What are you optimizing for?

One evening, leading up to my first duathlon, I was making the final adjustments to the derailleurs on my bike. I was tinkered and tinkered, trying to get everything just right. I wanted to see the chain move smoothly between every gear. My tinkering wasn’t working. No matter what I did the chain still skipped gears, hesitated to drop, refused to move smoothly.

I was about to call it quits. I lamented the fact that I hadn’t gotten a professional bike mechanic to tune everything. But, I had no time for that now. My race was days away and our local bike mechanics don’t have a reputation for speed.

Frustrated I stepped back and thought “why am I doing this at all?” My race was short and the course was flat. I didn’t need to have my bike shift smoothly between every gear. I needed it to be able to move between the few high gears I would actually use in the race. I was optimizing for the wrong things. 

Once I stopped obsessing over doing the best bike tuneup of my life, I got back to work. This was easier, something I was able to do on my own. Crisis averted.

This was a small issue but it’s an example of how things tend to go in life. We can get bogged down with doing things just right and forget why we are doing what we are doing in the first place. What is essential to the task at hand? What am I optimizing for?

With your health: are you optimizing for longevity? Being healthy and able-bodied in your old age? Are you optimizing for race results or aesthetics? Are you seeking short term pleasure and comfort without a thought for tomorrow?

With family: are you making the most of the time you have together? Raising children into self sufficient adults? Or are you trying to get from one activity to the other with as little headache as possible?

At work: are you building your team’s capacity or making sure everything gets done as quickly as possible. Do you give them autonomy or stay in control of every decisions? Do you share your knowledge or maintain some “job security”.

In every area of life there are many different things we can optimizing for at any given time. What that means will depend on our goals at the time. Often, it’s a tradeoff between long term and short term success. Most often it’s most wise to focus on the long term. But sometimes we are so concerned with perfection, we lose sight of our short term goals. It’s OK to optimize for the short term if it doesn’t harm our long term goals. That’s what I was reminded of working on those pesky derailleurs.

The key is to have our goals in the forefront of our mind and understand the tradeoffs of our decisions.

Something Worth Sharing.

If you haven’t heard Gordo Byrn’s story, it’s worth your time to do so. Gordo may embody what it means to optimize for the right things at the right time. This interview with Justin Keller focuses on Gordo giving up elite sports to prioritize family, navigating those difficult years with several young children.

I first heard bout Gordo from his interview with Rich Roll last year. I can say with confidence I wouldn’t be writing this today without hearing that podcast. Pursuing growth through endurance sports is more meaningful when you are sharing your story with others.