Steven Bartlett is an interesting young guy, He’s a self-made, multi-millionaire entrepreneur and host of a highly popular podcast called The Diary of a CEO. Recently, he released a book with the same title, subtitled The 33 Laws of Business and Life.
I just read Bartlett’s book, and I can say it’s no run-of-the-mill motivational, self-help spiel that promotes the law of attraction, manifestation, and unicorn-inflated fairy fluffs. This is an outlier look at what works and what doesn’t work. And there’s good stuff in here for writers.
Here’s the jacket copy:
Steven Bartlett has never been one to follow conventional rules. He’s achieved extraordinary success and emerged as one of the greatest marketing minds of our time by doing things differently. But there is a method to his maverick style.
Between founding and running a global digital marketing agency, investing in over forty companies, creating a hit podcast, and launching a venture fund for minority businesses, Bartlett has learned valuable lessons about success and failure, discovering a set of principles that he uses to guide him on his journey from strength to strength.
In The Diary of a CEO, he presents these thirty-three fundamental laws for the first time. Inspired by his own experience, rooted in psychology and behavioral science, and drawn from the conversations he’s had on his podcast with the world’s most successful entrepreneurs, entertainers, artists, writers, and athletes, these laws will ensure excellence and help you take real steps toward achieving your most daring goals.
From the power of ‘leaning into bizarre behavior’ to learning to ‘out-fail the competition’ to ‘never asking for consensus on creativity’ to ‘making pressure your privilege’ to understanding why ‘you must be an inconsistent leader,’ Bartlett provides counterintuitive and fresh insights to lead you on the path to success.
These laws will stand the test of time and will help anyone master their life and unleash their potential, no matter the field.
There’s a lot to digest in this work. A lot to ponder, and a lot to make you say, “That’s a different way to look at it.” But there’s one law (#27) that hit home for me as a writer.
It’s The Discipline Equation: Death, Time, and Discipline. This law teaches you how to be disciplined in anything you set your mind to through a simple “discipline equation”, and why discipline is the ultimate secret to being successful in any ambition we have. Like writing.
Discipline involves the strict allocation of time—the one resource we all have equally in a day, a month, a year. Bartlett uses an analogy called Time Betting where we’re issued poker chips of time blocks and can bet (gamble) upon the results of how we use them. He does this to make you realize how vitally important, precious, and valuable each chip—each minute and hour of your day—truly is.
Setting aside Bartlett’s figure that the average person spends 3.15 hours per day on their smartphone, he offers an intriguing formula for discipline:
Discipline = Value of Goal + Reward of Pursuit – Cost of Pursuit
Bartlett says that success is not complicated, it’s not magic, and it’s not mystery. Luck, chance, and fortune may give you a wonderful tailwind, but the rest will be a byproduct of how you choose to use your time. Most of it hinges on finding something that captivates us enough to persevere daily and use a goal that resonates profoundly enough to remain steadfast in our pursuit.
Success, especially writing success, is the embodiment of discipline—though it may not be easy, its core principles are beautifully simple.
Kill Zoners — Thoughts?
I recall an author talk, where he complained about how hard it was to write more than one book a year. His agent told him he was frittering his time away. The author started carrying notecards and whenever he had time–waiting for his food in a restaurant, in the doctor’s office, etc., he would write down scene ideas instead of playing Angry Birds or doomscrolling. It upped his productivity significantly.
I’ve read/heard author interviews where they talk of writing a book a year or three pages a day – something like that – and I wonder how they can make it. And doomscrolling… Enjoy your day, Terry!
Interesting, Garry. I totally agree with the importance of persistence and discipline. I’ve known many writers who were so talented they’d make you weep. But their work habits were hit and miss and they gave up too easily. If they’d stuck with writing, their books would have been hits.
Is writing glamorous? Nope. Is it rewarding? Yup!
Good morning, Debbie. I know you’d enjoy Diary of a CEO. It’s not by any means your typical self-help schtick. It’s actually quite brutal.
Short story about talent and motivation – a few years ago I began mentoring or helping a writer who I could see had great potential but after a month they dropped off. They never outright said it, but I could tell it was “just too hard”. It was quite disappointing to me to see that ability not unfold.
I absolutely agree. I’ve had many friends/acquaintances come and go in my writing circles who had at least a modicum of talent, but other priorities always took precedence–some for good reason, some not so much. Sometimes it makes me sad to think of the book a particularly good writer friend would’ve written, had she stuck it out. But I also believe whoever said “if you can do something else, do it” is right. Writing fiction as a vocation, career, “calling,” isn’t for the faint of heart. For the past nine years, it’s been my full-time job, self-employed, work from home, career. Which requires that discipline and persistence and “butt-in-chair.”
And I absolutely agree with you, Kelly. “But in chair. Fingers on keys” is the best writing advice there is. I have it written on the top of my blackboard. Yes, I have a blackboard and use white chalk. Call me old school 🙂
I know writers who like to “have written” . They like to talk about writing more than doing the actual discipline of sitting behind the computer putting words down.
Hi Patricia – I once wondered what the difference between the terms/titles of “author” and “writer” are. I now sorta think a writer is someone who currently writes or outputs words and an author is someone has written in the past. Anyway, I treat both as figures of speech 🙂
I was told a writer is one who writes, and an author is one who is published.
😀
That makes sense.
Another vote for discipline here. I read a statistic somewhere that only 3% of people who start out to write a book actually finish it. Only a small percentage of those get their book published. Persistence trumps talent.
I think you’re quite right on that stat, Kay. I smiled thinking of an encounter the other day with someone I casually know and they said, “Oh yeah, you wrote a book or something, didn’t you?” I just replied, “Uh-huh”, not mentioning that I’m nearly finished my twenty-second and still enjoying the process. And still learning how to do it properly 🙂
Twenty-two books! Garry, I’m in awe!
I have to say, even though I agree completely that discipline outweighs talent, I don’t understand Mr. Bartlett’s equation.
I guess I should have explained that formula. It clicks when you read the context of the entire chapter. What he’s saying is that to be motivated (disciplined) towards obtaining any goal, the return or reward has to outweigh the cost of obtaining it. As in finishing writing a book, the satisfaction of completion has to be worth even more than the effort.
I’ll never forget watching my first published book climb the sales charts and hit #5 in its category. That, alone, motivated me to write 21 more.
Persistence is key. I getting myself to the keyboard is both building a habit of regular writing, and a matter of honoring our calling sas a writers. Sometimes it’s a matter of pure discipline and stubborn will to write through whatever is going on, and continue to build that habit.
Deadlines small and big, timed writing, tracking words written etc can all be useful tools in helping us apply discipline to build that habit of persistence.
I have a quote from Steven Pressfield, Dale, that says discipline and persistence are always met with resistance and ultimately it’s about over coming the resistence to getting in front of the keyboard. I think that’s aptly put. Enjoy your day, my friend!
…because they have a story to tell.
That’s it for me, Garry. I do have one, and my brain is consumed with it right now. I have several small lined notebooks, they fit in my bag, and they go with me everywhere. (The pastor at church probably thinks I’m taking notes on his sermon, but . . . )
🙂
Every time I get that light bulb moment, it goes in the current notebook.
Thanks for sharing this. And have a great day…
Sounds like a good system, Deb. I have a notebook for time tracking and ideas but don’t carry it with me. Maybe I should start 🙂