The benefits of expecting adversity

Debunking the “life is an escalator” myth

One of the many hard lessons I’ve learned from starting a new business is that progress is rarely an unbroken upward trajectory. Every so often, I’ll be humming along, assuming things are OK, and then I’ll get an email or a call with a nasty surprise—often one that negatively impacts my company’s balance sheet.

For a while, these surprises would derail me. But now, I’ve come to expect them. It’s not that I like them, but I understand that the pain is not a result of the events themselves, but of my subconscious expectation that setbacks shouldn’t happen.

There’s a name for this: the “life is an escalator” myth. The belief that life will always be a smooth ride towards better and better outcomes—that we can somehow control the universe.

One way to counteract this pervasive and pernicious myth is to learn to expect adversity. Bake it into your forecasts—for your business and your personal life. The ace C.O.O. of my company, Toni Magyar, calls it “responsible pessimism.”

Another strategy comes from Dr. Rangan Chatterjee, a popular physician/podcaster, who says one way to measure how much you’ve bought into this myth is by monitoring how often you complain. (If you want an accurate measure, he suggests asking people close to you.) His suggestion: every time you complain, insert a moment of gratitude.

Click to hear or watch Dr. Chatterjee on my pod.

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Episode cheatsheet

The big takeaway

Dr. Rangan Chatterjee identifies nine areas of over-reliance that he says hold us back from making lasting changes in our lives.