The Reality Gap
Managing the flywheel of expectations and realities.
Howdy ðŸ¤
Today we’re discussing the difference between who we are and who we want to be and how to manage that difference to try and become a bit better each day.
I hope the thoughts and prompts below serve as a jumping-off point for helpful reflections and as always, thanks for reading!
Kevin
The Reality Gap
Beware of the gap: the gap between where you are and where you want to be. Simply thinking of the gap widens it, and you end up falling through.
Matt Haig
What we want to do and what we should do. What we hope to do and what we have to do. What we believe in and what we’re capable of. Who we are and what we do.
We all live with gaps in our lives between the vision of who we want to be and the reality of who we are. Some folks have larger or smaller gaps than others, but the way we manage those gaps is more important than the distance between who we are and who we want to be.
If we choose to ignore them or if we’re unaware of the gaps, we’ll only ever be focused on what’s right in front of us. We’ll be at the whim of our circumstances and make decisions impulsively instead of intentionally.
Most importantly, if we choose to ignore the reality of the gap between who we are and who we want to be, we’ll never change. The reality gap is the flywheel that drives all of the change (negative or positive) in our lives, and because the gap is only comprised of two points, so there are only two ways to change it.
First, we can choose to change who we want to be. We can widen or condense our reality gap depending on which direction we adjust our expectations. Some of us tend to lower our expectations and close the reality gap by letting ourselves off the hook. For perfectionists, this can be a welcome change and improvement, but for others, it can create a cycle of lowered expectations that leads to slow deterioration of performance over time.
Others tend to raise expectations to widen our reality gaps. Much like lowering our expectations, raising them affects different types of people differently. For some of us, it makes everything feel out of reach and discourages progress. For others, it keeps us motivated, excited, and always pushing ourselves toward the next level.
We can also manipulate the reality gap by changing our actions. We can adjust our actions to align with who we want to be or take action that moves us farther away from who we want to be.
Regardless of the levers we pull to adjust our reality gap, we want to create a flywheel that pushes us forward instead of pulling us backward. Managing the distance between who we are today and who we want to be is a delicate balance, and each of us needs to understand our own tendencies, strong suits, and weaknesses to titrate our expectations and our actions carefully.
In an ideal world, we can all work to ensure both who we are and who we want to be are always moving forward and expanding. The actions we take help us become who we once wanted to be, and once we become who we once wanted to be, we can create new expectations for the person we’d like to become and continue moving forward.
As long as we can manage the reality gap properly and keep the flywheel pointed in the right direction, the cycle of growth continues, and we become a bit better each day.
Prompts
Do you think more about daily action and who you are today or plans for the future and who you’d like to become?
To match your tendencies and move yourself forward, which direction should you adjust who you want to become?
Are your daily actions sufficient to help you become the person you’d like to be?
Deep Dive
Reasons to Stay Alive - Matt Haig
A book about surviving tragedy and making the most of your time on earth.
Thanks for reading! I’ll see you next Sunday.
Kevin