A Spy’s Guide to Thinking (Book Notes)

By Austin Collins

Spies are faced with unique decision making challenges. High stakes situations with global security implications demand an intelligent, precise and rapid process for evaluation and decisive action. A decision making process with proven effectiveness in the spy world can be applied to any situation. This book shows how to apply the process to your own decisions with concise, actionable examples. The hour you invest to read A Spy’s Guide to Thinking will instantly upgrade the quality of your decisions.

• Chapter 1: Use the following thought flow “Loop” to give your attention a focused and productive track to run on: Data > Analyze > Decision > Action > Repeat.
• Chapter 2: The first question to ask when evaluating an interaction with someone else: What kind of game do they think we are playing?
• Chapter 3: As you move from data collection towards action, commitment of time and resources increases, while access to relevant information decreases.
• Chapter 4: Create “positive sum” opportunities to engage others, using what you learn as the “Data” for the start of your next “Loop.”

For other book notes in the same 1 sentence per chapter style, click here.

Extreme Ownership (Book Notes)

By Austin Collins

Extreme Ownership is the most useful leadership book I’ve ever read. Using these principles, I’ve become a better parent, husband, and professional. Empowering. Applicable. Tactical. Legit.

• Chapter 1: “Extreme Ownership” is a leadership philosophy in which I assume complete personal responsibility for my team, creating an empowering culture of connection & continuous improvement.
• Chapter 2: If I tolerate or justify subpar performance, or blame anything or anyone other than myself, I am not taking “Extreme Ownership.”
• Chapter 3: When I understand and communicate the strategic “why” behind the mission, it creates “connective tissue” that aligns the team toward winning.
• Chapter 4: When I check my ego and take ownership, others can see the real issue without becoming defensive.
• Chapter 5: I must take ownership for identifying and facilitating the coordination of all available resources to accomplish our common goal.
• Chapter 6: By maintaining simplicity and confirming my communication is understood, I help everyone stay focused on the mission when things get hectic.
• Chapter 7: I can use the principle of “Prioritize and execute” in real time to make my team’s actions more effective by using these 3 steps:
  1. Relax
  2. Look around
  3. Make a call
• Chapter 8: A decentralized leadership structure, with a max 4-6 direct reports, allows every leader to specialize, stay focused & maintain effectiveness.
• Chapter 9: Strategic planning should be systematized to empower everyone on the team with ownership of constant improvement.
• Chapter 10: I need to take ownership for leading everyone in my world, including up the chain (superiors), and down the chain (subordinates).
• Chapter 11: Disciplined standard procedures create freedom to engage creatively and bring my gifts to any situation.

For other book notes in the same 1 sentence per chapter style, click here.

How To Be a Victim

By Austin Collins

“I feel like a victim right now… and I love it!” Ridiculous. And yet, from time to time, we all make the choice to see ourselves as victims. While spotting this behavior in others is easy, ego makes it far harder to see in ourselves. But we are not helpless. Humor is disarming, which makes it an ideal strategy to flank ego. Exploring how to be a better victim is a back door to self awareness.

Practice these 8 steps, and you will be a world class victim in no time.

1. Live in the past and the future. Any victim knows they are powerless over their circumstances. Dedicate yourself to focusing on on things you are actually powerless over. Resenting the past and fearing the future are great places to start. You can’t change these things, which proves that your victimhood is justified. Plus, the more you live in the past and the future, the less time you spend in the present, where you actually CAN do something. 
2. Use Parkinson’s Law. Do you know someone who always complains how “busy” they are, but they never seem to be doing much? This person is a victim of Parkinson’s Law, which says your tasks will expand to fill all of your available time. An important part of being a victim is feeling out of control. Make sure your life controls you as much as possible. Minimize your commitments and continuously repeat your mantra of “busyness.” These minimal commitments will gradually expand to fill your entire life. Then you can start dropping victim cliches like “Even if I wanted to do something about it, I just don’t have any time right now.”
3. Turn up the volume on your ego. How often do you calculate in advance how your actions might impact other people? I’m willing to bet its almost never. But forget all that. Everyone thinks about YOU before making their decisions, right? That’s your ego talking. If you are really serious about being a victim, you need to turn up the volume on that inner voice. You are the center of the world. Not just yours, but everyone’s. When things don’t go your way, you can be sure that someone else (most likely a group of them) is plotting your demise.
4. Avoid serving others. Serving the needs of others gives you a sense of peace and purpose. It also helps right size your ego. There is a good chance you will connect with other people who share these attributes. This makes it nearly impossible to maintain the covert narcissism necessary to move up in the victim world. Any serious victim will avoid serving others like the plague.
5. Take no ownership. Ownership is the direct opposite of victimhood. It is kryptonite to your victim status. Once you take ownership, you are on a slippery slope to accountability and responsibility.
6. Be a martyr. Martyrdom is a great way to avoid taking ownership. Be sure to emphasize guilt while avoiding responsibility. Avoid using phrases like “Here’s what I did wrong…” That has ownership written all over it. Instead, say things like “I guess it’s all my fault…” An additional benefit of martyrdom is identifying “rescuers.” These people will fall for your emotional misdirection and try to save you from your faux guilt. Surround yourself with these enablers and you can remain a victim indefinitely. 
7. Cling to a rigid mindset. An inflexible mindset is the wall to your victim fortress. Make it tall and reinforce it at every opportunity. You have worked hard to establish yourself as a victim. Don’t throw it all away by allowing flexibility in your thinking. Here are a couple useful tools to increase the rigidity of your mindset:
   • Only associate with people who have the same views as you do. Even victims need support and encouragement.
   • Develop an arsenal of universal rationalizations for dismissing anything that challenges your way of being. A few timeless classics:
     • “You could never understand.”
     • “I guess we will have to agree to disagree.”
     • Shamelessly change the subject.
8. Procrastinate as much as possible. A growing list of tasks and projects that never get accomplished is proof that life controls you. Procrastination is the perfect way to fabricate this evidence. 

Right Place. Right Time. On Purpose.

By Austin Collins

Goals and intentions are closely related and mutually supporting, but they are NOT the same thing. My coach Burton loves to remind me that “We are only in control of what we bring to life, not what we get from it.” Intentions are things we bring (and therefore control). This is why I suggest setting intentions BEFORE setting goals. Here’s a brief contrast of their characteristics.

• Intention:
  • Strategic, deliberate connection between values and responsibilities.
  • Measurable & controllable INPUT target (something we bring).
  • Creates motivation.
• Goal:
  • Quantifies progress, results, impact, accomplishment, etc…
  • Measurable OUTPUT target (something we get).
  • Creates focus & accountability.

 

Want to see the impact of a single written intention? Take a few minutes and construct one using the process below. Then watch what happens.

---

Step 1: Review current personal values

– Take Extreme Ownership –

– Maintain Simplicity –

– Bring Leadership –

– Think with Humility –

– Act Decisively –

Step 2: Identify current Areas of Responsibility (AOR)

– Personal –

– Husband –

– Father –

– Professional –

– Friend –

– Human –

AOR are simply the genres of life in which you currently have some measure of responsibility. My AOR list above includes only the relevant general categories. It turns out that a detailed AOR list (including sub-categories) is useful for tactical task & time management. I’ll cover that in a future post.

Step 3: Connect personal values with responsibilities

Q: Which AORs am I targeting for improvement? 

A: Father, Husband, Professional

I noticed a common theme after selecting my target AORs. Improving my leadership would have an outsized positive impact on my performance in all of them.

Q: Which values will bring the most benefit to those AORs?

A: Bring Leadership, Take Extreme Ownership, Act Decisively

The challenges? I have no formal leadership training, no budget and no time to engage a leadership coach.

Q: How will I connect these values and AOR?

A: I will become a better husband, father and professional by improving my leadership. I will learn from top leaders whose styles are characterized by decisive action and extreme ownership. 

Step 4: Define & acquire necessary resources

Q: How much time can I commit?

A: 3-5 hours / week

Q: Do I have location constraints?

A: Yes. Location is limited to my car (commuting)

Q: What are the ideal information formats?

A: Due to location constraints, Podcasts and Audiobooks are ideal

Q: Which information sources best align with intention, time, and location?

A: The military is a good place to find leaders who align with my intention. The following information sources will be my starting point. Jocko Willink will replace Michael Hyatt in my Top 5. McChrystal will replace Tim Ferriss until I complete his Audiobook, at which time he will be replaced by Romesha. This also sets up a flexible “Top 5” position that can be adjusted to support future intentions.

Step 5: Confirm & Execute

• Confirm final intention statement: I will become a better husband, father and professional by improving my leadership. I will spend 3-5 hours each week learning from top leaders whose styles are characterized by decisive action and extreme ownership. 
• Confirm Resources
  • Time: I have my time in the car on my calendar as personal development time. This is a reminder to use that time for learning about leadership, and not for other things (phone calls, etc…)
  • Information: All audiobooks and podcasts are downloaded on my phone. I switch them on before pulling out of my parking space.
  • Accountability: I have a note in Evernote called “Intention: Become a Better Leader.” Every day I write down at least one bullet point on something leadership related. The simple act of writing down observations, lessons learned, and questions helps focus attention and maintain momentum over time. Internalizing valuable principles is an additional benefit of summarizing critical information. For some examples of summarizing critical information take a look at my Book Notes page, where the essence of each chapter is distilled into a single sentence.

 

If you have any experiences with setting or executing intentions please share it below. We would love to learn from you!

Interrupt Procrastination

By Austin Collins

I have been putting off writing this piece for a while. Ironically, that’s precisely what makes me so qualified to write it. Procrastination is deferring items from your current to do list into the future. But the introspective research for this post made me aware of a troubling behavior trend: Patterns. Nurtured by routine and repetition, patterns accelerate procrastination, leading to a lifestyle of stress and disappointment. Awareness is the key to interrupting this process. This post will identify some of these patterns, and provide ideas for how to interrupt them.

 

There are no bad tools, just bad ways to use them. Delaying action can be a valuable strategic tool. Strategic procrastination will be addressed at another time. Right now, we are going to explore the compulsive and counterproductive brand of procrastination.

The lowest common denominator of all pattern based procrastination is FEAR. That fear manifests most commonly in these 3 symptoms:

1. Over-commitment (fear of saying “no,” fear of disappointing others): These fears contribute to an overly optimistic assessment of capacity. This leads to over-commitment and self-imposed stress, which is both unnecessary and completely avoidable.
2. Perfectionism (fear of not being good enough, fear of not living up to expectations): The concept of “perfect” is, at best, an unhelpful collision of fantasy and perception. Perfectionism inflates the time and energy required to complete tasks. The solution seems simple enough: Put things off until there is ample time to complete them perfectly.
3. Indecision (fear of regret, fear I won’t be able to get everything done): When everything is important, nothing is. When nothing is important, everything is easier to defer until later.

Procrastination is built on the foundation of fear. These underlying fears can not be addressed until behavior patterns are interrupted. Otherwise, we will spend all our time reacting to the real world symptoms of this illness. This is the most insidious aspect of procrastination. Urgent overt symptoms obscure the covert issues.

Identifying and interrupting patterns is an effective way to take a step back and benefit from a different perspective. This provides an access point to address the underlying issues (fear) identified above. Let’s take a closer look at a common pattern.

Consider the following equation:

To do list + calendar items = more time required than hours available.

This unrealistic workload creates a “manufactured urgency,”  which I used to believe was valuable fuel for a sustainable drive to achieve. Motivation is essential. But there are ways to harness the positive aspects of urgency without the stressful side effects.

Occasionally, the feeling of being trapped under an unreasonable number of commitments leads to intense motivation and productive momentum. But it’s easy to just go through the motions, becoming increasingly reactive along the way. Choosing to focus on one task can even lead to guilt for neglecting the others.

During the day, some combination of the following usually occurs:

• To do list tasks take longer than anticipated
• Urgent issues arise that require immediate attention
• Family commitments expand to require more time than normal

There is a tipping point sometime during the afternoon. It becomes obvious the remaining to-do items will take far longer than the remaining time. The solution is seductive in its simplicity: Prefill tomorrow’s to do list by deferring a block of today’s tasks. Groundwork for continuing the pattern is set: Tomorrow, just like today, will start with no extra bandwidth – no margin.

Procrastination starts small. It gains scale and momentum through patterns.

Newly minted awareness is a reason for optimism. Each driver of procrastination is also an access point in disguise. These are opportunities I have identified to shift focus and live in better alignment. Everyone has different nuances to their patterns, so you will want to create your own list. The resulting increase in Personal Leverage™ is dramatic.

I can only share ideas that have worked for me personally. Below is a list of the problems and solutions for each genre of patterns. Take what works, adapt what does not, and if you like, share your experience in the comments section.

Over commitment

Problems

• Large, unscheduled calendar blocks. A certain amount of unstructured time (a.k.a. “margin”) is a critical daily shock absorber. Too much margin is a license to be lazy or inefficient, 2 behaviors which are highly predictive of procrastination.
• Disconnect between calendar and task lists. Working through my task list requires time, but I don’t use my calendar to manage my tasks. I’m missing a real time reference for how much time my task list will take. 

Solutions

• Smaller calendar time blocks. No more 2 or 3 hour chunks of unscheduled time between meetings. I have found 30 to 45 minutes to be the ideal size for non-meeting time blocks. Remove the illusion of having lots of time, and it is easier to say “no” to the non-essentials.
• Schedule “margin” every day. Margin is simply a block of time on the calendar labeled as “margin.” It is a critical shock absorber that allows for tactical flexibility. Some days it is only 30 minutes, other days it might be a couple hours. I’ve found putting it in the middle of the day is most helpful. This time can be spent in whatever way makes the most sense. It could be used for having coffee with a friend, or to catch up on to do list items for work.
• Schedule the 2 most important items from your to do list onto the calendar. I manage my time first, and my task list second. Whatever is on my calendar gets first priority. I only revert to my task list when I’m not in a scheduled engagement. On a busy day, I might live completely on my calendar and never get to my “non-urgent” but still important tasks. When I put the most important 2 tasks from my list on my calendar, I feel less overwhelmed and am less prone to over committing.
• Change physical location at least once during the day. Work the same number of hours, but spend either the first or last 60-90 minutes of your day working from a different location. Coffee shops and parks work well, but an empty office down the hall can be just as effective. Use this change in venue to create productive manufactured urgency. Let’s say you have an hour left before you change locations. You think you can accomplish 4 to do list items during that time. Challenge yourself to complete 6 items. Don’t let rushing degrade the quality of your work. Slow is smooth and smooth is fast. Watch what happens to productivity.

Perfectionism

Problems

• Reluctance to delegate. It is hard enough to measure up to my own standard of perfection. Teaching someone else to operate according to that same standard is impossible.
• Not knowing where to start. Picking a starting point is daunting when everything needs to be done perfectly.

Solutions

• Empower direct reports with delegation accountability. Scheduling recurring 1:1’s is effective. As a mechanism for accountability, consider using a standing agenda that includes a review of previously delegated items.
• Begin each day by immediately completing any 2 tasks. The power of inertia should not be underestimated. I find it much easier to build on existing momentum than to get started.

Indecision

Problems

• Too much coffee. A moderate dose of caffeine can enhance focus. Too much leaves me feeling frantic and fragmented. Taking decisive action through these feelings is tough.
• False urgency. Some tasks can be completed quickly, giving the illusion of productivity. These tasks can appear urgent, which makes them easy to justify. The most common example is returning email as it comes in, instead of responding in batches.

Soutions

• Replace coffee with Kava tea. Executing slower but more consistently can yield greater work output.
• Pomodoro time management technique to create productive urgency. Want to really amplify the effectiveness of this tactic? Spend your 5 minute break doing one full circuit of Wim Hof breathing.

Leave a comment below with strategies and tools you use to mitigate procrastination!

The Personal Advisory Board You Didn’t Know You Had

By Austin Collins

Did you know you have a personal advisory board? There are 5 people in your life, right now, who collectively have an enormous impact on your attitude, motivation and mindset. Who are these people? Simple. The 5 people you spend the most time with. Here’s a subtle but significant truth that transforms this concept into a life changing opportunity: You don’t have to know someone personally for them to be in your “Top 5.” You have more control over your Top 5 than you think. I will show you how to leverage this control to recruit virtually anyone in the world to your team.

“You are the average of the 5 people you spend the most time with.” – Jim Rohn, Motivational speaker

This is one conceptual iteration of what is sometimes referred to as the Law of Averages. It’s actually not a law at all as far as science or mathematics are concerned. Despite it’s inaccurate title, it is very powerful when applied correctly.

Over the last year I have been experimenting with my own Top 5. Surrounding myself with different people has increased optimism, mindfulness, and discipline. I’m also more curious, so I ask better questions and have become a better listener. These changes are not fleeting. The reality is just the opposite. These elements of my life have shifted sustainably, and with momentum that continues to increase!

Why does this principle work? What makes it so high impact? These 2 brain functions are at the top of the list.

1. Brain plasticity: We can’t change our genetic hardware. But thanks to a beautiful quality of our brains, called “plasticity,” we can gradually change our operating system. This summary from a US Institute of Medicine Forum on Neuroscience offers a concise description: “…there is a back and forth pattern between nature and nurture, a dynamic system that involves a continuous feedback loop shaping the physical structure of our brains.” That’s why a carefully crafted Top 5 strategy is so profound. You simultaneously create a force multiplier for your actions AND physically change your brain to see the world in a way that serves your vision. In other words, you get to design your own self fulfilling prophecy!
2. Reticular activation system (RAS):  Your RAS is believed to control a number of critical brain functions. One of it’s responsibilities is to filter your perceptions of the world and guide your attention to the important data. This article from the SOAR library on Aviation lays it out well: “The RAS operates a lot like a spam filter that really works, and only brings to your attention email that you need to pay attention to.” I program my RAS every morning by listening to James Altucher for 40 minutes during my commute. He asks brilliant questions and learns amazing lessons from his guests. For the rest of the day, my RAS looks for opportunities to ask questions and learn from the people around me. But be careful, because the opposite is also true. For example, an argument filled political radio show will program my RAS to search for opportunities to disagree with everyone.

The world around us is the same either way. Using a different lens changes our experience. We have the right hardware built in to our heads. Changing our Top 5 upgrades our software to take advantage of it!

In the Personal Leverage™ framework, you deliberately seek out and consume content that aligns with your values and intentions. When you take action, you leverage the experience, perspective & wisdom of others. The alignment from this system creates a force multiplier that compounds over time, propelling you toward your personal purpose.

The 5 people you spend the most time with are collectively responsible for a huge portion of the content you consume. If you change this group of people, you change your life. Period.

Here is a high level illustration of the process I developed, which is explored in detail later in this post.

There have been a number of insightful articles written on this concept over the last few years from sources such as Lifehacker, Personal Excellence, and entrepreneur.com. They make great points and suggest relevant considerations for how to think about this concept. My intention is a bit different. I’m focused much less on educating you about the so called “Law of Averages.” Instead, this post is about 2 things:

1. Exploring the “force multiplier” effect produced by applying this Top 5 concept in coordination with a higher order life strategy, like the Personal Leverage™ model.
2. Sharing a repeatable, step by step process for implementing this concept.

You can use this post to hit the ground running, with a road map to take action immediately and effectively. If you are looking for more leverage in your life right now, this post is for you. For additional perspective, I encourage you to read the other posts mentioned above.

So how do you take control of your Top 5 and change your life? The entire process is outlined step by step below. Consider using either a mind map or a spreadsheet for this exercise. You can find my complete mind maps for each step of the entire process by clicking on the title of each step below. This is a start to finish process checklist for crafting a Top 5 strategy.

Each step below contains a link to a mindmap. These maps are my personal templates for completing each step. Use them as a starting point and adapt as necessary.

1. Acknowledge that you are a sponge. Think about it. Do you ever notice your attitude or vocabulary changing as you spend more time with different people? What else might you be picking up without realizing it?

I’m definitely a sponge – soaking up the mindset, vocabulary and emotional proclivities of people around me. As soon I embraced this reality, I tapped into a well of motivation that helped me keep up momentum as I began to change my Top 5.

2. What is the ideal outcome of changing your top 5? In his New York Times bestseller, Simon Sinek sagely suggests that you always “Start with Why.” I could not agree more. Why do you want to change your Top 5? Here are 2 questions to help crystallize your own personal “why.”

• What are your personal values? Values are a customized compass. In this case, they are instrumental in the pursuit of the right Top 5. If it’s been a while since you clarified the most important themes in your life, this is a perfect time to revisit them. I recommend this quick values exercise.
• If you could change 1 thing about the way you see the world, what would it be? Would you be an optimist, a better conversationalist, a better listener, more spiritual, etc…

My desired outcomes were to become a better problem solver, increase my self confidence and connect with new ideas & perspectives.

3. How is your time spent today? In order to determine who makes up you current Top 5, you must first understand where you spend your time. Take your weekly totals for the last month and average them. If the last month was odd for some reason, you can use a different time frame (next month, last quarter, etc). Take another look at my mind map for this step to see an example of this time inventory.

I found that my time is concentrated in 2 places: work & home. But the people I spend time with at work change from week to week. As a result, my Top 5 is fragmented and therefore easy to change.

4. Who are your Top 5 right now? Make a list of your Top 5 and the number of hours per week you spend with each of them. The beauty of this exercise is that you can make your own rules so they fit you perfectly. Here are a couple guidelines that helped me:

• Only adults are eligible for Top 5 status
• Teams count as a single person if interaction is mostly group based (work meetings, group collaborations, etc…)
• How much time per week would it take to replace the bottom person on that list?

How many hours per week would it take for someone to get into your Top 5?

My time tends to be fragmented across a landscape of people that changes from week to week. Thus, in order for me to get someone new into my Top 5, it only takes 2 hours per week.

5. Where and how can you consume content? Since the goal is consistent exposure to specific people, podcasts are naturally compelling. Find a Top 5 candidate who has lots of podcast episodes. That person now curates fresh content for you on a daily basis. How much better could it get?  Audiobooks, blogs and physical books can be very effective as well.

I spend about 7.5 hours every week in my car. It would be easy to think of this as “wasted time” and end up feeling depressed. Instead, I choose to see this as an amazing opportunity to change my Top 5!

6. Finalize your strategy. By this point, you know how much time is needed to replace your #5. You also already know when, where and how you can “spend time” with new Top 5-ers. Nothing left to do but execute!

After you have selected the newest member of your Top 5, download a week’s worth of podcasts, an audiobook or RSS feeds to have Siri read to you. Check out Amazon’s Whispersync for voice. The more options you know about for accessing information, the more likely you are to find the one that fits you best. Put time with your Top 5 on your calendar to remind yourself, and to create the space to execute. What gets scheduled gets done.

I chose to add Jocko Willink and James Altucher to my team. Their podcasts can be heard every day in my car.

7. Enjoy your new team – your new Top 5!

Do you have any experience applying the Top 5 strategy? Feel free to share your experience with this or ask questions in the comments. I would love to hear from you!

The Irony of Personal Values

By Austin Collins

Here is the great irony of personal values: By themselves have no value! But they can be a source of tremendous value IF you actively use them to adjust your actions and live in better alignment. During the last few years I’ve begun mindfully using my values to shape my intentions and actions. I still have a lot of room for improvement, but even in that short time the impact on my life has been dramatic. Here’s the good news: It is easy to articulate your values in an actionable way, increasing your Personal Leverage, and making your life a better place in the process.

 

In 2006, just after starting my current job, I did my first values exercise. I found it insightful, but in hindsight it was purely academic. There was no call to action, and consequently, no lasting impact on my life. Those papers went into a file never to be seen again. After all, now I knew my values. Mission accomplished, right? I was leaving a life changing opportunity on the table, and at the time I had no idea.

Values are the anchor points of the Personal Leverage Model. The most basic themes that are truly important in our lives.  A good values exercise will help you create an actionable foundation that can be used on a daily basis to help you live in better alignment.

If an equation existed that represented the “value of your values,” I would express it like this:

Value = Clarity + Connection + Accessibility

• Clarity: How clearly are your values defined?
• Connection: Is each of your values currently a central theme of significant importance in your life?
• Accessibility: Are your values accessible to help you set your intentions and guide your actions on a daily basis?

Visualize your values as an internal compass you use to navigate the outside world. As we grow and our perspective shifts, our values can change over time. Therefore, in order to maintain clarity, connection and accessibility, I recommend refreshing your values every year by going through the exercise below.

In the 6 months prior to writing this, I have experienced more life change than in the 5 previous years combined. Here are the 3 most significant changes:

• My wife left her stable corporate job to start her own consulting business.
• We purchased a house.
• We travelled to the Philippines to pick up our 3 newly adopted children.

With so much change going on, I felt this would be a great time to revisit my personal values.

I searched the web with the goal of finding a free, online values exercise that would challenge me to identify and frame a small number of core values in an actionable way. The one I resonated with most was this one from TapRooT.

I documented my process as I went through this exercise. You can find my notes below. My intention is to illustrate how easy it is to connect with your values in an actionable way. There is no better first step to begin growing your own Personal Leverage!

Step 1: Circle all of the values you connect with, and add any that are not on the list.

My notes on Step 1: Wow! 46 values circled in step 1. What comes to mind as I look at this… If everything is important, then nothing is.

 

Step 2: Sort all of the circled values into 5 similar groups. According to the Taproot instructions, they should be grouped in a way that “makes sense to you, personally.”  

My notes on Step 2: Since I have 6 groups, I need to eliminate one to get down to the 5 indicated in the instructions. This grouping and elimination process was tough since I don’t usually think about all of the different themes I connect with in my life, and how they would be grouped together.

 

Step 3: Select one value from each of the 5 remaining groups.

 

My notes on Step 3: I realized that the group I crossed out was actually a bunch of traits that I like to think of myself as having, as opposed to themes in my life I connect with. Very interesting to see that written down!

 

Step 4: Add a verb to each value you selected.

My notes on Step 4: Honestly, this was more challenging than I thought it would be. Surprisingly, it was one of the most beneficial parts of the entire exercise – primarily because it forced me to focus on application to my life and what that might look like. Notice the verbs I chose are underlined in the image above.

Do you have a system for defining your values that makes them accessible for active use in your life? I would love to hear from you!

The Personal Leverage™ Model

By Austin Collins

Most of the great ideas I’ve heard have one thing in common: Someone else thought of them! We are fortunate to live in a time when access to great ideas, and the potential to use them to improve our lives, has never been greater. But here’s the downside: Information overload causes us to be reactive. Have you ever tried to implement every good idea you hear? How well did that work? If you are like me, you could benefit from a simple framework that helps you leverage your gifts to create momentum in your life. Over the last 10 years I have developed and refined just such a system, which I have come to call “Personal Leverage.”

Personal Leverage is the force multiplier effect you experience when 4 key elements of your life are in alignment.

In chronological order, these elements are:

1. Values
2. Intentions
3. The content you consume
4. The actions you take

As you develop greater alignment, your Personal Leverage grows. The result is outsized and increasing momentum towards the things that matter most.

Let’s take a brief look at each of the elements in the Personal Leverage framework.

Values are the most basic themes that are truly important in our lives. A few of my personal values are engagement, authenticity, integrity and service.  Together, these form an internal compass, guiding the direction of my intentions and actions. Remember that values can change over time, so it is critical to remain aware of what yours are. Personal Leverage grows out of alignment, and values are where alignment begins.

Intention comes from the Latin “intendio,” meaning both “stretching” and “purpose.” In the Personal Leverage framework, it means stretching toward purpose. I think of intentions as the intersection of goals, attitude and motivation. When values and intentions are aligned, it creates a solid foundation to which you can anchor your actions. Clear intentions also provide a personalized filter for the vast universe of information.

Information Diet is essential to aligning intentions with actions. Being deliberate and disciplined about the content we consume can be especially challenging in a culture of constant connection. But access to the right ideas and information is critical. A great content strategy acts as a filter: Maximizing your exposure to relevant insight, education, encouragement and feedback – while minimizing distractions and negativity. After I have clarity on my values and intentions, here are some of the questions I ask that help me develop an information diet that is in alignment:

• “What is the minimum amount of information I need to begin taking the right actions?”
• “How can I obtain honest feedback that will help me improve my execution?”
• “Where can I find people or ideas that will challenge how I currently think?”
• “How can I limit the amount of non-essential information I consume?”
• “Where will my encouragement and affirmation come from?”
• “When and how will I consume this content?”

Taking action is how you bring your intentions to life, changing the world in the process. Actions are part of an execution plan that usually includes efficiency tools like time management and productivity tactics. Consuming content and taking action go hand in hand, since successful execution is almost always supported by encouragement and guided by feedback. The goal of a solid execution plan is to bring your intentions into the world, aligning your life with your values and thus growing your Personal Leverage.

This model has become so effective for me that I am dedicating this site, as well as a portion of my time on a weekly basis, to sharing it.

What have you found creates the most momentum in your life? Any ideas or examples to share? I’d love to hear about it. Feel free to comment here or use #PersonalLeverage on Twitter.