Read this if you feel lost and want to do work you actually care about.
Remind yourself what defines progress by breaking down the three items necessary for upward trajectory and positive change.
It's easy to feel lost if you don't feel like you are doing meaningful work.
To get out of a rut, it can be useful to break down what exactly defines progress, and the components that are necessary for an upward trajectory.
Entrepreneur Dan Koe highlights that there are certain drivers for forward momentum in work, and tapping into them can help reignite your passions and upgrade your skills:
Curiosity.
Intensity.
Consistency.
Each of these pillars adds a different dimension to progress, and all are required for measurable growth over time. Koe points to these ideas as drivers of career growth, but it's worth noting how they can provide guiding principles to a meaningful, well-balanced life.
Start with wonder
That's what will lead you to your passion, and help you decide what exactly you want to put your energy toward.
Curiosity is the driver of momentum because it's an inner belief, and often creates an inexplicable urge toward action.
Take me for example. As a writer, I first began writing because I felt compelled to tell stories. I wasn't sure why, but I leaned into it as hard as I could and let my wonder for words and language guide me.
Curiosity drives your exploration of the unknown – which is the domain you grow and learn. Life, in a sense, is a series of explorations of the unknown. A pattern of gradually more complex adventures.
Curiosity carries you to the next unknown place or skill, and helps you adopt the child-like mindset of an explorer. It can feel like a sprawling and unwieldy tool, but with time it becomes more specific and personal.
If you're unsure what part of your curiosity to tap into, start with a few questions:
What would I love to do every day?
What attainable skills do I wish I had?
What are my favorite 10 topics to read about?
Where can I connect the dots between my personal interests and career?
But curiosity can't move mountains on its own. It's primarily your discovery mechanism. But to reap the fruits of your own interests, curiosity needs to be leveraged, one day at a time.
Intensity
Intensity is your work ethic. It's how you build something and get a project off the ground.
The work, the brass tacks – without intensity, projects can't come to fruition and progress can stagnate or halt altogether.
This pillar comes once you solidify your curiosity and your aim. When you achieve clarity of vision, then you have a target you can work toward with vigor.
Curiosity brings focus, and that focus opens the door for diligent, aggressive bouts of work.
The intensity, too, allows you to gain greater clarity on your curiosity because you learn more and do more in the domain you are most interested in. Things start to click based on sheer volume of work.
The intensity is what helps you adopt your passion as part of your identity. When you look in the mirror, you can see not only the person looking back at you, but the potential success you can make of yourself.
Then, once you're embedded in your intensity and work, it's time to let the results compound into something greater.
Consistency is final the key to success.
Intensity, while important, can also tend to look like short bursts of enthusiasm followed by lulls of work. The intensity won't carry you far if it isn't grounded in the discipline and willingness to be consistent.
To be sure, the intensity is what helps you build your capacity for work. Your baseline gets higher and you no longer have to wonder what your passion is or what you'd like to do each day.
But the feeling of being lost can creep back in if your sentiment fades.
That's where consistency comes in. Strategy and scheduling become critical.
Consistency, primarily, comes from building habits and systems. It's a magical thing when you plug in your passions into the rigors of a system.
And to build a system that will last the longest and be the most effective, there's a few things to keep in mind:
Schedule your most challenging work for earliest in the day, when you're most awake
Implement blocks of deep focus (turn off notifications, silence calls and emails, etc.)
Plan out each week with the most important tasks and goals
Reflect on each week with everything you accomplished, as well as what you failed to accomplish in order to stay accountable to yourself
Loop in a friend or colleague with your schedule so you have one more person who can hold you accountable
Building a life on these pillars
The beautiful thing about curiosity, intensity, and consistency is that these three values can be implemented time and time again across different parts of your life.
They are not exclusive to work or side projects. The same framework can be used for your fitness routine, romantic relationships, improving your performance as a student or an athlete.
Once you begin thinking in these terms, with the three pillars, it becomes far easier to get yourself back on track if you begin to feel lost.
The mindset becomes ingrained into your day to day, and distractions from your upward trajectory become less enticing.