Hiark & Hormesis (9/2018)
NN Taleb spends a good portion of Anti-Fragile describing hormesis, a biphasic response (often to a toxic chemical or stressful situation) wherein low doses can lead to a favorable outcome while high doses can be fatal. The word ‘hormesis’ derives from the Greek for “set in motion, impel, urge on,” and that’s exactly what we hope Hiark can achieve for personal growth. Just to be clear, we’re neither supportive of everything NNT thinks (or tweets), nor of homeopathy which takes hormesis as a foundation. We’re more attached to thinking about psychological triggers analogous to fasting and exercise as physiologic triggers. Cells respond to challenges, they adapt and become more efficient due to mild-to-moderate stresses to the system. We think (and have seen across multiple settings) psyches respond similarly to challenges. So let’s think less in terms of mental methylmercury, and more ego exercising.
Personal growth is not “no pain, no gain.” Pain can be a potent trigger to self-reevaluation and change, but we believe there are other, better routes to growth (though none of them are easy). To improve your max bench press or mile time you want to push out today just slightly beyond what you were able to do yesterday. That frequent stress to the system tests our muscles and our lungs for weak spots and (theoretically) kills off the underperforming tissues to be replaced by ones with higher quality, able to meet the stressor. Our self narrative, the way we conceptualize ourselves in the world, also has stronger and weaker points, but without frequent tolerable, but boundary testing stressors, we can never root out the weak stories, kills them off, and replace them with new ideas about ourselves more firmly grounded in reality. We need psyche challenges to improve our psychological fitness the same way our body needs physical challenges.
In Hiark HQ above my desk is a framed 8.5 x 11” paper with two equations. The top line is 1.01 ^ 365 = 37.8 and just below it 0.99 ^ 365 = 0.03. Yes, it’s hackneyed, but it makes an unmistakable statement about the power of compounding small changes. Starting today, and for everyday over the next year, a 1% improvement over yesterday yields around a 37-fold increase, that’s 3,680% better, not 365% better from simple arithmetic gain. And compared to the person who does only 1% less each day, the 1% improver is 1,000x ahead or 100,000%!
Pushing out just slightly past what you could do yesterday can yield massive benefits. You shouldn’t go for an immediate step-wise change. Going from 100lbs to 200lbs on the bench press overnight will almost certainly leave you defeated and injured. Likewise, trying to change one’s habits and address blind spots in 24-hours is similarly unrealistic and likely harmful. Change and growth are gradual processes. A person can reach his or her goals with daily, slightly uncomfortable challenges to the psyche’s status quo. It’s uncomfortable, it can be unpleasant, it’s not always obvious it’s working, but with small insights, new minor decisions can be made that compound massively over time.
We don’t believe large positive changes in behavior or personality are possible quickly or easily. But we do believe that they are possible. By taking responsibility for our choices, by owning our role in every interaction, by being willing to ask for help on our blind spots, and by listening and integrating feedback when it’s given, we deeply believe that major progress is possible.
There may be pangs of discomfort when someone tells you that you are not how you thought you were. Your ego may bruise. That’s hormesis, if you take the time to touch the sore spot and commit to do something constructive about it. That feedback may not be universally shared, but it is a data point for you to process and it can be used fruitfully. Through Hiark you discover that people find you rude, bumptious, obnoxious at work? Ouch. Yes, it’s important to acknowledge the sting. That sting is two discordant realities clashing. Take a moment to nurse the wound, remind yourself that this is a single data point, not *THE UNIVERSAL TRUTH*, and then get on with integrating the data point into your updating knowledge of yourself. That is today’s 1% growth. That is psychological hormesis. You take a small dose of ego toxin, it destroys the false belief that everyone at work loves you and there’s nothing you could possibly improve upon, and you replace that false belief with a commitment to be kinder, to listen more respectfully, to be more patient at work. There is no room for these new commitments if the false belief remains. Personal growth, reaching our personal best, requires identifying and eliminating these false, idealized notions about ourselves. It makes us stronger, better people, as long as we ingest the bitter psychological pills in small enough doses.
Hiark’s mission is to use technology to improve relationships and help people realize their latent potential. We don’t offer a service to maximize short-term comfort or self-delusion. We aren’t for everyone, and we’re okay with that. We often metaphorically compare Hiark to HIIT. If you’ve ever studied the face of someone running intervals, it rarely reveals ecstasy. It’s not agony, not even pain exactly. What you see is struggle, effort, what 1%-better-than-yesterday actually looks like in the flesh. There is always a yesterday. With Hiark, you aren’t competing against friends (or enemies) to be “the best.” It’s not you versus them or you versus the world. You are competing against yesterday to be your best self. Everyone using Hiark is fighting the exact same battle against complacency, against wasted potential or unrealized relationships. And no matter who you are, right now, today, there is an opportunity to be 1% better in some domain than you were yesterday.
