Dash of Courage: The Psychology of Stuck

"Change the way you look at things, and the things you look at change." - Wayne Dyer

Why do so many capable, intelligent people stay safe when they know they're capable of more?

I call it: The Psychology of Stuck

There was a Nobel-Prize winning psychologist named Daniel Kahneman.
He became famous for an acronym.
Brace yourself.

WYSIATI

Clearly...he was not a marketer.
But he was a brilliant psychologist.

WYSIATI stands for:

What You See Is All There Is.

Here's what that means:
When you're making a decision, your brain only calculates based on the information directly in front of you. 

So when you consider something bold...
Starting the project
Speaking up in the meeting
Booking the trip
Pitching the idea

What do you see?
Risk. Embarrassment. Failure. What could go wrong.

What you don't see:
The confidence you'll build. The skill you'll gain. The respect you'll earn. The growth that follows.

Your brain isn't broken. 
It's efficient.

It fills in missing data with the most vivid information available. And fear is vivid. Because your brain is wired for survival, not expansion. 

Here's the trap. 
WYSIATI makes comfort look rational 
Hesitation feel intelligent
Delay sound strategic.

And that's how people stay stuck
Because incomplete data favors fear.

But Courage isn't emotional.
It's Corrective.

Between stimulus and response there is a window
A small one. 
10 Seconds of Insane Courage

Ten seconds to override instinct 
Ten seconds to interrupt hesitation
Ten seconds to act on possibility not probability

In those ten seconds you're expanding what you can see
You're breaking WYSIATI

Dash of Courage
This upcoming week, pick one small situation and do the opposite of your default

Always sit in the same spot? Move.
Always stay quiet in the meetings? Speak first.
Always order the same thing? Don't.
Always scroll at night? Search something wildly unrelated and confuse the algorithm.

You don't need a new life.
You need disrupted patterns.

WYSIATI feeds on a routine
Shake it up.

Courage over Comfort,
Garrett