Desirable Difficulties
I write down a lot of quotes and thoughts on notecards. Things I want to remind myself of or stumble upon again. Periodically, I’ll comb through them and it’s always surprising how differently they hit depending on what’s going on in my life. Here’s one I read the other day, this is a quote from Anthony Bourdain:
"There's a guy in my head, and all he wants to do is lay in bed all day long, smoke pot, and watch old movies and cartoons. My life is a series of stratagems, to avoid, and outwit that guy."
You read that and immediately know what he means.
We all stare down the easy path, the autopilot route everyday. And most days we have to consciously choose something else.
But lately I’ve been wondering: is choosing the “hard” path always the right move? Or is that just ego in disguise?
It’s especially tricky in business when we’re being sold the hard path in the form of discipline, leadership, grit, and delayed gratification. And the easy path in terms of silver bullets, one-stop shops, and the smart move. But sometimes the hard thing is just…hard. And other times the easy thing is easy because it doesn’t get you what you want.
For agency leaders, these choices show up constantly:
Giving honest feedback vs. polite avoidance
Taking or leaving money from a misaligned client
Using AI tools vs. doing it manually
Reusing a proven framework vs. reinventing the wheel
Choosing the off-the-shelf solution vs. building your own
It seems there’s always an easy option and hard option but choosing between the two isn’t so simple.
There’s a psychological concept that’s been helpful for me here - desirable difficulties.
The term comes from learning science and refers to experiences that are harder in the moment but lead to better outcomes long-term. It’s the mental equivalent of lifting heavy things at the gym.
It’s a helpful way to evaluate hard choices in your work and life. Not, is this hard? But is this the right kind of hard?
Two Personal Examples
Publishing written content is core to my growth process. I use AI to help research and refine my writing, but the ideas and first draft always come from me - as does the final edit. Using AI as a full content generation tool would be easier and the output might be just as good, but I don’t get better along the way. I consider content creation, writing in my case, a desirable difficulty. It takes immense time and effort but isn’t that kind of the point? Even if nobody reads this, I’ve developed a depth of thinking that I can bring to the actual work I do with my clients. Research has shown the impact of AI-centric content generation on learning and the results aren’t good. My thinking and perspective is too precious to outsource (and I think yours is too).
Another area I’ve spent considerable time on is growth frameworks. During my first year in business I spent time each week trying to understand new frameworks so I could have the perfect fit for each new client. But that just made me slightly knowledgeable about a lot of different ways to do things - and it was really hard. I was confusing variety with value. Instead, I’ve focused on a few key framework areas and developed deeper expertise about how to apply them across different clients. Easier? Yes. Better. Also yes.
You’re not going to get better by choosing the hard thing. You get better by choosing the right hard thing.
There’s still a guy in my head who wants to lay in bed all day and watch cartoons. But there’s also a guy in my head who wants to overcomplicate everything and turn every task into a test of character. Both need outwitting.
