Lessons - Paradoxes That Challenge the Very Fabric of Reality

Welcome to Lessons episodes of Success Story, part of the HubSpot podcast network. These lessons episodes will be shorter conversations with past guests, valued members of the success story community, and myself. They'll be focused on teaching you actionable, insightful takeaways that you can use to upscale your personal and professional life. Because really, they combine these two totally illogical concepts that completely contradict each other. And this is such a useful tool because it forces us to think differently and critically about anything that we think about. And when you go into these paradoxes, they really force you to dig deeper and they reveal some really incredible wisdom. So if you don't know what a paradox is, here's an example, a very basic example so that you can start to wrap your mind around it. So my friend James, he is a paradox, very basic example, but still a paradox. On one hand, he is a incredibly successful accomplished trial attorney. He argues all these complex cases. In his free time, he volunteers at animal shelters and he fosters rescue dogs. So this seems like a total contradiction. A hard-ass trial lawyer doesn't take no for an answer. And then, you know, in his free time, he's basically saving these beautiful, rescue animals. But in his particular case, the paradox actually makes sense because him as an individual needs both in his life. He needs to argue court cases. This fulfills a massive intellectual challenge he has. And then caring for animals satisfies his more nurturing side. So there are paradoxes in his character that make him who he is. And I think we all have these inner paradoxes like James. And I think that when we explore them and when we understand them, we unlock new self-knowledge because they really invite us to move past our usual linear thinking and binary categories. So when we make space for these contradictions, we open up a new way to see the world and a new way to see ourselves and how we interpret the world. So again, these are some of my favorite paradoxes that I'm going to speak through today. And in all seriousness, when I do the research for these videos or I do the research for my newsletter, some of the content I put out, this sort of sparks my creativity and it helps me challenge my assumptions. Because paradoxes are like zen coins. They're these seemingly non-sensical riddles that really guide you to profound realizations. And I realize that not everybody here is creating this type of content all the time and doing the research. And some of you are just consuming, which is fine. But you'll notice a common thread that I'm a very big believer in. It is, it is thinking outside the box and challenging, right? This is how, this is how anybody who you look up to and it's not somebody who you looked up to in like a business sense, somebody who just looked up to any sort of leader, they challenge assumptions and they do things differently, which helps them stand out in the day to day in a good way. Sometimes in a bad way, but usually we're hopefully aiming for in a good way. And I hope that when we dive into these paradoxes, this sort of gives you a fresh perspective to look at different problems in your life and look at different ways that you view things and hopefully this will make you a better, more self-aware person. So let's kick it off. First, paradox is the hedonism paradox. So raise your hand if you love pleasure. Good food, travel, lazy Sundays on the couch. We all want to maximize fun and enjoyment. This is called hedonism and this is the idea that pleasure is the highest aim in life. And on the surface, it makes total sense. Who doesn't want to be happy? But here's a crazy thing. The more we chase pleasure, the less we actually enjoy it. So let me give an example. Imagine you take an incredible vacation Hawaii. You're lying on the beach drinking my ties for a week straight. Absolute bliss. What happens when you get home? In contrast to the beach, your life feels like shit. You miss the ocean, you miss the sun, you miss the drinks, you miss the umbrellas. Too much pleasure has actually made you dissatisfied with everyday life. This is the pleasure paradox, the hedonism paradox in action. And the same thing applies to everyday pleasures. When we have too much of a good thing or too much entertainment, we get bored because the novelty wears off. This is why people that make a ton of money sometimes can be very depressed. So you have to understand, we also get let down when the reality doesn't meet our pleasure expectations. So if you plan to fun night out and it ended up being like meh, or you bought some fancy new toy and you stop caring about it after a week. Chasing pleasure too directly is an uphill battle. So the pleasure paradox, the hedonism paradox, it shows that we find happiness indirectly. Actually not through always chasing but through contrasts, surprises, and lower expectations. So more isn't always better. So the next time you're beating yourself up for not maximizing fun 24 7, remember that fun is only fun and subjective setting. Fun is only fun if you have something to compare it to. Moderation and modesty actually enable you to enjoy life to the fullest. And if you are constantly seeking pleasure, the bar will continuously get higher and higher and higher. And that's why some people really go off the deep end when all they seek is pure pleasure in life because there is no limit. And again, pleasure is subjective compared to your baseline. The next paradox, the tolerance paradox. We're actually seeing this live out right now in history. And tolerance sounds great in theory, right? Live and let live. We need to respect your beliefs. You respect mine. It's all good. This is the mind bending thing about tolerance that we have to be careful of. Absolute tolerance can actually destroy tolerance. Here's an example. Imagine a society where all beliefs and behaviors are tolerated no matter what. That means tolerant progressives have to tolerate the intolerant bigots. And then the bigots then start undermining diversity and human rights or undermining anything. And then nobody wants to stop them because they're saying we're tolerant. So soon, the bigots then outlaw tolerance completely. And this shows that unlimited tolerance is actually self-destructive. And this is a concept that the philosopher Carl Popper realized when he was fleeing the Nazis. So to have a truly tolerant society, we can't tolerate intolerance. And he explained it like this. In order to maintain a tolerant society, a society must be intolerant of intolerance. And it kind of makes your brain hurt, but it makes sense because we don't have to tolerate hate and we don't have to tolerate oppression. We can counter them with reason and free speech, but we should defend values like diversity and freedom against those who attack them because true tolerance requires moral boundaries. It's a paradox that to preserve open-mindedness, we have to push back against closed-mindedness. So the next time somebody demands that you tolerate injustice or that rather you tolerate injustice just because of tolerance, remember that healthy tolerance always needs limits. The next paradox is the growth paradox. This is something that we are seeing every single day in our lives as professionals because I bet you everybody who's watching this, they're putting in the work and in certain things in their life, they're not seeing results. It could be their relationship, it could be the gym, it could be their actual work, their business, their startup, their job. I've been there too because we all get obsessed with immediate gains, but real growth, it's always like putting in constant effort. It's like planting a seed and watching it grow over time versus instant gratification. Let me explain with an example. So Facebook, 2004, this is just a simple college network at first. After its first year, it had a million users, it sounds like a lot to us, but to be honest, in the grand scheme of software, a million is not that impressive, especially compared to where it is right now. So it wasn't exactly viral in its first year, but Facebook's founders were playing the long game. So they kept improving the product, they kept figuring out the business model, they kept building the team, they laid a solid foundation in the early years, and then exponential growth. There was this hockey stick like growth curve, and now Facebook has 2.9 billion monthly active users. So that's the power of exponential returns and to quote a great investor, Morgan Housel. Nothing happens for a long time, and then everything happens at once. See, the lulls and the plateaus, they're not failures. They're setting the stage for this future liftoff. And with personal growth, it is always about the long game, and not even personal growth, just growth in general. So you keep planting the seeds, keep watering the garden, you nurture your skills, you tend to the relationships, you do the work one day, those seeds blossom beyond your wildest dreams, and you never really know out of all the seeds you plant, which ones are going to take off, out of all the initiatives you take on. So you really have to resist the urge for instant results, and always, always, always commit to the process, not the outcome, because your time always will come at some point. And when it comes, it'll be worth all the effort. The next paradox is the failure paradox. So I think all of us here have avoided risk at some point because we've feared failure, and I've done this like many, many, many, many times, stepping outside your comfort zone can feel incredibly scary. But you know what? Failure is very much underrated. In fact, it can be our greatest asset and ally and teacher on the path to success. A good example, James Dyson, James Dyson, inventor of the Dyson bagless vacuum. Early in his career, Dyson created 5127 vacuum prototypes, and 5126 of them failed. But he saw each failure as an essential step. Every mistake gave him more data to improve the next prototype. And after thousands of tweaks and tests, Dyson finally nailed prototype number 5127. Now Dyson is a household name. James is a billionaire, and he's even spoken about this. He is quoted saying, I learned from each one of those 5126 failures. See, failure reveals our blind spots and flaws and it stretches our creativity. It builds resilience, it builds determination. Failure is the ultimate personal growth tool. So the next time you're afraid of failing, remember Dyson's 5,000 flops. View failure as helpful feedback to get better because the more you fail, the more you learn. The next paradox, the subjectivity paradox. Now this is a little bit of an interesting one. It's going to force you to really wrap your head around it. It's slightly complex, but stay with me. So the subjectivity paradox, it asks us what's going on in our mind right now. How does our mind make sense of the world? And the reason why this particular question stumps philosophers, well, it's because of this particular fact. See, in our head, we have two sides to our head, our mind, our thoughts. We have the subject and the object. The subject is our inner world, thoughts, feeling, the eye at the center of our lived experience. The object is our physical self that can be observed and measured scientifically. So are we subjects, objects, or both? And it is a mind-bender. See, on one hand, I feel like a free agent. I make my own choices. I take action, but science and the outside observer sees me as a bundle of chemicals shaped by biology and environment. So how do we reconcile those perspectives? Who's in charge? My inner subject or my outer object? And then this starts to bring in questions of free will and identity and morality. So see, the paradox applies to us, but it also applies to others because we are all subjects navigating our inner worlds, but to each other, we're objects, physical beings that we observe and evaluate. So what's the resolution? Well, maybe we need to embrace the contradiction, recognize that we are actually both subjects and objects inner and outer beings at the same time. This is where the paradox comes in. So as subjects, we create personal meanings, values in our self, and as objects, we can learn from data and experiences. And we can respect both facets in ourselves and others. So by transcending this paradox, we actually reach a higher level of consciousness. It is not either or, but both and and this somewhat solves the subjectivity paradox, a little bit of a mind game to play around with. The next paradox is the confirmation bias paradox. So the confirmation bias paradox is really focused on helping you understand how to figure out what is true in this world. And I don't know about you, but I always rely on my own opinions and my own beliefs. They shape how I see things. This is how most humans operate. But what if my beliefs are totally wrong? And this is a very scary thought. And this is bringing us to the confirmation bias paradox. So the confirmation, confirmation bias is when we seek out information that fits our existing beliefs and we ignore anything that contradicts our own belief. And this is how lots of people think. So it's scary, but when we're watching news channels that align with our politics, we're assuming that they're correct. Or what happens when we're avoiding people with different views? Well, it feels comfortable to have our own beliefs confirmed. But this paradoxically traps us in our own limited perspective. It's like this flywheel echo chamber. We stop questioning, we stop learning, we stop updating our views. This is not good for growth. And this happened a lot during COVID too. When we were only on social, confirming our own opinions of COVID, of politics, of everything in the world against people that also believe the same things as us. And this creates a lot of discord, a lot of separation in society. And our minds are actually playing into this because they cling to these familiar beliefs to avoid discomfort and feel rational. But this really comes out of cost because confirmation bias closes our minds. So how do we escape this paradox? Well, to actually escape this, we have to actively seek out opposing views that challenge our own. And it feels uncomfortable at first, but it forces us to rethink assumption. Another way is to expose ourselves to diverse people with different backgrounds, experiences. This expands our perspective. And by becoming aware of the confirmation bias paradox, we can catch ourselves seeking self-validating information. And we make an effort to disrupt that tendency. See, our beliefs don't have to stay stagnant. And there's a whole world of insights out there. So we have to keep an open mind. The next paradox is the flow paradox. So have you ever been it, you know, quote unquote, in the zone while doing something challenging? So it could be sports, music coding, you get so focused that everything else fades away. So the psychologist, Mihai Chicks and Mihai calls this mental state flow. And you probably experience it when your skills match the challenge. So not too hard, not too easy, just right. Because flow, you've probably heard of this before is good for creativity, productivity, well, being, who doesn't want more of that. But flow actually has a tricky paradox associated with it too. See, flow can both cause peak performance and be caused by it. It is a chicken and egg situation. See, on one hand, flow happens when you're so immersed in the challenge that this laser focus naturally improves performance. But on the other hand, when you're doing well, you can get into flow. So because you have good feedback and the results keep you engaged. So which comes first, flow or peak performance. And the answer is that it's a loop. See, flow enhances performance, which enhances flow, which enhances performance. They build on each other. So instead of resolving the paradox, we use it to our advantage. So we seek flow to perform better and we perform better to keep flow going. It's a virtuous cycle. We can ride this flow paradox way to take our skills to the next level. The next paradox is the perfection paradox. See, perfectionism sucks you in with the promise of greatness, but it often leaves you anxious, overwhelmed, and basically feeling like a failure. And this is very familiar for many of us because this is the perfection paradox in action. See, ironically, chasing perfection makes excellence impossible. Because where does this faulty mindset come from? Well, two key beliefs. So perfection is possible in the end goal, and then perfection is the only way to be successful and worthy. But these beliefs are actually very, very toxic. The toxic combo that creates this constant pressure, this fear of failure, this fear constant procrastination. It makes us lose perspective and joy. So how can we escape the perfection paradox? First, question those unhelpful perfectionist beliefs. So do we really need to be flawless to succeed or have self-worth? Is perfection even realistic for humans? Often no. Second, embrace imperfection. So progress requires mistakes and lessons. Let's celebrate growth rather than beating ourselves up over setbacks. We are perfectly as human beings imperfect. And third, strive for excellence over perfection. Excellence is improving through effort. It's enjoying the journey of growth. See, perfectionism chokes excellence. Bottom line, perfectionism limits potential and destroys happiness. Excellence unleashes potential and creates happiness. See, the choices are so we can break free from the paradox by always pursuing progress over perfection. The next paradox is the knowledge paradox. See, everybody is drowning in information these days. Social media, 24-7 news. The data is endless, but here's the paradox. The more info, we get. It doesn't actually equate into knowledge. Interesting, right? You think that with all this data, we'd understand the world better. But there's another philosopher, Michael Polani. He realized that there are limits to explicit learning. He showed that much of our knowledge is intuitive and unexplainable, like riding a bike. We can do it fine. Good luck explaining the physics of somebody. See, our tactic explicit knowledge exceeds what we can articulate. So while books and courses are useful, they only go so far. True mastery of anything requires personal experience. And as Polani said, we know more than we can tell. This means that we can't fully teach tactic explicit skills either. Imagine trying to teach somebody how to be empathetic or creative. You can guide them, but some skills have to be lived. So the paradox here is that the more we learn, the more we realize the depths of our ignorance and knowledge reveals its really its own boundary. So next time you feel overwhelmed by facts and figures, remember wisdom is more than information. You have to focus on unfolding and understanding your intuitive gifts, not just analyzing more data. So you got to say humble, you got to say curious. See, the knowledge paradox is our teacher here. Knowing more is not the same as understanding more. The next paradox is the choice paradox. So options, options, options, we are blessed with choices galore these days. If you need a new phone, there's 50 models to pick from. You can't decide on what's for dinner. There's hundreds of restaurants. More choices, you think. Sounds like a good thing, right? Well, chill, because we all know that too much choice can backfire and make us miserable. And you shouldn't be surprised. This is the choice paradox. Every decision requires trade-offs. We weigh pros and cons, compare features and dissipate regrets. This comparison shopping drains our mental bandwidth. We also expect more choices will make us happier, but too often we end up over analyzing. Second guessing ourselves, did I pick the perfect one? Should I go with something else? Without realizing it, extra options actually burden us. They lead us to this decision fatigue, this frustration, and this massive amount of dissatisfaction. So our minds can only handle so much complexity. So while some choices are good, too much choice becomes paralyzing. And what we think will make us happy actually could do the opposite. So the next time we're overwhelmed, deciding between two options, remember the choice paradox, consider limiting your choices to a few quality options. Your mind, your happiness, will thank you. Next up, the patience paradox. Now, in our fast paced world, patience seems old-fashioned. We want everything ASAP, success, results, goals, delay in our mind equals failure for some reason. But what if patience was a secret weapon, not a weakness? What if it could make you better and faster in the long run? See, patience means enduring struggles calmly and purposefully. It's staying focused despite setbacks or criticism. Patience is a choice, not passive waiting. It's seeing challenges as opportunities to improve. It's using feedback to get smarter. It's viewing failures as steps forward. With patience, we practice more effectively. We experiment more openly. We iterate more efficiently. See, patience unlocks growth. And I know it's easier said than done. But we all have access to patience within us. So the next time you're frustrated with, quote unquote, slow progress, remember the patience paradox, resist short-term thinking, reframe struggles as a path to eventual mastery, because patience taps into our deeper potential. Progress always takes time, effort, and purpose, but the patient path leads to the most rewarding destination. So take a breath, trust the process, embrace the journey. The next paradox is the individuality paradox. See, we love to celebrate bold individuals in society. The misfits, the creatives, the rule-breakers. Being true to yourself is very powerful, but here's a twist. Our individuality doesn't arise in isolation. It emerges through social interaction, obviously a very non-individualistic interaction. Think about it. How do we discover our unique talents and interests by trying new activities, by getting feedback from others? How do we develop our values and personality, by exposing ourselves to different cultures and perspectives? How do we find purpose and chase big dreams? Well, with support, resources, networks, all provided by society, even our sense of identity comes from comparing ourselves to others. So our differences literally make us who we are. While individuality seems cool, defiant, independent, it actually relies on social immersion. So we blossom through collaboration and never through seclusion. So the next time you're trying to break from the pack, maybe isolate yourself, whatever it is, remember, individuality cannot exist without society. And we flourish through both divergence and belonging. And the individuality paradox reveals a nuanced truth. Being self-defined requires interaction. So our passion, our purposes, are unlocked through community. And that's why you have to go out there, engage with the world, and that's where self-discovery begins. The next paradox is the planning paradox. See, planning seems so responsible, right? Making strategic goals, assigning tasks, anticipating challenges, sounds logical, sounds necessary. But what if planning could backfire and limit our potential? Here's how it happened. Planning assumes that we can predict the future. We think we know exactly what we want and how things are going to unfold, but the reality is actually very, very messy and uncertain. Our plans get derailed by obstacles we didn't foresee. New opportunities come up, we have to pivot, priority shift, assumptions, crumble, rigid planning creates blinders. We get attached to one approach and resist course correction. And then our adaptability suffers. So over planning can actually also make us procrastinate. All that upfront work becomes overwhelming and intimidating, analysis paralysis strikes. So planning has diminishing returns. It gives clarity, but can also create rigid tunnel vision if you're not careful. So the paradox is that plans are essential, but insufficient. So you lay the foundations through smart goal setting, project mapping, but leave room for surprises, for growth, and for reimagining. See, balance, structure, with flexibility. And plans always can guide, but they can never control. So when you embrace uncertainty, we unlock greater potential and opportunity. And lastly, one of my favorites, the acceptance paradox. See, accepting yourself and your circumstances sounds passive, right? You're just resigning yourself to the status quo, flaws, and all. But get this. Acceptance is actually the key to positive change. See, when we accept ourselves without judgment or shame, the strangest thing happens. We become more motivated to grow. How? Because acceptance, why it's the negative voices telling us I'm not good enough. It eases the stress distorting our thoughts. See, acceptance frees us from perfectionism. We can take risks, we can learn from failure, we can be curious. It is not passive resignation, but acknowledging reality so we can work with it. See, acceptance creates space for action. With acceptance, challenges become opportunities. Feedback becomes guidance. Setbacks become lessons. We get comfortable with being imperfect human works in progress. And that comfort propels us forward. So the next time you're tempted to criticize yourself, I'll actually take a second. Take a breath of self acceptance instead. It nurtures your personal growth in a really surprising way. See, acceptance never means giving up. It means embracing ourselves so we can become our best self. Anyways, that's enough paradoxes. That is enough to contrarian mental models for one day. I know this was a long one, but I really went down the rabbit hole this week and there are so many good ones to discuss. As you can see, this forces you to look at life differently. I love how paradoxes force us to do that cognitive work. And I could probably do another 50, but I'll save that for another week. If you enjoyed this video, if you enjoyed this podcast, I'd love to hear from you. Leave some comments below, smash that like button, subscribe, whatever you're going to do. Let me know what else you want on path. Let me know what other insights you want. I could probably do another 50, but I'll save that for another week.