#287: There is always a "time lag" between effort and results. -- Why do we feel that our efforts are a "waste"?

Hello, I'm nobu. While running a gas station in Toyama Prefecture, I also manage a regional revitalization project called Boost X project.

In my previous article, #286: The day a gas station in Toyama and a tiny library in Yokohama connected. -- Why my thoughts reached a place they shouldn't have.

I wrote about the "chemical reaction" where my book ended up being placed in a "tiny library on a hill" in Yokohama, 300km away.

Some of you might have seen this and thought, "That's nice. I wonder if I could do that too." But this chemical reaction didn't happen magically overnight.

There was always a "period of trial" involved.
Today, I want to talk about the "time lag" between effort and results, which is the reason why many people give up early in their challenges.

1. Business has no "periodic tests"

Why do we feel anxious and want to give up at the beginning of our efforts?

I feel it's because we are too accustomed to the "school system."

In school, there were periodic tests. If you studied, you immediately got feedback in the form of a score. Others, using their own standards, would decide whether you were doing well or not, saying things like, "Your effort is correct (80 points)" or "You need a little more work (40 points)."

At the time, you might have felt, "I don't care about tests!" when you had to take them.
However, that meddlesome system was actually a "helpful mechanism where others tell you your current position based on their own standards."

However, in business or personal content creation, there is no "test day." There is no teacher, and no one to grade your work with a red pen. Unless you can prepare your own opportunities or indicators like tests, you will continue to experience a "silent..." period of no response no matter how hard you try. The only time you can feel it is when some kind of sales increase.

That is why many people fall into an illusion.
"I don't feel like I'm moving forward. Am I just wasting my time?"

Because the test day never comes, it becomes scary to continue studying (making an effort). This is the psychological reality of why many people drop out early on.

2. There is "latency" between effort and results

However, just because you don't get test scores back doesn't mean your efforts are going to waste.

In the world of communication research and development, there is a term called "latency." It refers to the "delay time" from when a signal is sent (Input) until a response is returned (Output).

Effort and results are the same. It's not like school tests where you get "same-day grading." In the business world, there is always a long "time lag" (delay) between making an effort (Input) and it appearing as a visible result (Output).

At first, no matter how much you do, the graph remains flat. But that doesn't mean you are "just wasting" your time. You might simply be spending time in a "latent period."

3. Results always appear with a "discrepancy"

Just as there is a "law of conservation of energy" in physics, thoughts and actions that are correctly accumulated are definitely building up beneath the surface.

And there is one more interesting feeling I have. It is that "the results I imagine and the results that actually appear often diverge."

As you gain experience, the accuracy of "if I do this, this will happen" increases to some extent. However, even then, it almost never goes exactly as you imagined.
More often than not, you aim for "A" but end up with "B" or "C" instead.

My connection with "Tomo-san, the director of the mini-mini library on the hill" from last time was also, to be honest, a "coincidence."
I wasn't aiming for that specifically.
But if you look back at my effort process up to this point, it has become a "natural flow that makes sense for it to have turned out that way."

Your efforts might not reach the goal you envisioned (like getting a perfect score on a test). But that is not a failure; it is often a "process of creating other wonderful results."

Therefore, there is no need to feel down because it didn't go "as planned." That "discrepancy" itself has the potential to become a big bonus that exceeds your imagination.

Summary: Can you trust that "silence"?

If you are currently feeling anxious, thinking, "I'm doing it every day, but I don't feel any progress," or "Isn't this just a waste?"

That is a natural fear. This is because the business world is a place where
you have the freedom of not having anyone give you an 'X' (fail), but you also don't get a 'circle' (pass) from anyone.

This silence is extremely scary. It is because you have to move forward in the dark without knowing if you are truly on the right path.

That is precisely why what you need is not the evaluation of others, but your own "justice (core)." You need the resolve to spend time relying on the core of "I believe in this," sometimes like diving underwater and holding your breath to move forward.

But the moment you surface for air, there should be a wonderful view spread out before you that you never even imagined.

The current time of "silence" is likely not a useless waste.
It is a precious "latent period" for triggering future chemical reactions.

Believe that your current "striving" will lead to a future "explosion."

If you could give me a "like" or "follow," it would be great encouragement for my writing! If you have any experiences of "a time when your efforts didn't pay off" or "something that came back in an unexpected way later," please let me know in the comments section.

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<Booster nobu | The mastermind behind the Boost X project>
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