Underachieving Never Felt So Good. Here’s Why…

“Good friends, good books, and a sleepy conscience: this is the ideal life.” 
~ Mark Twain

I’ve been somewhat of a self-improvement junkie for the last few years.

I’ve read dozens of books, meditated, journaled, and worked on my finances.

I’ve developed morning routines starting at 5 a.m. and sought to deepen my prayer life.

I’ve learned a lot about my strengths and weaknesses along the way and I’ve even been able to measurably improve my life in a number of areas.

But more recently, I’ve been working on self-acceptance and contentment. I’ve welcomed messages like “perfectly imperfect” and the exhortation to love myself, not despite my flaws, but with my flaws.

And I must admit, I’m torn between these two impulses—the impulse to improve vs the impulse to accept.

On the one hand though improving is good, when I’m in this mode, I feel like I’m running away from myself and toward a version of myself that is unattainable. The pursuit often feels never ending and exhausting.

On the other hand, acceptance and contentment feel like failure and mediocrity. Why should I be content with my life today when it could be so much better?

Be You, Only Better

There’s a book currently topping the charts on Amazon called Best Self: Be You, Only Better. It’s written by celebrity life coach Mike Bayer. I hadn’t heard of Coach Mike until I ran into this book on a recent trip to BJ’s.

The title immediately caught my attention, especially the subtitle.

Be You, Only Better.

This captures the central and compelling promise of the self-improvement movement. Every year we’re told that we can be even better than we were the year before.

In the past, I would pick up a book like this and quickly browse it to see whether it was worth downloading the audio version on my Audible account. Instead, I just looked at it and said to myself “Nah, I’m good.”

As I reflected on my reaction, I thought it was quite telling. Something had clearly shifted in me over time.

I have no idea what’s in the book. It might have some amazing insight I’ve never thought of or encountered before that might actually allow me to achieve my best self. It might express an old idea in a way that finally connects.

I’ve just grown so tired of chasing down magic bullets and pills that I just didn’t care. I was happy just to be myself, even if it wasn’t the best version.

The Underachiever’s Manifesto

At a recent visit to my therapist, another catchy title caught my eye: The Underachiever’s Manifesto: The Guide to Accomplishing Little and Feeling Great.

It’s a little book, only about 90 pages long that can be read in as little as 30 minutes. In the past, I would have avoided a book like this. But that day I was intrigued so I borrowed it.

Written by Ray Bennett, M.D., it’s meant for type A personalities who need to take a break from achieving and succeeding so they can regain their sanity—cause what good is success if you’re not sane enough to enjoy it?

In it, he lays out ten principles of underachievement. They are:

1. Life’s too short
2. Control is an illusion
3. Expectations lead to misery
4. Great expectations lead to great misery
5. Achievement creates expectations
6. The law of diminishing returns applies everywhere.
7. Perfect is the enemy of good.
8. The tallest blade of grass is the surest to be cut.
9. Accomplishment is in the eye of the beholder.
10. The 4 Percent Value-Added Principle

These principles are mostly self-explanatory. The last one pertains to the fact that the genetic similarity between humans and chimpanzees stands at 96%. Yet, we seem to work a lot harder to prove our worth. And since we are genetically similar to many other living things, not to mention each other—that stands at 99.9%—Bennett concludes that, “Being alive at all is by far your greatest achievement.”

Here’s what’s funny about that insight. We can’t even claim it as our greatest achievement because none of us brought ourselves into the world. Neither do we run the gazillion complex processes in our bodies that keep us alive (thank God).

Can’t get much more underachieving than that.

How many books have you read in the past year?

One of the things that personal achievement gurus use as a metric for personal achievement is this:

How many books you read.

Because somewhere along the way, someone discovered it as a common trait among the uber-successful. Bill Gates is reported to read about 50 books per year. Mere mortals read between 4 and 12 books a year.

I’ve always loved books and reading. I didn’t realize that I was underachieving even at this until I was exposed to the reading metrics of high-achievers.

So I resolved to read more books. Soon I was reading more than 12 books a year (nevermind that most of them were audiobooks). I was on my way to reading like a rockstar. I implicitly believed that the closer I could get to Bill Gates level reading, the more likely I was to achieve worldly success.

I’ve since relaxed on that ambition.

But then I noticed that my wife was ramping up her reading and doing awesome book reviews on her blog. I just happened to ask her in passing, “How many books did you read this year?” Her answer blew me away.

45.

Keep in mind, most of these were not audio books. She read them the old-fashioned way—eyeballs on paper.

That’s certainly approaching Bill Gates level reading. But factor in the idea that she’s a busy working mom with seven kids and all of a sudden, Bill’s 50 seem to pale in comparison with her 45.

If you check out what she’s read, you’ll see that it’s not all personal-development books. There are fiction books, marriage books, sex books, educational books, and children’s books too. Let’s just say that my reading list was narrower in scope.

The amazing thing about this is that she was not out there boasting about how many books she’s read. She just reads, writes about what she’s learned, and tries to put the principles she’s learned into practice.

I didn’t keep track of how many books I read in 2018 but I’m almost sure it was less than 12.

I felt like an underachiever.

And I was ok with that.

But looking back, I was ashamed of the fact that I increased the number of books I read a year so I could feel better about myself relative to others. It was important that I read more books than the average person so I wouldn’t be average myself.

How sad…

Be You, Not Better

The achievement impulse tugs at me from time to time.

But more and more I find myself saying, “Nah, I’m good.”

Get a PhD? Nah, I’m good.

Buy a fancy car? Nah, I’m good.

Have another kid? Nah, I’m good (note the seven kids reference above).

Maybe someday I’ll be more motivated to do these and much more. But today, I’m happy to just be me. Being me and not better never felt so good.