Stress is the difference between what you want and what you have

Hello!

Today's newsletter is the 25th one that I've written, having done so weekly for the past six months. At an average of about 1700 words each, that's 42,500 words total. These newsletters amount to a roughly 150 page book. That's crazy!

I wrote all of those words, and will continue writing more, in service of helping you. I've learned a lot in the last two decades of leadership and life, and not all of those lessons came easy! I'd like to save you a little heartache, heartburn, sweat, and tears by sharing what I've learned with you all in this newsletter.

In order to serve you better, I'd like to get a sense of what you're interested in. Today, and maybe a couple times in the future, I'll be sending a brief survey to get to know you, and your interests, a little better.

Today I'd like some feedback on the length of the newsletter, and which sections you most consistently read. There are open sections for your more free-form thoughts as well.

I'm also asking for a testimonial from you if you're comfortable providing one. I don't share this newsletter broadly yet, but when I do, your testimonial will be helpful.

Please fill out the survey here: https://forms.gle/dgwQKbYMRiDgFwvN7. It's anonymous in case that helps you feel more comfortable sharing ideas. It should only take a couple minutes to fill out and it will help me write a better newsletter for you.

It would mean a lot to me if you'd share your thoughts!

Thanks!

Kevin

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A Quote

“ The only thing more infectious than a good attitude is a bad one. The more you dwell on the negative, the weaker you feel, and that weakness infects those around you. However, the reverse is also true. I knew that if I could control my attitude and redirect my attention, I’d gain control of the entire situation. — David Goggins, "Never Finished"

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Three Things

1 - 🐶 OpenAI Text to Video - OpenAI recently shared details and sample videos of their text to video model, Sora. It’s really impressive! This is only available to a small group of people (not me!) while they work on testing and safety. Watch the MKBHD video linked to check out some of the sample videos and his really strong commentary on them.

2 - 📚 Endure - I really enjoyed this book, subtitled, “Mind, Body, and the Curiously Elastic Limits of Human Performance.” It explores the relationship between your brain and your body when it comes to operating at the limits of endurance. A key point in the book is that your perceived level of effort is the driving factor behind endurance performance. Even something as simple as positive self talk while working out can improve performance.

3 - 🌴 Lost Amazon Civilization - Remnants of an ancient civilization has been discovered beneath the Amazon, and they predict that more discoveries will be made. Described as a “fully urbanized,” as opposed to a collection of villages, this discovery shows that the Amazon hasn’t always been rural or undeveloped.

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Deeper Dive on a Model of Stress

What is stress? It happens to us every day. Maybe multiple times per day! We feel stress at work. We feel stress at home. We feel stress from our schedule. We feel stress from other people.

Where don’t we experience stress?

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The Fundamental Principle and Examples

A fundamental principle underlying stress is this: It’s the difference between what we have and what we want.

This framework could represent material things, experiences, feelings, or other people.

For material things, it could be that you want a different house or car. It could be clothes and jewelry. It could be new gear for your hobby or sport.

For experiences, it could be that you want a different job. You want to go on vacation. You want the weather to change. You want all the traffic to go away!

For feelings, maybe you don’t want to feel anger, anxiety, or sadness.

For other people, this is where you want your experience of someone else to change.

“If only my boss would…”
“I wish my spouse wouldn’t…”
“I hope my kids stop…”

The tension between these two poles - what you have and what you want to have - is what gives rise to the feeling of stress.

To make this framework tangible, what’s been giving you a feeling of stress lately? What’s the thing you want? How is that different than what you already have or are currently experiencing?

How do you plan to resolve this tension?

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Addressing the tension with inaction

A common response to resolving the stress is inaction. We wish or hope that things will change.

When those things don’t change, we develop coping mechanisms in response. Sometimes it’s exercise. Sometimes it’s diving into TV or games. It could be drugs or alcohol. There are a billion coping mechanisms, and they’re all trying to resolve this tension.

But they don’t address the root cause.

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Addressing the tension with action

The other common response to resolving the stress is action. We strive to have the thing we want become the thing we have. Sometimes it works! We buy the thing. We go on the trip.

Through work, effort, and exertion, we resolve the tension by changing what we have into the thing we want.

This is good! This is what drives humans to action, and why having a compelling vision drives companies and teams to new heights.

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The downside of turning wants into haves

The downside of this human behavior is that we’re often doing it unconsciously.

You want to own or experience something other than what you have or are experiencing, which creates tension. Your brain works to resolve the tension.

So, we get the thing we want, but very often our wants don’t disappear. They just get replaced with other wants! This cycle of wants (again, be it things, experiences, feelings, or other people) can create some unhealthy outcomes.

We might find ourselves devoting our time to work to make enough money to afford our material wants, sacrificing relationships and health.

We might climb the hedonic treadmill. We get the thing we want, feel momentary happiness, then return to our baseline happiness. So we decide to want something else. We keep tugging on the rope and pulling wants into haves.

In practice this means that your brain is constantly trying to make the universe contort its shape to match what you want. You end up trying to control your environment and the people in it - and feeling stress if the universe doesn’t accommodate you.

Honestly, it’s exhausting!

Thankfully, there’s another way of resolving the tension.

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Resolving the tension by letting go

I had been 100% operating in a mindset of turning wants into haves.

Something happened that I didn’t like, or someone did something I didn’t want them to do, or I wanted something I didn’t have - and I’d drive to close the gap.

But it wouldn’t always work.

Unsurprisingly, I felt stress!

Then I discovered that there was another option.

I could let go of wanting something different. I could be content with what I had.

At first it didn’t make sense. I resisted the idea. I mean, of course the universe should work the way I see it. People should act the “right” way. Make the “right” decisions.

I can’t help but want the vacation. The new material possession. That’s just how things work! The wants felt rigid and immoveable.

While I was used to treating my wants as fixed, it stood to reason that I could treat them as adjustable. I could resolve the tension by just not wanting things to be different than they were.

A helpful thought was realizing that this framework explains why the same situation can cause stress in one person and be absolutely stress-free for another person! The experience is neutral; it’s our judgment of whether we want it to be that way that causes stress.

An introvert might be stressed by going to a conference by themselves. An extrovert would relish the opportunity to meet so many new people! Same situation, one person feeling stress, the other not.

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But if we let go of wants, won’t nothing change?

If it’s true that you can resolve stress by letting go of wants, if everyone did that, wouldn’t the world grind to a halt?

Yes, I think that’s right.

So, how do we leverage this tension in a way that serves us, rather than being unconscious of it and letting it drive us to feel stress?

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Focus on what you can control

The crux of all of this is whether the thing you want is something you can control.

If you can control it, then it’s a candidate for you to work on changing. If it’s not, that’s probably something you should let go.

Here are just a few examples of this distinction:

Traffic - You can’t control all the other cars and drivers. You can control your route. You can choose to value the extra time in the car as time for a podcast, audio book, or calling someone.

Weather - You can’t control the weather. You can control what you wear to be comfortable in the weather.

Layoffs - You can’t control whether your company will have a layoff. You can control your networking activity and skill development to be ready in case one does happen (also see Premeditatio Malorum).

In each case - traffic, weather, and layoffs - you don’t control the outcome. You can fight the clouds, but you can’t make the sun appear. If you’re mad that the sun isn’t out, you’ll sit in that stress until the universes changes the weather of its own accord.

So don’t let go of all wants - just work on letting go of the things you don’t control.

For the things you can control, be sure to strategize and prioritize which ones you go after - or you’ll still be stressed about all the things you can do but don’t have time for. 😀

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Acknowledging the challenge

It’s really easy to type out the words, “let go of wants.” It’s much harder to do.

I discovered this framework somewhere in late 2017 to early 2018, so I’ve been working on it for six years. I can attest to both its impact in letting go of stress, but also how difficult it is to let go of wants!

I said earlier I had been 100% operating in a mindset of striving to turn what I wanted into what I had, which is 0% letting go. Maybe these aren’t exact numbers, but given that I wasn’t even aware of letting go, it had to be near zero 🤣

I couldn’t hazard a guess into what those percentages are today, but I know I’ve made progress. I still have triggers - things that seem really important to be different than what I’m experiencing. While I might also know that I can’t control them, it doesn’t mean they're easy to let go.

But I keep practicing and keep working on it, and I see the benefits. You will, too.

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Bringing it all together

Stress is the difference between what you have and what you want.

You can resolve the tension by striving toward your want. You can also resolve the tension by letting go of wanting things to be different.

The pivotal factor for whether to strive or let go is whether the thing is something you can control.

If you can control it, go for it! If you can’t control it, let it go.

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Call to action

This week you should test the model for yourself! You should also practice letting go of a little want.

To test the model, if you feel stress about anything, take inventory. What is it that you want? How is that different than what you have?

Once you see the two things outlined in your head, think through the different ways to close the gap. Which of those things can you control? Which of those things do you not control that you should let go?

To practice letting go, think of a teeny little want. Something you don’t control, which is usually other people. Maybe you want the line to move faster at coffee? I don’t know what yours will be, but whatever it is, just practice letting go of wanting the thing to be different and see how that feels.

As always, please send me a note at heykev@kevinnoble.xyz to let me know how your practice works out for you. I’d love to hear your story.

Kevin