These Clues Reveal Why You Are Underperforming in Life (Unnecessarily)
#3 – You usually succeed
Nothing is wrong yet everything feels … blah.
You’re not happy and you don’t know why. I’ve spent plenty of my life in this perpetual state of torture.
Everything is fine yet it’s not fine.
You’re cruising, but you know deep down that you’re underperforming and have no idea why.
The first step is to look for the clues.
You hardly feel like an imposter
Imposter syndrome is seen as a bad thing. It’s not.
If you’ve not felt like an imposter you’re not growing in life. When I got a new job a few years back in technology, I nearly pooped my pants on the first day.
I had no idea about ‘the cloud’ or lines of code. I felt like a cheater. I was waiting for my boss to find out and fire me. But he never did.
Choosing a job where you feel like an imposter is a sign of growth. You’ll figure it out – you always do.
Choosing not to be an imposter is the real pandemic.
Underperformance comes from a lack of growth. And imposter syndrome is the #1 sign you must look for.
Takeaway: feel imposter syndrome frequently.
You always get a bigger slice of the pie
Selfishness secretly destroys high performance.
The trouble is no one tells you. I had a Zoom call recently with a new person I met on Twitter. They talked a good game so they piqued my curiosity. We got on a call and it was all about them. They siphoned off my energy and time for their benefit.
They didn’t even ask about me. Dontcha know I’m about to be a daddy, I thought.
The Zoom call ended. No follow-up or action happened. Silence. Then I realized why: when one person gets to eat the entire pie and nobody else gets a bite, our human nature switches off our attention.
We run in the other direction.
I always say in business: the best deals are the ones where you give more of the upside to the other side. Because what happens is they start to overcompensate with what they can give, and it unlocks mutual generosity.
Generosity and kindness are what make the world go round. It’s what stops potential wars and creates human progress, like sending people to the moon or Mars.
Takeaway: if life feels lifeless, give more of yourself away.
You usually succeed
Ever met one of those dudes who's always winning?
They’re a giant failure. They’re underperforming because they’re playing life on easy mode. Easy mode feels like crap. It’s barely living. It’s a lifeless zombie existence. You die at 25 and get buried at 75 in easy mode.
Some people fall into this ‘easy’ trap though.
Maybe daddy has a lot of money and can buy them opportunities. Or maybe mommy rings her friends in business to get them deals. Or maybe the trust fund bankrolled their success.
Never trust people who succeed regularly. It’s an illusion.
High performance is sometimes succeeding… and failing most of the time.
The failures produce resilience. Failures create drive. And the dopamine you get from overcoming challenges creates feelings of progress.
All we really want in life is to get the feeling of progress, not success.
Takeaway: seek out challenges to fail more, and gain access to a higher power.
You already know everything
I run an online academy and get to speak with prospective students all the time. After thousands of interactions there’s a pattern.
Some of them think they know everything already.
They look at our curriculum and say to themselves:
“Write a bio. Yep, I already know.”
“Build a writing habit. Yep, I already know.”
“Join a platform with lots of users. Yep, I already know.”
These people don’t join my academy because they think they have it all figured out.
The trouble is they often have it all wrong.
They know. But what they know has been taught to them incorrectly. Or they learned what they know from an unqualified TikTok guru.
High performance is found in the nuances.
Writing an online bio of yourself is easy. It’s just words. But doing it right so it interests people takes skill and lots of A/B testing. It’s not a one-time, do it one-way exercise.
Thinking you already know everything (or know a lot) in any field is a huge red flag. The boundaries of information are limitless.
High performance comes from an open mind that is always learning.
Takeaway: you only know 1% on any topic. Learn more to earn more.
You’re wildly confident it’s going to work
Overconfidence is another plague.
Quiet confidence is fine. But many people have such certainty when it comes to their goals. They shouldn’t. Life is wildly unpredictable.
Most bets you make won’t pay off and life is like that by design.
You want to experience plenty of uncertainty.
Uncertainty is when you tackle your fears. Every time a fear is defeated defeat you grow in life and experience true meaning and fulfillment. That leads to high performance.
Takeaway: add more uncertainty to life.
You don’t invest enough
Many people barely invest. I’m not talking about the stock market either. I’m talking about investing in yourself – education, books, health, meditation, exercise.
Our focus goes where energy goes. Our energy is an investment we can make. For example, I choose to invest a lot of my energy into writing. It pays me many dividends in life, such as random opportunities I could never dream of.
But too many people starve themselves.
They’re always running behind. They never make time to invest their hours wisely into growth opportunities. Or they’re so bad at managing money that they’ve never got any money left over to take care of themselves or their goals.
It makes me upset.
We only get out what we invest in. And good investments are proactive not reactive.
Takeaway: invest time, money, and energy into proactive goals.
Wrapping up
Underperformance is stupidly obvious when you pay attention to these signs. Life is supposed to be a daily struggle full of uncertainty.
If it’s not, you’re limiting your potential and halting your growth. It will show up in life through a zero care-factor attitude, low motivation, and feelings of frustration.
Get out there and give more than feels normal. That’ll get you back on the path to success.
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Tim, thank you very much for this insightful, encouraging piece. I don't know anyone, where I live, who makes a decent living, or any money at all, as an online content creator/writer, and often I feel alone, and as though I'm delusional for trying to do that. But when I read your work, I start to see possibilities, and the dwindling fire within me is reignited. I thank you for that.
Another masterpiece! Thank you Mr. Denning 😊