Fail Early, Fail Often - What Business Can Teach Us About Happiness

How many of us have wondered whether there is a "perfect" life out there for us?  We ask ourselves whether we are doing the job or dating the person we were "meant for."  We wonder if we have screwed up our lives, by choosing the wrong career, living in the wrong state, or dating the wrong person.   We sit and wait, for some clear and divine path to present itself and save us from the un-perfect life we have found ourselves in.  

Though we all do it, it is depressing to think there is one perfect path, a path that was meant for us, but we just haven't had the luck to find it yet.   This is dangerous and depressing because this type of thinking sets us up to feel like a victim of our circumstances, stuck without options, unlucky, and therefore jealous of those who we view as having "perfect lives."    Who wants to feel stuck, victimized, jealous, and unlucky?   This type of thinking also sets us up for a very specific type of dilemma where we feel we only have TWO options - either stay STUCK in the current situation, or take a HUGE risk to jump onto a completely different path.  How scary!  

Surprisingly, the best solution to this common problem seems to come to us from our fiends in the IT world.  Who knew that our tech savvy friends could have a better approach to helping us find happiness and life satisfaction?   This approach has a name, Design Thinking, and is a well known strategy in the business world.   Can Design Thinking help us design a better life for ourselves?   Absolutely, and here's how....

1.  Stop thinking there is a 1 perfect end result.  

Imagine that you're a tech developer and are trying to design the next big thing in the IT world (say a new cell phone or camera design).  Would it be a good approach to sit around and just think until you come up with the PERFECT design?   Um, no.   You would most likely just stay stuck in the thinking phase, since you would have no information on what works, what doesn't, or how certain designs go over with the public.    Instead, a good developer doesn't wait until they have thought of the perfect design - they just jump in and create something pretty basic, that they know will not be the end result but will help them on their way there.   If you took this approach to your life, you would not just sit around thinking and imagining a perfect end result, you would take a basic, small step forward, knowing it is a test of sorts to help you on your way to a good end result.    For example, think of a man who has told himself there is NO WAY he can be happy until he is happily married (married = perfect life).  This person stays in the "thinking" phase, refusing to go out with anyone he doesn't see as marriage material.   He feels no need to engage in activities for self-improvement or social benefit because he ultimately has decided that marriage is the "fix" for the things that he is not satisfied with in his life.  He ultimately misses all the great learning opportunities and relationship practice that would have come with casually dating, and he says "no" to an invitation to a friend's party where he would have met a very special someone.   Does this sound like the kind of person who will get married real soon? 

2.  Fail Early, Fail Often

So, how do you move from taking basic, simple steps to something that looks more like a satisfying end result?   Fail Early and Fail Often, is a mantra that has helped create many successful business and IT products.   The concept is this - the more feedback you can get in the early stages of creation, the better you can edit your product towards a more successful end result.  Knowledge is the most powerful tool.  Small failures, that happen early in the designing stage, are the BEST way to gain knowledge about what works, what you're capable of (or not), and what you like/dislike.   How does this look in life design?   Here is an example:

Jamie's "dream job" is working as a criminal psychologist, interviewing those charged with crimes to see whether they are competent to stand trial or legally sane at the time of the criminal act.  She has a degree in Marketing with a minor in Psychology and is really unhappy with her current job in the Marketing field.   In order to become a criminal psychologist, she would have to commit to approximately 100K in debt and 4-6 years of her life, a HUGE risk.  She feels she only has two options, stay unhappy in her current, well-paying job, OR take a huge risk to quit her job and jump into an expensive 4 year degree program.   What if she takes the Design Thinking approach?  Then, perhaps she thinks of some small, simple, less risky steps that will help her test out this new option, receive feedback (does she really like it, is it something she is good at, what does the job really entail, etc.) and make a more informed decision with increased confidence of the long term results.  So instead of feeling STUCK with only two options, Jamie stays with her Marketing job and makes a commitment to volunteer at the local detention center in her spare time for ~ 2 months.  As a volunteer Jamie is provided the opportunity to work directly with the population that she would be working with as a criminal psychologist.  Additionally, she is able to get to know both an actual criminal psychologist and the detention center's counseling team.  As she volunteers for 2 months, she realizes that she is more interested in what the counselors do than the criminal psychologist.  With full confidence, Jamie ends up applying for a 2 year MA program in Forensic Counseling (only  2yrs/40K compared to 4 yrs/100K), quitting her day job, and easily getting an internship at the detention center where she volunteered.  Winning! 

Design Thinking can help us build the life we want with more confidence by helping us get unstuck from the idea that there is ONE PERFECT LIFE, and get us moving in the right direction by testing out our options with less risk.  

Now, think of something you've always wanted to do or be that would entail risk.  Then, work your way backward from this perfect end result and figure out one basic, small step that will help you gather more information about what it is you want to do or be.   Yes, you may have to give up some of your free time, but it will be worth it when you realize you have more control over your life than you thought.