This Is How To Get What You Want In Life: 6 Secrets To High-Agency

We’d all like to think we’re deliberately steering our lives. Yet a heck of a lot of adulthood consists of continuing whatever we were already doing because stopping would require change. You took a job because you needed money, stayed because you knew where the toilets were, and now, apparently, this is your destiny.

If you’re ever going to achieve those things you dream about, it’s going to require some agency. Being proactive. The capacity to act deliberately and influence your circumstances to get what you want. Sounds simple because it is simple… except in the way that spending less than you earn is simple, or eating fewer calories than you burn is simple.

We get tired, we get frustrated, and it’s easy to believe that we’re not able to influence our lives. Then you see a high-agency person accomplish something and you’re like, “Wait. You’re allowed to do that?”

They seem to have magic powers. And they’re not always the smartest or the most talented. Quite a few are visibly idiots. This should be encouraging. Instead, we get annoyed. How can Gary launch a business? I’ve heard him pronounce “espresso.” Yet there he is, getting somewhere. And here we are, possessing the correct pronunciation and absolutely nothing else.

You can complain and make excuses, but reality has a known bias toward things that actually happen.

Don’t worry. There’s good news. Agency is a skill we can cultivate. Time to learn how.

This week we’ll be drawing from “Agency” by Martin Seligman and “You Can Just Do Things” by Cate Hall and Sasha Chapin.

Let’s get to it…

 

Forget Motivation. You Need Evidence.

A lot of people are familiar with the concept of “learned helplessness” that Martin Seligman and Steven Maier introduced in a 1967 study. Animals exposed to shocks they couldn’t control later failed to escape them even when escape was possible. Seligman thought the animals had learned that their actions were useless.

But in 2016, Maier and Seligman published a fifty-year retrospective admitting the original theory got it backwards. Neuroscience research showed it’s passivity that’s the default response to chronic stress. The thing we need to learn is control. The brain needs proof that your actions matter to kick things into high gear.

If you don’t think effort will have any effect, you give up. (This is a narrower claim than saying “people are naturally lazy,” a conclusion humanity has always been eager to reach about other humanity.)

The practical lesson here is that agency can be built through seeing that your actions make a difference.

Do something to give yourself proof you can accomplish things. Psychologist Albert Bandura called these actions “mastery experiences.” Choose one small task with an observable finish that largely depends on you. Record what your action changed. Then increase the challenge gradually.

You’re looking for a connection: I did this, and this improved. It may feel ridiculously small. That’s okay. Small wins can make a big difference psychologically.

(To learn the uncomfortable reason you keep self-sabotaging, click here.)

Sounds simple. So why don’t we do it? Because you claim to “know yourself.” You tried something before, it failed, and now you’re sure you can’t do it.

To quote the great motivational speaker Yoda, “You must unlearn what you have learned”…

 

Disprove “Fake Lessons”

We’ll read thirty reviews online before deciding to buy a blender, but when it comes to deciding whether we’re able to change our lives, apparently, one failed attempt in 2018 is sufficient research.

“That single attempt didn’t go well” solidifies into “I’m not the kind of person who can do that.”

Cate Hall refers to these as “fake lessons.” One negative result and we turn it into a rule that extends way beyond the evidence. You tried organizing a dinner, two people canceled, and suddenly it’s obvious that nobody ever liked you.

In statistics, this is referred to as overfitting: creating an explanation so closely adapted to a few past events that it doesn’t generalize well. Somebody behaved badly, so trusting is always foolish. You struggled, so you’re fundamentally untalented. Eventually, you collect enough rules about what you can’t do that fewer and fewer actions seem worth taking.

The solution? Go back and test these old rules. Create narrower, more reasonable conclusions that the evidence actually supports. You pitch an idea at work and nobody gets behind it. Instead of concluding, “My ideas are all terrible,” you make the working theory “I haven’t established credibility with these colleagues.”

Now you have a path. Consult others, get advice, test the new theory, and take steps toward building the skill.

(To learn how to stop being lazy and get more done, click here.)

But what if you’re so bogged down with fake lessons that you feel unable to move? You’d need to become a completely different person.

Actually, that’s the perfect solution…

 

Be Your Own Turnaround CEO

Ever notice how easy it is to solve other people’s issues? Your friend describes their difficult problem and you’re like a codebreaker at Bletchley Park. Leave that job. Make the phone call. The path is obvious. But with your own problems, ummmmmm.

There’s an easy fix: Be someone else for a little while.

Imagine you’ve just arrived in your life and been put in charge of improving it. Same circumstances. But you don’t have to defend the decisions that got you here. No sunk costs, no shame ledger. And you only need to do it for thirty minutes a day.

We’re often reluctant to change when change suggests we could have done something earlier. “If I can improve this situation in one afternoon, what the heck have I been doing for the last nine years?!?” An awkward question. Better to wait and make it ten.

But now you’re not you anymore. These problems? They’re someone else’s fault. You’re just here to clean up the mess. Look at the situation, identify what matters most, and take the next step.

Pretending to be someone else may sound childish. There is, conveniently, research involving children. The researchers call it “the Batman Effect.” Kids persisted a lot longer on a dull activity when they pretended to be Batman. Now that doesn’t prove you can achieve all your goals by whispering “Gotham needs me.” But it does show shifting outside of your usual perspective can help you get things done.

(To learn the 6 steps neuroscience says will make you more productive, click here.)

Makes sense, right? But you still might be reluctant to act because of a totally understandable reason: fear. You’re afraid of looking silly or screwing up. Let’s address that…

 

Pay The Embarrassment Tax

You’d like to change your life… provided nobody sees you doing it. Ideally, improvement would occur under general anesthesia, and you’d wake up an expert at public speaking.

We think embarrassment is going to be a big, dramatic thing but that’s not how it usually exerts its influence. Often it just whispers, “Wouldn’t it be easier to do this some other time?” Yes, actually. Some Other Time sounds fantastic. I have an entire second life scheduled there.

Cate Hall calls this the “Path of Least Embarrassment.” We toss good options because they might make us look inexperienced or stupid. And the magic solution to this is…

There isn’t. Pay the tax. Gaining a skill requires accepting a temporary drop in status. You have to tolerate some amount of being visibly inexperienced. Before you can be fluent in a language, you will occasionally inform a waiter that your grandmother is an airport terminal.

Disappointing. I know. You came for insight and got humiliation. This is the intellectual equivalent of ordering tiramisu and receiving a colonoscopy prep kit.

Pick something you’ve avoided because you might be embarrassed. Make the stakes low enough that you can handle a disappointing result. Asking the “dumb” question. Making a request that might get a big “no.”

Before you do it, make a prediction about what will happen. Then note what does happen. Why? Because we underestimate how often the answer will be “Sure. No problem.” And we all overestimate how bad we’ll feel when we get rejected.

The real goal here is updating your assumptions. Making them more realistic so next time will be easier. It’s exposure therapy. Realizing that even if you do get embarrassed, you can handle it and keep moving forward.

(To learn how to get “unstuck,” click here.)

But even after all this, what if you still can’t see a way forward? Time to get creative…

 

Imagine Alternatives

Some restrictions are real. You need medical training to do surgery. Gravity remains unreceptive to feedback. But most restrictions are just a bunch of old assumptions you’ve left sitting around. Believe it or not, your options extend beyond “put up with this” and “complain about this while putting up with it.”

Cate Hall suggests imagining your default approach is illegal.

I am wildly in love with the perversity of this.

You hate your job, but in this new reality if you submit a resume online, a SWAT team will kick your door in. What do you do now?

You’d have to ask friends if they know anyone at the company you’re eyeing. You could attend a conference or event where you know the firm will have a presence. Or you might consider other companies, roles, or completely different fields where your skills might be valuable.

Not that difficult. But many people hear this and think, “I can’t do that. I’m not experienced enough.” I understand. One question: Have you encountered the world?

Somewhere, right now, a person with a lot less knowledge than you is giving a presentation on the very thing you think you’re not qualified to do. They’re writing a book about it. Somebody is doing a YouTube explainer on it with charts. And the charts are wrong.

Hall’s friend Eli Dourado calls this “reverse impostor syndrome.” Take a look around at how many people do stuff despite not being experts at the level you demand of yourself.

Get started. We think everyone else began at the top. They didn’t. Learn as you go.

(To learn how to be productive without being miserable, click here.)

And what if all else fails? What’s the nuclear option for increasing agency?

 

Crisis Creates Agency

I’m exceptionally good in an emergency, provided I’ve spent several months creating it through neglect.

Nothing improves the cleanliness of your home faster than knowing guests are showing up in an hour. We can leverage this principle.

You want to achieve your dreams. Problem is, there aren’t any consequences for not following through. Crisis creates agency. So, when all else fails, create a crisis.

I understand that “Have you tried making your life harder?” sounds like an unnecessarily sinister way to get things done. But your moods are unreliable, so arrange things in such a way that you don’t require their cooperation.

Put another person on the other end of an obligation and suddenly “Do I feel like doing this?” becomes “How can I get this done?” Or put a mildly uncomfortable amount of money at stake.

What will almost inevitably follow is commonly described as “rising to the occasion.” Of course, the occasion must be installed at an appropriate height. Please do not manufacture a crisis involving your mortgage or a romantic partner who owns a sword.

(To learn the 5 ways to overcome chronic procrastination, click here.)

Okay, we’ve covered a lot. Time to round it all up and learn the most surprising thing about agency…

 

Sum Up

Here’s how to increase agency…

• Forget Motivation. You Need Evidence: If you don’t believe effort will accomplish anything, it’s not surprising that telling yourself to work harder doesn’t get you off your butt.
• Disprove “Fake Lessons”: You try. You fail. You create a rule all-encompassing enough that it prohibits most activities associated with being alive. This is not the path to success.
• Be Your Own Turnaround CEO: Pretend you’re fixing someone else’s problems. You’d stop asking, “How could I have let things get this bad?” and start asking, “What needs attention first?” Doing this does not require a new personality. You can do it with the old one complaining in the background.
• Pay The Embarrassment Tax: Trying to always look competent can prevent you from becoming competent at anything new. You’ve spent years trying to keep anyone from thinking less of you. Find out what else those years could buy.
• Imagine Alternatives: Your default approach is now illegal. This is good because my default approach has enjoyed immunity from prosecution for years.
• Crisis Creates Agency: If the only way you get things done is by running around like a firefighter, it can help to also be an arsonist.

When we hear someone lacks agency, we picture somebody lazy. Truth is, you can be very successful and still be low agency.

Many people are very accomplished at achieving a life they never wanted. (This is one of adulthood’s less advertised features.) They realize they can’t change their life because they’re too good at maintaining it.

So ask yourself the scary questions before it’s too late:

• Do I even want this career?
• Do I want this marriage as it is?
• Am I building a life I enjoy, or just maintaining something I’d be embarrassed to explain abandoning?

You should absolutely expect your brain to throw a fit. The emotional immune system will immediately go into high gear. Are you insane? Think of the money! What about all the years you’ve invested? WHAT WILL JENNIFER NEXT DOOR SAY?

It’s okay to ask the questions. You can explore an idea without immediately starting demolition on your life. Maybe your current circumstances just need a small change. Or maybe you want out.

The research on regret is straightforward and intuitive. Actions tend to hurt more in the short term, while inaction weighs heavily over the long run. Eventually, what we never attempted troubles us more than what we did badly.

I spend a lot of time imagining how lousy it would feel to make a change and have it go wrong. I spend a lot less time imagining how it would feel to recognize, years from now, that I knew I wanted something different but kept myself distracted with trivial crap.

Most people do nothing about their dreams. They move the goalposts and rationalize. Too often we just settle for a life that’s fine. Fine is the emotional state of somebody who’s put their life in neutral and is coasting downhill while making engine noises with their mouth.

Sometimes doing nothing protects you from finding out you can’t do something.

It also prevents you from finding out you can.