Improvement happens slowly. Problems occur quickly.
I was listening to Stephen Pinker—author of “The Better Angels of Our Nature” and generally optimistic intellectual—on the “People I Mostly Admire” podcast. He was talking about how journalism naturally focuses on negative occurrences:
“There is a built-in bias [to focus] on things that go wrong, because things can fall apart very quickly. Whereas, improvement creeps up a few percentage points a year and compounds, which can transform our lives.”—Stephen Pinker
It’s not hard to see why journalists focus on the negative stuff. It’s big. It’s obvious. It’s dramatic. The slow and steady improvement is much harder to make a compelling story out of, so it rarely happens.
I reckon we’re all plagued by a similar psychology when it comes to assessing our own lives. Take public speaking, for example. It’s much more difficult to notice the slow, steady improvement that can occur thanks to months or years of practice. That’s not as obvious or dramatic as that one time you lost your train of thought while delivering a presentation to an audience that included the managing partner of your division and looked silly in front of everyone.
Which means that subconsciously, just as we think the world is going to shit even when the data tells us otherwise (as Pinker is oft to point out), our decision-making is effected more by a small number of dramatic problems than it is by a near-overwhelming amount tiny compounding positive improvements.
To counteract that, we need to consciously dial down the attention we give to dramatically negative experiences, and dial up the attention we give to the tiny improvements which collectively compound to transform who we are.
P.S. — If you'd like to be more entertaining, more likeable, and more profitable when public speaking, come join the wonderful BNI crew in Melbourne next week, where I'll be delivering a workshop on public speaking for business and career growth.
Organised by my friend from waaaaaay back Rachael Dere, it will be a wonderful opportunity to grow your own capabilities, or offer it to members of your team.