We all have really good ideas. Some of them we remember the next day, and some we don't.
Four Hundred Percent is an idea that I hoped would change our lives for the better. When it occurred to me, I made a best effort to remember it in its pristine state. But since I had a voice recorder handy, I did more than just remember it the next day. These are the exact words which went into the voice recorder that day...
"So today I had a really really exciting idea about what people call the eighty-twenty rule. And the eighty-twenty rule implies that 80% of your success will come out of the 20% of things that we do. And this 80-20 Rule can be applied to sales, businesses making money, and many others.
But the idea that I had on top of that is that you can't just stop at doing the twenty percent. To really maximixe the potential of each 100%, we have to go through and do the other eighty percent. And here's a reason why - On any day, you DO hundred percent, and out of that hundred percent of time, twenty percent of time-and-effort produces eighty percent of the results. Think about that again; 20% of the work = 80% of the results. So if you maximixe your day's potential, it can give you 400% of Results from 100% of Effort."
... and I rambled on of about 5 more minutes, fleshing out the idea. Why is this important? It's important because it highlights the basic core of Four Hundred Percent: use the synergies between the regular things you do in a day, to produce exponential outcomes that will maximize every 20% of Effort in your day. Let's call this 20-E. The results this 20-E produces can be called 80-R (for 80% Results). Capisce?
This article you're reading here is born of the simple power of an everyday idea which I had (thank you! I'll take a bow!), combined with a voice recorder and website. Without synergy between those 3 things and 20-E, this idea would be lost like millions of others out there. No 20-E = No 80-R = No bueno!
Take a break for the 400% idea and read this tip (we'll continue the idea after this):
The key to having a good schedule is having different habits for each part of the day. It will help you transition through the day, and keep you on track and happy. The fastest thing you can habitualize is the lighting in your home or office. Having different lights on at different times will drastically change your perception of time. You can also hack this system to give yourself a 'light boost' (yeah, I just came up with that) when you need it, by tricking the mind into thinking it's 'go time'.
So if I can have your focus back, I'd like you to consider what would happen if, from now onwards, I settled on all my ideas coming from the voice recorder + website method? The idea-generation machine would become stifled. Why? Because there are only so many ideas which need a voice-recorder and a website! So now, to utilize the next 20-E effectively, I have to find another way to produce the next 80-R. This means looking for another way to maximize the next 20% of Effort, and have it produce 80% of Results. Want an example? Maybe I join a fitness gym, join a softball league, and for signing up my entire softball team up for the gym, get rewarded a free lifetime membership, for life!?
Some people do the opposite of good things for themselves, and what's the opposite of good? Exactly. They take that 20% of Effort (and it's attached 80% of Results) and say that they're happy with that being their maximum. So now they begin focusing on just the 20% percent. That 80/20 becomes their 100/100, but now, only twenty percent of that is producing eighty percent .
It's a circle that keeps getting smaller in mass and losing power, with less work, and less results. Every time someone does the bare minimum twenty percent that is needed to survive, they're effectively leaving money on the table (the other 80% of Effort which could produce another 320% of Results).
So we have 2 different ways this could go, and I want to inspire you to pick the team which is rising, not the one which is falling. But first, what are some basic things you need to be doing to start using the Four Hundred Percent idea?
Here are some basics
(1) try New things
(2) meet people, reignite friendships, and be somewhat social
(3) don't give up on something because it's not possible now. If you can improve your chances of success later, when you're more mature and experienced, wouldn't you want your future self to benefit? So don't give up. Your future self will thank you.
Don't Give Up. Your future self will thank you.
I'm not saying that you need to continue doing the stuff that bores you, and doesn't engage you, or doesn't make you any money, or makes you miserable. You don't need to do any of that. But every time we reduce your workload down to the twenty percent, you have to find other things to do with the eighty percent of your time!
You have to be productive, not just busy-productive. And you must try new things. Try other things because guess what will happen if you keep trying new things? That twenty percent effect will multiply. So the original equation says twenty percent of the work equals eighty percent of the results. That leaves you with eighty percent of time you control to fill with other, new things. But really re-inventing yourself and focusing in finding out what truly makes you happy, and finding more and more and more of those things every time you do the other twenty percent of the work, that twenty-to-forty-to-sixty-to-eighty-to-one-hundred that is multiplied by eighty percent every time (whew!), there is no limit!!
Although the time available to us is limited at a hundred percent, there is no limit to the impact of things we can do with that time. That same 20% Effort can lead to 80% of Results.... It can give you Four Hundred Percent. Since I'm a visual guy, I made this picture to convey the message
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