How to increase your agency: a flowchart

Agency: accepting the world, noticing paths to your goals, noticing what your goals are

• You have a problem: are you working on it?

• No: Are you in a victim mindset?

• Yes: Can you answer these questions?

• What if it were possible?
• What’s the stupidest, easiest thing you could do to make even a little bit of progress?
• Why are you so sure you won’t succeed?

• No: Can you answer these questions?

• (now) What are you doing right now?
• (goal) 

• What is a detailed description of the world after you’ve succeeded?
• What does success look like?
• What are you actually trying to do?
• In 12 months, what would you like to be celebrating with a friend?

• (why) Why do you want to do that?
• (problem) 

• What is the roadblock?
• What is the problem in detail?
• What might make you procrastinate?

• (solutions) What are some ideas that could possibly work?
• (plan) Given the best, easiest, or most liked idea, what’s your rough draft of a plan?
• (next step) What’s the immediate next step?
• (help) Who or what could help fill in the gaps?
• (environment) How could you set up your social context and environment to

• bolster your motivation, and
• avoid frustrations and temptations?

• Yes: Can you answer these questions?

• What is a detailed description of the world after you’ve succeeded?
• What’s the connection between what you’re doing now, your plan, and the goal?

Remember, people tend to

• underestimate the likelihood of success for “bad” plans that could work
• overestimate the likelihood of success for sure-thing plans (day-to-day is usually more chaotic than we expect)

Free yourself from the requirement that your ideas must be good. All that matters is that they’re possible. It could work.