I’m going to tell you about my worst professional failure (yes, there’s been more than one) and I’m not embarrassed to do so, but I also want to remind you about next month’s book club. We start next Tuesday.

Already know you’re in? Sign up here: www.maxdaniels.com/store/september-book-club. Copy-paste the link text if you have trouble.

More details below. Also below: Book Club Spark Notes, right up front. (You know, at the bottom.)

Here is the giant fail that I’m still atoning for:

When I started training as a life coach 15+ years ago, I was told firmly that I needed to “pick a niche” (even though I was a natural born generalist). Also, that niche needed to be a problem I was thoroughly familiar with and had fully solved.

I attempted to “execute on” this advice, as we used to say in the very corporate corner of tech I was trying to escape from¹ at that exact moment and I chose the problem I was the most familiar with, as it never left my mind, even when I was dreaming. That was we1ght loss and binge eating.

However, I had not managed the second requirement: problem fully solved.

Reader, it was NOT. Not fully.

My own problem was largely solved, but I had not written my book yet and hadn’t built out the process² the book gives you. Instead, I tried to use my teachers’ toolkits with my clients. Solutions that had never worked 100% for me.

I mean. We all kept trying! We all had some success!

Turns out, the problem was baked right into the solution. Which involved practices that lead straight to results that look like:

• snatching defeat from the jaws of victory

• inescapably trapped aka staying stuck for YEARS

• “self sabotage”

• one step forward, two steps back. Everyone sees.

I’ve detailed this whole mirthless merry-go-round in my book which not for nothing contains THE ACTUAL SOLUTION, may I recommend??, so we won’t get into it here.

But this is what Robert Fritz, in the book we will be reading, describes as structural conflict, and by definition that is conflict that is not resolvable from inside the structure that produces it.

Another way to put this is that psychological tools won’t get you there if the environment, the structure, is reality-tunneling you into the choice you don’t want to make but are not equipped to resist.

No one inside the structure can resist “the bad choice” forever. And that’s The Path of Least Resistance, as problem.

But you CAN create a new path, a new structure, positive friction and not just better outcomes but outcomes better than you’re even imagining right now.

I’ll give you the shortcut right now, in case I don’t see you in September’s Book Club. (Which I sincerely do hope you’ll join.)

Here is the secret: Put your attention on what you want to create. Put your effort there.

Create the structures that will help you create what you want. Then, CREATE WHAT YOU WANT.

If you know you want to join the book club:

Already in? Sign up here: www.maxdaniels.com/store/september-book-club.

If you’re thinking about joining the book club:

Well I hope you will! Here are some

Details.

If this sounds like something that might help you advance on the path, here are the details:

Meetings. We will meet three times in September (Tuesdays at 7pm Eastern on the 1st, 8th and 15th) over Zoom to investigate, discuss and most important implement Fritz’s thinking.

Recordings. Yes. Yours to keep.

Community. There is a Discord for Q&A, discussion and recordings.

Cost. $22 USD.

Link. www.maxdaniels.com/store/september-book-club

Questions? Just hit Reply. Hope to see you there!

RECOMMENDING.

reading.

The Ending Writes Itself: Ooooh, I did not like the beginning of this locked-room mystery. Full of cliche! Then a character I did like was introduced, then I began to see what the authors were doing and admire it.

By the end every character has gotten a just (mostly) and fitting arc, and although you may be able to predict much of what happens, I predict this will only add to your enjoyment.

watching.

Lucky is another story about justice, again with characters who have fitting arcs. One of its pleasing little gifts is observing all the dyads in play. Out of the whole cast of characters there is only one pair who can accurately be said to mutually love and care for each other, and it’s not the two you would pick out of a lineup at the beginning, that’s for sure.

writing.

Today is a good day to start (or start again). Over on MDK, we talk about taking stock of the year so far—and how we’ll approach the rest of it.