Welcome to reThinkable - my weekly newsletter where I share actionable insights to build a wealthier and healthier life.

Fun fact about me: I’m not the biggest fan of vegetables. I’ll cook and eat them but I won’t do it with a smile on my face.

But I recently discovered a life hack - I can make vegetable smoothies! I’ll blend spinach, frozen broccoli, carrots, and frozen fruit then BAM! I’m drinking my vegetables AND it’s absolutely delicious.

Here’s what we’re covering today:

1. ❔ Ask this question before starting anything

2. 🔭 What’s the point?

3. 🛠️ How to do it effectively

Estimated read time: 3 minutes and 22 seconds

❔ Ask this question before starting anything

There’s one question I will always ask myself before I start a new project. It’s something I learned after trying and failing countless times.

It’s a simple question that’ll help you avoid most problems that you might otherwise encounter. The great thing is, you can apply this to nearly anything: work projects, school projects, entrepreneurship etc.

The question goes like this:

“If you started the project today and in 6 months it failed and it was your fault, what happened?”

🔭  What’s the point?

This question forces you to implement The Premortem Technique, an approach that makes you imagine all the ways your project could fail. Then, it makes you work backward to find ways to avoid those problems before they occur. 

Here are 3 reasons this is helpful:

1. Back to reality

When starting something new, we tend to be susceptible to optimism bias where we overestimate our chances of success. The problem is, we become blindsided and have trouble anticipating even the most obvious potential challenges.

2. Avoid unnecessary failure and pain

The worst part of failing at something is seeing all your time and effort go down the drain. By anticipating core issues, it could help you prevent avoidable problems, and prepare you for inevitable ones.

3. Are you actually ready?

Most people fail because they don’t have the necessary skills to succeed - even when they think they do. The problem is, most people fall for the Dunning-Kruger effect, a psychological bias that claims, “people who are actually the least skilled at  something are most likely to overestimate their competence at it.”

🛠️ How to do it effectively

But answering the question, “If you started the project today and in 6 months it failed and it was your fault, what happened?” requires a lot of thinking and can be challenging if you’ve never done it before.

Knowing the answer is just half the battle, you also have to create an action plan to avoid or solve said problems.

Here’s a 5-step process that can help:

Step 1: Imagine that the project has failed

To be clear, you haven’t actually started the project so it hasn’t actually failed. But you want to make this scenario as real as possible. Jot down potential failures, from least to most significant. 

For example:

Let’s say I want to start a YouTube channel, I could say something along the lines of:

“I’ve failed with my YouTube channel. I’m tired of making videos and I’ve stopped uploading them altogether.”

Step 2: Brainstorm reasons for the failure

Next to each failure, write down any reason that comes to mind.  If this is your first time starting a project like this, it’ll be helpful to do some research. To get some ideas, you can Google  “I failed [insert type of project here].” Here are some ideas: 

• I failed starting a YouTube channel

• I failed running a cost benefit analysis at work

• I failed my science fair project

Read about people who failed in similar projects and write down what happened.

For example:

• I got burnt out

  (you will burn out from time to time)

• I have no time

• My video editing sucks

• I don’t understand how YouTube works

PS: You have to give as many reasons as possible. This example is just to help you understand what it looks like in practice

Step 3: Prioritize and organize the reasons 

Some of your reasons will have little to no impact on the outcome. Some, the cost of avoiding them may outweigh the benefits. You want to remove these from the list.

For the remaining reasons, organize them into 2 separate lists:

1. Avoidable List - these are the problems you can prevent

2. Inevitable List - these are the problems that will almost certainly show up

For example:

Step 4: Create an action plan to avoid the avoidable problems

Depending on the problem, your action plan could be one sentence or a step-by-step solution. Do which one you think is better for your situation. 

For example: 

Reason: My video editing sucks

Solution: Buy a video editing course to learn how to make better videos or hire a good video editor

Step 5: Write down what you will do to overcome the inevitable problems

Unexpectedness and uncertainty impact our ability to think rationally.

To avoid this, prepare for problems you know are inevitable. Do this by creating an action plan for how you will solve them when they arise.

For example:

Reason: I got burnt out

Solution: When I burn out, I will take a break for a week to recover

PS: You should only ask yourself this question for projects where the cost of failure is high. For projects where failure has little to no impact on your well-being, doing this analysis can just be procrastination disguised as productivity.

A better way to invest

Many of you ask what I use to invest in stocks since everything is on sale now. I’ve tried plenty of investing platforms but my top pick is still moomoo. It’s easy and quick to use and the free stock analytics helps a ton.

Moomoo is offering reThinkable subscribers a limited-time exclusive deal: get up to 15 free stocks valued up to $2,000 each if you open and deposit $1,000. Take advantage of it!

PS: Despite the funny name, moomoo is a registered broker dealer with the SEC and is a member of SIPC meaning you’re insured up to $500,000.

🔎 Think More

• 🤑 A Canadian study gave homeless people $7,500. Here’s how they spent it.

• 🤔 Living in poverty makes you behave very differently

• 👴🏽How much do you need to save to retire a millionaire if you make $65,000 a year?

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