“The path of least resistance”. This idea usually isn’t brought up in a positive context, maybe it’s sometimes used to describe someone lazy or not willing to do the hard work. This maybe true in a lot of instances when choosing to sit on the couch or going with the status quo or going with what’s known.
But I want to use it in a less typical way, I want to use it in the context of what we choose to do even when it’s something productive. Our minds are wired to find the path of least resistance, it is looking for ways to conserve energy. So even when we are doing something productive we tend to choose the activity that will require the most efficient amount of effort and the most optimized output.
For example a person that likes to work by themselves versus a someone that likes working on a team. A person that feels confident organizing and structuring plans and ideas versus a person that likes focusing on the tasks immediately at hand. Or a person that has conviction in their independent thinking versus someone that is more comfortable committed to and supporting a group. A person that is more comfortable speaking their thoughts and ideas versus someone that is more confident in writing them.
In each of these cases people “like” to do what produces the most value and and has the best returns. The work is valued and recognized by others. The work is intrinsically interesting, engaging and rewarding. It’s “fun”. And in a lot of cases, actually energizes the person doing it. This feedback loop of intrinsically “fun” work that people value and recognize is invigorating and energizing. And as the feedback loop continues, the more the person does the work, the better they get at it, the higher the value of the work, and the more efficient they become in executing it. And as they stack their learned and developed skills, it installs into a foundational layer becoming more instinctual and intuitive, which they can continue to add more higher developed skills upon their what becomes their “base” skills.
The point I want to make here is that we are not limited by doing things we are only good at or feel comfortable doing. We should not limit ourselves from learning new things even if they are uncomfortable or awkward at first. Finding the path of least resistance helps us find efficiencies and optimizes our efforts and yes, we have our strengths and they should be valued, developed and utilized as much as possible but we become rigid in only doing the things that comes the easiest. We learn so much by doing what is uncomfortable, difficult, and “unrewarding” at times. If you can accept that the things that we “like” to do are for a large part, things that have naturally found themselves in positive feedback loop. And we can create an “artificially” positive feedback loop for the new different, uncomfortable things we want to learn or do.