You live in the valley, not on top of the peak

2018-12-10 by Michaƫl Dupont

I recently wrote about the fact that we cannot sustain peak energy, the energy we have during those days where we are incredibly productive and everything seems easy. Then regression to the mean kicks in, and we have normal days where it is not so easy anymore.

Peak performance is a rat race for perfectionists. A perfectionist wants to stay up there, on top of the peak. An imperfectionist doesn't care so much about the peak, he's focusing on the valley.

"Peak" is a good word. You climb it for a while, then you descend it and go back where you live and spend most of your time: the valley. Peaks are not meant to be a place where you can live.

To use another analogy, unless you're Spiderman you cannot stick to your ceiling. So better focus on what you're standing upon: the floor.

Raising your ceiling is just raising something you rarely reach. Raising your floor means raising every step you take.

Unless you make something so easy or automatic that you will stick to it no matter what is your energy level on a given day, you're just trying to push the ceiling. So think about valley performance. What change can you make to become consistently better?