a plan like that, two things started happening:
1. Lots of progress, since it actually works, and,
2. Lots of bad feelings, since my adherence wasn't all that great.
This began an interesting set of thinking for me.
I thought about this for months.
I said to myself: "You know, this doesn't make any sense at all. I hit my targets a lot of the time, I hit them often enough that I'm gradually trending upwards in body composition, athletic ability, habits... I'm learning various techniques and technologies over time, I'm getting a better grasp of the science, I'm getting a better grasp of what environments are supportive of my goals and which are detrimental... I hit my targets a lot and I'm going in the right direction, and yet I'm less happy and more miserable than if I didn't have any goals here at all, because hitting them doesn't feel that good and falling short makes me start to go crazy."
Now, this is true not just of eating and nutrition and training, but of everything.
Of being more systematic.
Of having faster followup.
Of tracking spending and earning carefully and hitting certain targets.
Of writing certain amounts of words each day.
Of meditating regularly.
Of keeping habits up.
Of doing highest production work.
Of eliminating various distractions.
And so on, and so on.
So I had to ask -- why is this?
It doesn't make any sense. How come getting my nutrition to a better state, or improving my finances, hurts instead of feels good?
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EPIPHANIA
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And then one day, it clicked. And everything got easier.
When you set a goal to improve some sort of behavior, things usually don't change instantly. Especially if you're making progress on a lot of fronts and constantly setting new goals, some will take easily and some won't. And few will happen instantly.
So when you actually stare at failure, when you have a day like I did on August 3rd, it hurts a lot.
3-Aug 1 cup of crazy trail mix ~640
3-Aug Chicken half-burrito ~700
3-Aug 1 cup of crazy trail mix ~640
3-Aug 1 cup of crazy trail mix ~640
3-Aug 2 cups Cheerios ~200
3-Aug 1 cup whole milk ~150
3-Aug Toast x2 ~90
3-Aug 1 cup of crazy trail mix ~640
3-Aug 1 cup of crazy trail mix ~640
3-Aug Toast ~90
3-Aug Cheese x2 ~200
3-Aug Almonds ~170
3-Aug Almonds ~170
3-Aug Almonds ~170
3-Aug Cheese x2 ~200
3-Aug Cheese x2 ~200
3-Aug Cheerios, 3 cups ~300
3-Aug Milk, half-cup ~80
3-Aug Bread x4, butter ~220
3-Aug Burrito chicken wrap ~1200
3-Aug More calories: Cereal x6, milk x2, almonds x4, toast x6, butter, others ~2000
3 Aug total cal ~9340
Ladies and gentleman, that's me writing down in real time a binge eating meltdown.
Ouch.
I'm trying to eat 12,250 calories per week, and on August 3rd, I ate 9,340 calories in one day.
That'll screw progress up. Frankly I didn't even enjoy it much. "Burrito chicken wrap"? Yuck.
Here's the thing: if I wasn't tracking all that down, I wouldn't see the failure. Sure, it didn't feel good while happening, but I probably would've underestimated how much I ate. And within a few days, I would have largely forgotten about it.
Instead, after a couple weeks of fighting myself back to on track (I started lifting weights very heavily to at least turn some of that dreadful surplus into muscle), I was able to reset my protocols and get back onto how I normally do things.
But the whole thing hurt and was stressful psychologically, daily, far more than if I just let the failure linger quietly in the background.
I can say confidently that, around five years ago, going off-track like I did in early August would've broken up my diet, nutrition, and training until the next time I revisited the topic in six months or a year.
Nowdays, stupid stuff like that still happens reasonably often, but I'm able to reset and get back to what I'm working on within a week or two, a couple months at most, and make repairs.
What changed?
Well, here's what didn't change: the pain didn't go down.
I dislike failure as much as ever. When I set standards or a goal and fall short of it, it sucks just as much as it did at any other point of my life.
That didn't change.
What did change is that "click" happened, that day everything got easier.
I kept asking myself why I was making more progress than ever, but feeling rather awful about it. It was absolutely certain to me that working from my standards -- that I often failed and fell short of -- led me to a more fruitful and productive life, and yet it was also certain that it added more stress and negative feelings than if I was just quietly failing and accepting that.
I kept asking -- why, why, why is this true?
It shouldn't be true.
It doesn't make sense.
Oh, wait, yes it does. I get it.
Developing goals and plans in an area you're unhappy with your results converts chronic pain to acute pain.
Click.
Acute pain hurts more than chronic pain. Slowly getting sick and unhealthy from smoking (chronic) hurts a lot less than immediate nicotine withdrawal (acute).
Writing down and staring at your failure and wondering why your willpower broke down (an acute problem) is a lot more painful and potentially overwhelming than sweeping an area you suck at under the rug (a chronic problem).
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CONVERSIONEM
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And my life started to change.
I realized that, when I start digging deep into patterns of behavior and living that are producing outcomes I don't like, my first unskilled attempts are likely to fail and be very unpleasant.
That unpleasantness doesn't change. It's still there. I hate failing and falling short as much as anyone, and yes it's stressful and annoying and stupid. I still ask the, "Oh my god, why is this happening?" question; and, of course, the even more dreadful: "Why is this happening again?! I thought I was past this already..."
But now I have the answer to that question.
"Because I chose to convert the chronic pain to acute pain."
I know I've said it five times already, but I can't help but say it again: failure still sucks and I still hate it, and it feels just as bad as before.
But now it makes sense; it's purposeful.
Moreover, there's no real running away. You go through the acute pain, fail repeatedly, but eventually break through. That's been my experience, and the experience of just about everyone I know who persistently works to improve their lives.
I could, theoretically, run away from the acute pain of a single failure or set of failing events. Yes, having your willpower break, making a bad decision, doing something in an unskilled or clumsy way, making a mistake where you really ought to have known better... all of these still hurt. Just as much as before.
But these things make sense now.
Most people don't want to really study their finances and how their money moves; they get a headache if they start opening up all their bank statements and expenses and receipts and try to figure out where their money went.
Yes. That's acute pain. Yes, if your finances are bad, studying them will give you a headache and stress you out.
But they were bad anyways, in the background of your life, lurking there, constantly sapping energy and morale from you, making you more vulnerable to crises, taking away freedom and ability to really live and thrive.
When you find an area in your life like that -- we've all got plenty of them -- you can run from them when you feel the acute pain.
Or you can embrace it.
So the next time you're cringing, beating yourself up, feeling miserable, crying out rhetorically -- "Oh my god, why is this nonsense happening?!"
You can answer yourself,
"Because I chose to convert the chronic pain to acute pain."