Welcome to the new friends of the Mental Models, Concepts, and Frameworks newsletter who have joined us since last week!

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This Week: 12 mental models you can use daily to improve your life

Good and Bad Procrastination

Good procrastination is avoiding work with 0 chance of being mentioned in your obituary—like errands.

”Unless you're working on the biggest things you could be, you're type-B procrastinating, no matter how much you're getting done.”

h/t @paulg

Decomplication

We’ve been led to believe that our everyday problems—weight loss, productivity, saving money—require complex solutions.

This is called ‘artificial complexity.’

Decomplication is the process of boiling problems down to their simplest form.

h/t @nateliason

Speed Matters

The faster you do things, the less activation energy is required to do any one thing.

To avoid procrastination, keep the activation energy low by shortening the timeframe for the work that needs to be done, and work faster.

h/t @jsomers

Sunk Cost Fallacy

You irrationally cling to things that have already cost you something and use valuable mental energy doing so:

• Projects

• Investments

• Relationships

To escape, ask yourself:

• Had I not already invested in this, would I do so today?

Cut the sunk costs.

Consider Unintended Consequences

Before making a decision, ask, "What are the possible unplanned outcomes that could occur?"

Focus on the possible second-order effects—can you live with ALL of them?

“We make choices, but we don't always choose the consequences.”

—Sean Covey

Via Negativa

When we have a problem, our natural instinct is to add a new habit or buy a solution.

But usually, you improve your life by subtracting instead.

The foods you avoid are more important than the foods you eat.

Subtracting distractions is the key to productivity.

Help This Person

Every time you encounter another person, think: "How can I help this person?"

It's not altruistic.

Nothing else can so quickly accelerate your career and quality of life.

Helpful people don't ask "how can I help?"

They just help.

Reversible vs. Irreversible Decisions Framework

Irreversible decisions are 'one-way doors.'

They must be made slowly and deliberately.

Reversible decisions are 'two-way doors.'

These decisions can and should be made quickly.

Pre-Mortem

Involves assuming that your decision has failed and working backwards to determine what the potential causes were.

This process has multiple benefits:

• Removes overconfidence and irrational optimism

• Reveals blind spots

• Simplifies thinking

h/t @KleInsight

10/10/10 Rule

We're all guilty of making decisions without thinking about long term consequences.

To avoid this, ask:

How will I feel about this 10 minutes from now?

10 months from now?

10 years from now?

This helps clarify the decision that results in a win/win/win.

Think for Yourself

Thinking for yourself is life’s greatest competitive advantage—you see opportunities others don’t.

How?

• Read History

• Ask, “Is it true?”

• Meet different types of people

• Be less aware of conventional beliefs

• Cultivate independent-minded friends

The World-Class Framework

How you do anything is how you do everything.

Your personal brand is the sum of the thousands of micro-acts you put in over the course of your career or life.

It’s hard to find meaning in menial or boring tasks.

There’s often no immediate payoff that comes with them—like any good habit, there’s no immediate gratification.

We just want to get them done as quickly as possible so we can get on with the real, more interesting work.

But, this is a mistake.

Because how you do anything is how you do everything.

Your personal brand is the summation of the thousands of micro-acts you put in over the course of your career or life.

It’s what you do when no one is looking or expecting you to do a great job.

And the surest way in life to find luck is to make sure you give your very best in each and every one of those moments.

Because you never know what might be around the corner.

And you never know when doing your best will lead to a life-changing opportunity.

Remember:

Every day, you’re not just working for someone else.

You’re working for your future self.

You’re your own boss—the boss of the ‘luck’ that will eventually come your way.

Make the choice to increase your luck by being ‘world-class’ in everything you do.

That's it, I hope you enjoyed reading :)