People who are successful at breaking habits or making habits overdetermine success. People who are unsuccessful ask, “What is the minimum requirement for achieving this goal?” Then, they do just a little bit less. People who are successful at achieving the goal do more—a lot more. Grant Cardone calls it the 10X Rule. He recommends you make an estimation of effort and multiply that by 10. A little over the top, you say? How did you do in achieving your last goal? How did you do in breaking a habit last time? How did you do in establishing a habit last time? 10X might not be such a bad idea.

If you want to get your finances under control, make more spending cuts than you think will be necessary. Add in some creative ways of making some extra money, and sell a few things. That is what we mean by overdetermining success.

Losing 30 pounds is harder than you think. Plan to walk twice as far and twice as often as you think you will need to. Plan to cut back your calories more than you think is necessary. Things are often considerably more difficult than they appear.

Improving your marriage is more trouble than you imagine, but it can be done. Don’t plan on reading one book and hope you all will be well. Plan on reading a book a month for a year. Sit down on a loveseat with your spouse and read the book together— the same chapter read at the same time. Discuss as you go. Read a dozen books the first year. Read half a dozen the next year. Read one book a year for the rest of your life. This is what we mean by overdetermining success. It may seem like a lot of trouble, but not near as much trouble as a divorce.

Kerry Patterson speaks of making change inevitable. How would you like to make change inevitable? You do it by overdetermining success. The opposite leads to failure:

Believing that the road to success will be rocky leads to greater success, because it forces you to take action. People who are confident that they will succeed and equally confident that success won’t come easily, put in more effort, plan how to deal with problems before they arise, and persist longer in the face of difficulty.

Unrealistic optimists are less likely to consider all the possible turns the path to their goal might take. They are more likely to take risks without thinking things through. And they are only too happy to tell you that you are “being negative” when you dare to express concerns, harbor reservations, or dwell too long on obstacles that stand in hot water.[1]