As human beings, we all have a tendency or a need to do the bare minimum and get by. I’m not saying that’s the right thing to do and I’m not even saying all of us think like that. I’m saying that we’re evolutionarily designed to act that way.
The human mind is designed to think of the easiest way to get things done. Why would our body needlessly put itself under extra stress to get things done when it can achieve the same results with less effort? Why walk 25 steps to get from point A to point B when there’s an easier route that takes only 10 steps? Your subconscious mind doesn’t care about how many steps you need to get in. Why prepare a fresh & nutritious meal for yourself when there’s frozen dinner that’ll take all but 5 minutes to cook? It’s not like your body inherently knows the nutritional differences between the two.
The body doesn’t understand long term benefits. It understands instant gratification. This is, like most things, an evolutionary trait. There never used to be any sort of certainty for our ancestors when it came to food, sex or shelter so they tended to consume as quickly as they could. While things have changed considerably for us ever since then, we’ve still hung on to this trait.
What is the Pareto Principle?
This brings me to the Pareto Principle. The Pareto Principle is an old management principle that states that 80% of the results we get come from 20% of our efforts. I first read about this in Tim Ferris’s “The 4-Hour Workweek”. In simple terms, what I’m trying to say is that we should focus primarily on refining the 20% of things that we can do that will give us 80% of our results. Refining this 20% is bound to give us the biggest impact on our lives. Lean into our nature of finding the easy way of doing things but in a more effective way. The pie chart diagram below actually explains it quite well.
I’ll be splitting up my “The Pareto Principle for Everyday Life” into 3 different sections. Click on the links below to read more. The bulk of the information I have for you will be in the links below. These are –
- The Pareto Principle for Health & Fitness
- The Pareto Principle for Relationships
- The Pareto Principle for Work & Productivity
If you have any questions or suggestions, once again, feel free to contact me at mohan@bebetteratyou.com.
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