(from Seth Godin’s blog dated September 1, 2019. Click here for the original post. Seth is the author of more than 18 books that have been bestsellers all over the world. He writes about the post-industrial revolution, the way ideas spread, marketing, quitting, leadership and most of all, changing everything. You might be familiar with his books Linchpin, Tribes, The Dip and Purple Cow. Follow him on Twitter @thisissethsblog.)
This one simple trick makes everything faster and easier
Here it is, tested, effective and worthwhile:
Stop chasing shortcuts.
Personal finance, weight loss, marketing, careers, beating traffic, relationships, education–everything that matters to someone often comes with heavily promoted shortcuts as an alternative.
Fast, risk-free, effortless secrets that magically work, often at someone else’s expense.
But if the shortcuts worked as promised, they wouldn’t be shortcuts, would they? They’d be the standard.
A shortcut is not an innovation. It’s not a direct path, either. Those work, but they require effort, risk and insight.
If you can’t afford the time and effort to do it right, you probably can’t afford to do it over after you realize that the shortcut was merely a trap.