What is the Reverse Effort Rule?

The first person to mention the reverse effort rule was the English philosopher Aldous Huxley. According to the philosopher; The more we consciously try something to achieve success in a short period of time, the less success we will achieve. Because it is not possible for us to immediately succeed in something just because we are making an effort. There is also the fact that people can actually attract into their lives what they fear will happen to them.

In other words, the more important it is for you to have something happen, the more you can fear that it will not happen. In fact, this fear causes a rather paradoxical situation that leaves the person in a dilemma between doing and not doing. But for Huxley, the key to success is relaxation. But how can we achieve success in a subject without being stressed by being in a relaxed psychology?

Relaxing means taking the job too seriously and not pushing the limits.

So think of it like this; You are riding a bicycle for the first time, you know that learning to ride a bicycle is a time-consuming activity and there are certain rules, but since you will experience this for the first time, you cannot manage to balance on the bicycle. Instead of accepting this as normal, you are stressing yourself out when you go over the issue and try to make something happen that doesn’t exist.

On top of that, when you are worried that “I will never be able to ride a bike”, you can’t really ride a bike. Because when you believe that you cannot achieve something, you realize that belief by making an effort on that thing once and not trying again. Having these thoughts will only waste your time, according to the law of reverse effort. Because according to this philosophy, if something is going to happen, it will happen when the time comes.

In fact, the origin of this philosophical understanding is based on Taoism.

The understanding of Taoism that emerged in China; He says that it is necessary to adopt the Wu Wei understanding in order to overcome the fact that the effort made gives the opposite result than expected. Wu Wei means surrender. This way of thinking states that we should perceive letting go as wisdom. In other words, the importance of not being afraid to let go of the things we hold tightly is sometimes emphasized if it is not beneficial for us to deal with a subject persistently.

In fact, this philosophy should not be equated with a fatalistic point of view. Because this way of thinking says that the things we strive for sometimes fail because they exceed our capacity. In other words, surrender means; to calm down a little, knowing the fact that one will not succeed in everything. According to this understanding, a person should do what he has to do in a relaxed psychology while walking on the path he knows to be right, set aside unnecessary fears and let the flow go without thinking about what the result will be.

In fact, the reverse effort rule is trying to tell us that some things take time and patience to make things happen.

Think of it this way; To learn a new sport, talent is not enough, it is necessary to learn the technique of that sport. Here, while memorizing the movements of that sport, you also have to code in your mind why the movement that needs to be done is done. So all these start a certain learning journey and gradually you start to be successful in that field of sport.

In other words, to be successful is not only to be competent in a subject, but also to master the rules required by that subject. Thus, you will see that mastering a job takes time. In short, if you try something once and feel like “that’s what I was afraid of, I already knew I couldn’t do it”, you would fall into the trap of the reverse effort rule.

Preoccupation with a subject increases your anxiety and stress levels even more. Sometimes, instead of focusing on that job all the time to do good work, it may be more beneficial to take a break for a while and then start working again. US businessman Warren Buffet also states that no matter how much talent and effort, sometimes things take time.

Sources: Big Think, Medium, Spica