Hello!
Seiiti Arata.
You know how to get a kid to drop a toy, right?
Just show her a new one.
That shiny object will catch her attention, and she will forget all about the old toy.
Even if the old toy is better.
We adults are not that different.
Whenever we discover something new, that shiny object catches our attention and makes us
abandon what we have in hand—even if we are on the right track.
This behavior is so common that it even has a name: Shiny Object Syndrome.
It makes you act based more on emotion than on reason.
And while it may seem harmless, it can disrupt every area of your life.
Shiny Object Syndrome prevents you from realizing your biggest dreams.
Most people can achieve their life goals using a good plan.
And a good plan is a plan proven by time, that others have already used to achieve the
same goals.
If you want to lose weight, the challenge is to have adherence to the calorie restriction
plan.
And there are many paths for this.
For example, you can choose a low-carb diet or a low-fat diet or a vegetarian diet or
a carnivorous diet…
As long as you follow the diet consistently, you will reach the goal.
If you want to earn with investments, you can choose the fundamental analysis of companies,
you do technical analysis of stocks, you can invest in your own businesses, you can buy
bitcoin and learn to keep your own keys.
There are multiple paths…
As long as you maintain consistency in the strategy, you will reach the objective.
If you want to learn a new language, you can choose to take face-to-face courses, online
courses, or private lessons.
You can participate in language exchanges or watch movies and TV series…
Just stay consistent and you'll get there.
With these three examples, notice that a good plan is one that you can stick to for as long
as it takes.
In evidence-based medicine this is called adherence.
It's no use just presenting a patient with the best protocol for good health.
It is necessary for the patient to be able to implement the plan for as long as necessary.
However, it is difficult to achieve adherence because people suffer from the shiny object
syndrome.
They start out excited about the Pumpkin diet but soon learn about the Pineapple diet and
change their minds before the first plan has had time to produce any results.
And as soon as they hear about something else, they change their strategy again.
And so they spend their lives jumping from branch to branch like a squirrel, hoping the
next bright object will bring the desired result.
But they would already have achieved the result if they had stuck to the original plan for
a longer time.
Shiny objects are distractions that delay your life goals.
Shiny Object Syndrome is just a fancy name for something that is very simple and yet
difficult to combat: distraction.
And distraction messes with your emotions.
The desire for novelty compels you to make irrational decisions.
Imagine if you had to get from point A to point B, and the only path available was a
straight road, free of any signs or obstacles.
You would simply travel this road in the only possible way, and you would soon arrive at
the desired destination.
Now imagine that you have to go from the same point A to the same point B, but now there
are hundreds of different paths, each one with several forks, holes, obstacles, shortcuts,
and detours.
And along these paths are several advertisements saying that another way is better, a different
route will get you there faster, that you are on the wrong path.
That's what happens when you don't stick to the plan you've laid out to achieve your goals.
You keep changing strategies from time to time, and you never see the results.
That doesn't mean your original plan is always going to be the best path.
But even if it's not the best path, it's probably better to stick with it for a while than to
keep changing strategies without giving the plan time to produce the results you want.
So learn to give your initial route some time.
You don't have to be forever stuck to the original plan, with no flexibility to change
when you find that path isn't going to yield results.
But you need to at least give yourself time to see if the plan will work or not.
You do this by eliminating distractions, maintaining emotional control, and learning to say no.
Going back to the weight loss example, if you chose the X diet, stay with it.
Don't keep reading about the Y diet; don't keep looking on the internet for information
about the Z diet.
The fewer distractions you have, the easier it will be to focus on your plan and say no
to shiny objects dangling in front of you.
Our desire for novelty is inevitable, so learn to use it to your advantage.
It doesn't matter if you are a super-focused person or someone who is easily distracted.
If you are a human being, you have a natural tendency to be interested in novelty.
And since shiny objects will sooner or later catch your eye, you can learn to use this
tendency to your advantage.
The best way to do this is to shorten the timeframe of your goals so that you increase
your focus.
With a smaller goal and a shorter timeframe, you are less likely to lose interest in your
original plan.
Instead of setting a goal saying that you will lose fifteen pounds in a year using the
paleo diet, set a smaller goal in a shorter amount of time.
That way, you can evaluate your progress more often.
For example, aim to lose three pounds in a month on this diet.
If, at the end of a month, you are dissatisfied with the diet or find that it is not producing
results for you, change your plan and try something new.
A good way to do this is using the weekly mini goals technique that we taught you in
episode 203 of the series Hello!
Seiiti Arata [https://arata.se/hello203].
If you reduce your goals to small, seven-day chunks, you can renew your spirits and find
something new every week.
Just be careful because, for most purposes, it's not very effective to change the strategy
every couple of weeks.
It is a very short time to see results in a diet, in an investment plan, or in learning
a language.
But even without changing the strategy, you can have a shiny object within the plan by
changing the menu, the actions to be analyzed, the type of exercises you are going to do…
There is no time rule for changing strategy.
You need to analyze with common sense why the results did not appear.
Getting stuck with a strategy that isn't working is just as bad as jumping about, pursuing
every shiny new object that appears.
Because of this, you need to have balance and common sense to define when a strategy
is not working for you and when it needs to be replaced.
The best way to get that common sense is by analyzing data.
Make a plan with your objective, define the strategy to reach that objective, and then
execute the strategy for a predefined time.
At the end of that time, analyze the data to see if the plan worked.
If it's not working, then you can switch strategies with intention, now driven by reason and not
emotion.
Back to the weight loss example.
Imagine that you chose the paleo diet, consulted a nutritionist that you really trust, followed
the menu most of the time, and yet after ninety days, you didn’t see any significant weight
loss.
In this example, this particular diet may just not work for you.
Maybe it's more effective to switch strategies, try something else, and look for better results.
See how this type of approach differs from being distracted by information that appears
in front of you all the time?
In Shiny Object Syndrome, the new things are pulling you off track, and the distractions
delay the achievement of your goals.
Here, you are in charge, trying out strategies and observing results before testing something
new.
For this to work, you need to have a plan.
You need to be clear and realistic about what you want to achieve, what strategy you are
going to use, and how long it will likely take to see the results.
It may seem complicated, but it's much simpler than constantly trying new and fancy solutions
without ever seeing the result.
Shiny Object Syndrome is a tendency to look for new things all the time, losing interest
in and abandoning what we already have—even if that is working fine.
This type of behavior disrupts all areas of our life, greatly delaying the achievement
of our goals.
To beat Shiny Object Syndrome, you need to have a plan and stick to it.
You need to give the plan time to work and show results, and only then analyze if you
really need something new.
In the Planning Your Life course, you learn to plan like this.
You’ll develop a plan that goes from your most important personal values ​​to the
practical steps you need to take to turn your goals into reality.
You can view a special lesson from the Planning Your Life course right now by visiting https://arata.se/planningyourlife.