Gap vs. Gain

How are you measuring your success? 

I spend a lot of time reading, listening to podcasts and thinking. I have loved investing in self development practices for as long as I can remember. 

I have some issues with perfectionism and all or nothing thinking (I am working on it :))

I came across Atomic Habits, by, James Clear a few years back and I wasn’t in a place where I could “hear” it and allow the principles to resonate with me. In a nutshell, he’s all about making a 1% change and over time you’ll be in a very different place in your life by applying the 1% principle to reach your goals. Think of a compass and your desire is to go in a straight line and at the end is your goal. But your compass was set just one degree off… over the course of time you’re going to find yourself either way left or way right of your center when you think you’ve reached your goal. 

Fast forward to this year and I read The Slight Edge, by Jeff Olson, and I get it now. 

In The Slight Edge it resonated with me because I believe everything you do is a vote for your future self. What I took from the book (in a nutshell) is that you either are contributing or contaminating your efforts to reach a goal. Both take equal effort, but 95% of us are choosing things that don’t support the goals we have. It’s Gap vs Gain thinking. 

It’s the Gap vs Gain Mindset. You are one or the other. 

If you’re a Gap thinker, your mind is set on the “gap” between where you are now and where you want to be. 

If you’re a Gain thinker, your mind is set on how far you’ve come or “gained” from the place you started. 

When reading the definitions like that, nothing really seems wrong with either of them.  I found that in my realization of which one I was, it played hard into my issues with perfectionism. In the Gap mindset, I am always striving, hustling, pressing on, pushing forward and never ever looking back to see how much I’ve accomplished. The energy is desperate, critical, heavy and sometimes demeaning. I never really get to experience the relief, and pride of accomplishing because the gap never actually closes. I never gave myself credit for anything unless it was FIREWORKS AMAZING, and I can tell you those achievements are few and far between. 

So the flip side of the Gap mindset is the Gain mindset.  I’ve been challenging myself over the past year to reframe the way I see my goals. I am piecing them out in to smaller attainable, achievable portions that I decided were good milestones, and am giving myself credit for doing things that attribute to the goal. I am only measuring myself from where I started. Other people’s achievements are none of my business. I am focusing on where I began, what I did each day to move toward the goal and giving myself credit for those actions. 

I can measurably look back at my starting point and see what I have accomplished. It’s has been uplifting, motivating and I am recognizing what I’ve put in to every step. I was not giving myself credit for most of my efforts and beating myself up for not being as far along as what I thought I should be (whatever that means). Now I can look back at each week, month and quarter to see how many votes I made for my future self. Perfectionism never got me this far because I spent so many years quitting because it wasn’t perfect, but when has life ever been perfect, when has every single thing ever gone exactly the way we expect it go? Pretty much never… 

As I get better and better at the Gain Thinking, I’m quitting less and less. Quitting less means not having to completely revamp and rewrite every thing, instead I can add, I can be creative about obstacles, I can give myself permission to continue on instead of stopping, berating and doing everything over again. 

If you’re a Gap Thinker, the good news is that you can flip it, just like I did. There is no purpose in staying in “struggle mode” by never seeing what you’re doing well and not giving yourself credit for your contributions. There is no reason not to give yourself credit for the votes you’re putting in the box that positively support your future self.

Listen to your inner critic this week and see where you can practice flipping over to Gain Thinking. Look only from where you started, list out any contributions you made toward the goal (big or small) and give yourself some credit and track how you feel!

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this, send me an email christeen@christeenolsencoaching.com and share with anyone in your circle who might benefit from evaluating their thinking. 

Have a great week my friends!
Chris