Ray Dalio's 5 Step Process (To Getting What You Want Out Of Life)

[cedric]

This is part 4 of the Principles Sequence, a series on the Ray Dalio book. Read the overall book summary here.

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This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://commoncog.com/dalios-5-step-process-to-getting-what-you-want/

[roddaut]

I love this post. And yes, it is hard to follow the steps. I appreciate that you did that. The diagnose step was super important. And you helped me avoid a mistake.

I think we can more easily diagnose our problems if we use a question from Gabrielle Oettingen’s research on mental contrasting.

To diagnose she asks “What is it within you that his holding you back?” That way people go straight to the jugular instead of dithering about the surface issues.

[cedric]

@roddaut

To diagnose she asks “What is it within you that his holding you back?” That way people go straight to the jugular instead of dithering about the surface issues.

Ooh yes this is good. I will note that I think the key unlock for techniques like this is a ‘mental muscle’ — which is hard to describe because it’s not visible externally. The ‘mental muscle’ that’s relevant here is the ability to identify the specific feeling of pain when you refuse to look at an issue directly.

It feels a bit like … your attention wants to slide off the issue. You want to stop introspecting. You make up lies so you don’t have to introspect on that issue directly. You blame other things that is easier to accept. It is a skill to recognise when you’re doing this, catch this, and then stare at it directly and work out all the implications of this terrible thing.

And that’s hard. And it’s difficult to do externally with someone else, and you never really know if someone is doing it or not.

[roddaut]

I’m even trained in tools to help people look at that kind of thing and reduce the power of the thoughts and feelings we run from … and still if I’m not conscious of them I avoid them. Only now when I realize I’m avoiding something am I able to purposefully look for the inner stuff so I can deal with it. Writing helps a lot.

And I agree, it’s a kind of mental muscle. I think it’s also training yourself to notice the cues. “Oh I meant to write that email yesterday. How come I didn’t? Maybe i’m avoiding something.”