Chapter Content
## Chapter 12: The Alchemy of Experimentation: Turning "What If?" Into "Let's See."
Viktor Orlov, a young man born and raised in the heart of Russia, had always felt a stirring for something beyond the familiar snow-dusted landscapes of his childhood. The world pulsed with untold stories, alien customs, and the beckoning call of the unknown. What secrets lay hidden within different cultures? What untapped potential could be unlocked by absorbing perspectives from across the globe?
Driven by this hunger, Viktor navigated the complex process of international student visas and found himself enrolled in a Tokyo university. Post-graduation, he sought further education in Canada, eventually landing a role in the dynamic world of digital marketing. His career trajectory was promising, but a nagging realization began to take root. To truly thrive in this digital landscape, especially when collaborating with developers, he needed to speak their language – code. With pre-existing student loans already weighing him down, the prospect of returning to university for a formal computer science degree was simply not viable. Instead, Viktor resolved to embark on a journey of self-teaching, dedicating his free time after work to mastering the art of programming through freely available online resources.
However, the path of the autodidact is often fraught with challenges. The glittering allure of Toronto, a city brimming with life and endless possibilities, frequently threatened to pull him away from his keyboard. The siren song of a cozy night in front of the television was equally tempting. To combat these distractions, Viktor conceived a clever strategy – he formed a mutual support group. His initial commitment was simple: to consistently show up and host study sessions at local cafes. But the group's popularity soon exploded, quickly outgrowing the confines of the local coffee shops and necessitating a move to a shared workspace. This small study circle blossomed into one of the most vibrant and extensive developer communities in all of Canada. This achievement alone was a testament to Viktor's dedication, but his commitment paid off in even greater dividends when he received his very first offer to work as a developer.
Many would have rested on their laurels at this point, content with a fulfilling job, a comfortable income, and a network of stimulating individuals. But Viktor perceived a subtle stagnation creeping into his progress. He pondered the possibilities, and a bold idea struck him: what if he publicly vowed to dedicate at least one hour each day to coding for the next three months – or better yet, for a full hundred days?
This public vow became his touchstone: a deliberate undertaking to consistently engage in a specific activity for a pre-defined period. He dubbed it the "#100DaysOfCode" challenge, envisioning it as a commitment mechanism that would compel him to code daily, even when the siren call of the television was at its loudest. Beyond simply acquiring new coding skills, he hoped to unearth deeper self-knowledge and forge meaningful connections with others who shared his passion.
When the hundred days drew to a close, Viktor had not only significantly enhanced his coding abilities but had also ignited a spark in countless others to embark on their own personal challenges. He now stands at the heart of a global community of developers, all united by their shared pursuit of growth and knowledge.
Like Viktor, how can you transform your life into an expansive laboratory – a dynamic playground where doubts transform into the genesis for exploration and experimentation?
**Sculpting a Miniature Experiment**
Having peeled back the layers of habitual thinking, diligently gathered data from the tapestry of your life, and brainstormed potential hypotheses worthy of investigation, you've reawakened your understanding of the possibilities that surround you. With your field notes in hand, you're primed to devise an experiment that transcends the limitations of linear thought. The final, crucial, ingredient is to solidify your hypothesis into a pact – a tangible commitment you'll honor for a set timeframe.
A pact acts as a simple, iterative action that propels you inexorably toward the realization of your deepest ambitions, independent of the immediate outcome of each individual trial. It follows a straightforward structure:
* I will [action] for [duration].
The pact is the fundamental unit of personal experimentation, a self-initiated invitation to venture into the unknown and glean wisdom from the experience. It's a rallying cry against inertia, a call to embrace forward momentum. What makes the pact so potent is its emphasis on your *outputs* (for example, "publish 25 blog posts over the next 25 weeks") instead of your *outcomes* (for example, "attract 5,000 blog subscribers in 25 weeks"). It emboldens you to take that initial step, removing the fear of failure, as there is no "wrong" decision. The only requirement is your consistent presence. A pact is:
* **Meaningful:** While freeing you from an obsession with the endpoint, the pact should ignite your enthusiasm and imbue the learning process with purpose. When each experiment carries inherent meaning, the weight of finding a singular, grand purpose in life lightens.
* **Executable:** An effective experiment is anchored in actions you can realistically perform. The pact should be achievable with your existing resources, empowering you to take action today instead of over-planning for an uncertain tomorrow.
* **Consistent:** For reliable data gathering, the actions that define your pact need to be simple and repeatable. For example, your pact could involve something you undertake daily, every weekend, or each week.
* **Observable:** Notice that "measurable" is not used here. Performance metrics often steer you to fixate on the outcome. Instead, you should track your pact through a binary lens: Did you fulfill the action, or did you not? A simple "yes" or "no" makes monitoring progress straightforward.
In contrast to linear goal-setting, a pact cultivates an experimental mindset—an openness to discovery, a willingness to learn with receptivity, and the absence of pre-conceived notions. When we approach challenges playfully, they morph into sandboxes for experimentation, empowering us to release our grip on the final result, just like a scientist who maintains a neutral gaze while observing the experiment and taking detailed notes to refine future iterations.
Any area of uncertainty or blossoming curiosity can be transformed into a pact, from probing a new passion project to refining a particular skill, evaluating a potential career path, or experimenting with an alternative daily routine. A pact can be as straightforward as dedicating two weeks to daily stretching, or it can reach towards something more ambitious, such as designing a unique digital illustration each week for the next three months. It can facilitate the testing of assumptions related to work (such as setting aside two hours on Mondays for focused reading and creative thought for a month), your well-being (such as aiming for the same bedtime every day for a week), or your interpersonal relationships (such as having a date night with your partner every other Saturday for six months).
Our control over our emotions is limited, which is why attempts to conjure motivation often fall short. A pact sidesteps this difficulty by prioritizing *doing* over *planning*. As the esteemed psychologist and philosopher William James astutely observed: "Action seems to follow feeling, but really action and feeling go together; and by regulating the action, which is under the more direct control of the will, we can indirectly regulate the feeling, which is not.”
Like the precise protocol of a scientific experiment, a pact is structured around instructions that are crystal clear and well-defined. This is why "I will learn how to code" is a weak pact, whereas "I will code every day for a hundred days" resonates more strongly. Similarly, rather than "I will write a book," try "I will write every weekday for the next six months." Substitute "I will run a marathon" with "I will run every Sunday for six weeks." The pact format provides a straightforward mechanism for committing to action, leveraging momentum as a replacement for sheer willpower. All it takes is the first step, trusting that confidence will naturally blossom through repetition.
**The Intrinsic Power of Repeated Trials**
Elara Vance spent fifteen years toiling away in the financial industry, convinced that she was living out childhood fantasies: a lavish salary, enviable social status, a luxurious apartment in the city center. Yet, deep within, she experienced a profound sense of emptiness and lived in the fear that she would spend the rest of her life as a passenger, not a driver. She eventually made the decision to leave and start a blog. "As I delved into writing and embraced the life of an internet content creator," she shared, "I committed to trying out small-scale, one-month experiments. I would try TikTok for a month and track what happened, or I'd dedicate myself to a podcast for fifty-two weeks."
Note the specified number of repetitions. Committing in advance to a defined timeframe for your experiment brings a clear advantage: it obliges you to postpone judgment until you've completed a pre-agreed number of iterations. This significantly reduces the odds of prematurely abandoning your pact after a particularly arduous week. You can maintain confidence even as you navigate unexpected detours along the road.
Confidence is not an innate trait nor a magical occurrence; it's a skill built through action. To nurture confidence, the only route is to get started. Every action is a wager on yourself, accumulating evidence that validates your ability to achieve what you set out to do.
Repeated trials represent a cornerstone of effective experimentation. To generate reliable insights, you need enough data. Imagine you and a friend are engaged in a friendly game of darts, seeking to determine who is the better marksman. You couldn't crown the champion based on a single throw. Instead, you need to throw the dart repeatedly to see if one of you consistently hits the bullseye, or if it was simply a fluke. Similarly, you can't assess whether you would enjoy living in a particular city after spending one afternoon there, and you can't gauge your audience's appreciation of your writing by publishing a single essay. A meaningful experiment requires multiple repetitions to confirm that the results are not simply attributable to chance.
The repeated trials of your pact equip you with more trustworthy data to make informed decisions. Moreover, each iteration is likely to surpass the previous one, fostering organic growth independent of whether you decide to extend your pact beyond its initial duration.
This inclination for subsequent responses to a creative problem to outperform earlier ones is known as the serial-order effect, which has been recognized as "one of the most enduring and reliable findings in modern creativity research." Simply put, iteration pays.
While the serial-order effect is most apparent in short-term exercises, creative growth can be fostered over a lifetime. The mythology of startup success often glorifies youth. But the likelihood of a founder in their fifties achieving a successful exit is nearly double that of a founder in their thirties. Similar patterns hold true for scientific breakthroughs. A scientist's peak productivity typically clusters around the age of forty.
Naturally, early success captivates because of its rarity, but the most sustainable path to achievement lies in trying, failing, learning, and trying again. This explains why so many successful startups and groundbreaking inventions are born from individuals in their forties and beyond: they've accumulated more repetitions – they've weathered more trials and learned from each stumble.
How many repetitions are needed to tap into the benefits of the serial-order effect? Mastery can demand decades of dedicated practice. The longer the pact, the more likely you are to succumb to the urge to quit before reaching the finish line. Fortunately, the goal here isn't achieving long-term mastery, but cultivating immediate confidence in the next steps.
Generally, more repetitions translate to more data. Life-altering revelations are unlikely to emerge in a couple of days. In the words of John Maxwell: "The more you do, the more you fail. The more you fail, the more you learn. The more you learn, the better you get." But this formula only works when each loop is completed, so it’s crucial to maintain realistic commitments. Committing to a three-month plan holds no value if you give up after a few days.
Shorter timeframes are frequently more effective. For something entirely new, a ten-day pact serves as an excellent launching point. This provides enough time to identify emerging patterns without feeling overwhelming. If you have previously experimented with the idea, a one-month pact allows you to build on that existing base. Finally, for activities that are already woven into the fabric of your life but you desire to engage in more consistently, a three-month pact reinforces those patterns and amplifies them, enabling the collection of high-quality data to steer your journey. Coincidentally, three months roughly mirrors the duration of the #100DaysofCode challenge and my own undertaking to write 100 articles in 100 workdays at Ness Labs.
These suggestions shouldn't deter you from contemplating a longer-term pact. Anya Sharma, a former colleague of mine, dedicated twelve months to exploring whether coaching could fulfill her as a career path. "I hypothesized that as a coach, I could pursue what I loved, in my own way, and earn enough to meet our financial needs," she said. "So, I allocated a year to experimenting with this hypothesis." After ten months, she had a definitive answer: this was the correct path for her at that moment.
Your timeframe can even function as a preliminary barometer of your enthusiasm for an experiment. Are you willing to commit for this duration to investigate this avenue? If the very thought of it induces exhaustion, it’s better to construct a more attainable pact. The true worth of a pact isn’t its length but rather the insights and development it fosters.
**What a Pact Isn't**
Because of the focus on repeated action, a pact can be easily confused with other tools that focus on behavior change and goal-setting. Below are a few key differences to provide clarity:
* **A pact is not a habit.** A habit has an indefinite timeline (for example, exercising every day) fueled by the desire to attain a specific outcome (for example, improved health). Failure may be demotivating, but we try to regain the track. On the other hand, a pact has a set number of iterations (for example, writing 100 articles) driven by curiosity (for example, testing out a writing career). Failure is a precious source of information to guide us in fine-tuning our path or even abandon the pact entirely if it is not suitable. A pact can prove useful before settling on a new habit. We are more prone to stick with habits that bring reward. But how do we know what feels right without trialing varying methods of implementing the habit? Through rounds of experimentation, a pact can become a habit when you sense that it has integrated into your daily life in a way that surpasses the initial commitment. As an example, I initiated journaling as part of a two-week pact to explore mindfulness practices. The experimentation helped me discover the ideal method and time of day, and I have now been journaling daily for more than three years.
* **A pact is not a New Year's resolution.** If you have struggled with maintaining New Year's resolutions, you are not alone. There is considerable evidence that New Year's resolutions don't often work. A survey of over 31 million activities conducted by the Strava team indicated that the bulk of New Year's resolutions are abandoned by January 12, which they dubbed Quitter's Day. New Year's resolutions fail because people over-commit to a series of lofty aspirations. The human mind has a complex relationship with effort. We are drawn to the idea of it yet would rather avoid the actual exertion. This concept is referred to as the effort paradox. Because we mistakenly believe that we would be happier by conquering a more significant challenge, we tend to opt for difficult paths precisely because they demand more effort– even if it means that we are more likely to fail! In contrast, a pact contains one basic action that is repeated over a predetermined timeframe. Internet challenges such as the #100DayProject or #100DaysofCode typically last less than a third of a year—a more reasonable commitment when compared to most New Year's resolutions.
* **A pact is not a performance metric.** During my time at Google, we utilized OKRs which means Objectives and Key Results. KPIs, or Key Performance Indicators, are utilized by other companies. These are all designed for specific target achievement. Rather than the outcome, a pact is focused on the output. Achievement is showing up, irrespective of the final result. As Benjamin Hayes, who studied medicine at Cambridge University for six years prior to becoming a full-time entrepreneur online, described, "I try my best to not focus on the numbers. Any time that I think about the numbers, I experience burnout. It feels like it's no longer fun. However, when I reinforce the notion that my sole role is showing up, that is what keeps me going." Instead of stressing about how he would thrive outside the well-defined medical career, he trusted that he would find a way. His YouTube channel has millions of subscribers. Transforming his association with performance was crucial to accomplishing enduring success: "People state that SMART goals must be set," he explained. "But I avoid setting goals outside of my control. I just have to publish one or two videos each week."
* **A pact is not a resource-intensive project.** As we will discuss later, there are resources for managing your experiments, but these do not include time and money. Experiments can be brief—for example, just ten minutes each day for ten days. Though specific experiments may require some level of financial freedom, many are conducted for free. Consider experimenting with meditation, running, writing, capturing photos, presenting at work, learning to code, or playing games with your kids. It's even possible to experiment with doing nothing for a few minutes each day.
Essentially, a pact is a protocol for a personal experiment. It directs what must be done and the frequency for the test. It provides a method of re-igniting curiosity and an assurance of discovery and growth.
**Choosing Your Pact**
Be careful of the maximalist mindset when you choose your pact. Beyond the effort paradox, there are a few biases that cause us to gravitate towards more ambitious projects. Overconfidence, combined with planning fallacy, could lead us to believe we are more than capable of completing a task when we are not. As a result, we bite off more than we can chew.
What is the smallest scale you can achieve? It is easy to maintain pacts on the best days, but think instead of your worst ones. Author and performer, Isabella Martel, first committed to posting 250 words of scriptwriting each day. Once she'd gained confidence in the process, she expanded her pact to videos of reading the scripts.
It is also tempting to follow a few pacts all at once, especially if you have never ran such personal experiments. Once you approach life with experimentation, there will be infinite opportunities to explore new and interesting paths.
When Leo Maxwell's scented candles business didn't succeed, he learned that he didn't enjoy numbers. Throughout this venture, many people had praised his ability to think creatively. Leo decided to explore his artistic capabilities by making twenty paintings without trying to create a masterpiece. Although the first paintings weren't perfect, he remained committed to his daily practice, using online tutorials. He was just looking to improve himself.
Within a month, he hosted an event where he sold five paintings. Today, his gallery in Venice is a prosperous business, with art aficionados visiting from around the world. Leo also still paints in public at events.
You also don't need to quit your job to conduct experiments. Theodore Morrison conducted most of his research while working as an engineer. Haruki Murakami wrote his first two books as he worked for a jazz club.
Creative producer, Leo Velez, also kept his job as he explored other things. Food was a big part of his family, and he always enjoyed cooking. Although he wanted to invest in his cooking skills, he didn't want to give up his personal life.
He signed up for an online course and decided to spend 3-5 hours cooking each weekend in Paris. He focused on improving himself a bit each time. And in the evening, he'd invite his friends to try his recipes.
After almost two years, he successfully passed his exam. He doesn't have specific plans for his certificate, but he is prepared for different possibilities.
Eventually, choose your pact on your curiosity. What excites you? What do you want to learn? You pact needs to align with existing interests, and it needs to drive you to new ones.
Outside of a pact that is based on your curiosity, you shouldn't have anything else figured out.
Now, take a couple of minutes to note your pact:
* I will [action] for [duration].
You've committed to action instead of stagnation. You've built creative engine with your first step for improvement.
By building your first pact, you've moved forward into transitioning and experimentation.
| | Linear Mindset | Experimental Mindset |
| :---------------------- | :--------------------------------------------- | :----------------------------------------- |
| Response to Uncertainty | Fight or flight, triggering anxiety. | Engaging, triggering curiosity. |
| Mental Model of Growth | Ladders with predictable outcomes. | Experiments with unpredictable outcomes. |
| Definition of Success | Predefined success focused on fixed goal. | Emergent success focused on deliberation. |
| Goal-Setting Framework | SMART: Specific, measurable, assignable, etc. | PACT: Purposeful, actionable, continuous, etc. |
No more SMART goal setting; no more five-year plans; no more life road maps. Success is guaranteed even without knowing what the outcome is.
New possibilities will come when you focus on showing up instead of perfecting everything. You have experiments rooted in curiosity like many examples.