To reveal the science of the quantum leap, Sawyer went down to the atomic level. “We talk about the quantum leap of an electron, going from a lower energy state to a higher state.” Sawyer explained that this doesn’t mean an electron travels to that higher state the way a mountaineer ascends Everest. It’s not step-by-step. It means the electron has gone instantaneously from the base of the mountain to the peak, bypassing all the intermediate steps.
Quantum leaps can also take place with human motivation. The base of the mountain represents having no desire to work toward a change of behavior, and the peak indicates a strong and ongoing drive to do all the things being a new person entails.
The traditional models of behavior change, as already discussed, involve climbing the mountain one step at a time. But a quantum leap takes a person’s motivation right to the top. You are facing a mountain. You stand at the bottom. Peak motivation—your ultimate ability to do the work with inspired vigor—resides at the top. You can climb to that peak one step at a time (where there is risk of slipping and sliding back to the bottom anywhere along the route, but especially at the beginning), or you can step inside a Star Trek–style transporter device and materialize at the summit.
If you can locate such a transporter and figure out how to make it work, is it not worth giving it a shot if it means you get to bypass all those steps?
This does not mean the traditional model of slow-and-steady behavior change isn’t sometimes worthwhile. This isn’t one of those books filled with the Truth that “they” don’t want you to know about. The reality is that millions have changed their lives via psychological baby steps, whereas many others achieve sudden change. And some people have experienced both types.
My friend Paul Ingraham, a health writer in Vancouver, has gone through three major behavioral changes in his life. Two of them were in the traditional linear fashion he called “forced marches across a tipping point; one desperate, determined step at a time.” The other was via epiphany, which he described as “Way easier, completely irresistible. To have it was to change, no work required. Just *Poof!* I’m different now.”
“Forced marches across a tipping point.” This is an apt description for what most cognitive-behavior-change models are built around. But it doesn’t always work that way.
I do not wish to dismiss decades of work by respected psychologists in the baby-steps approach to change, because it’s a valuable tool that can be used to lead to epiphany. As I mentioned previously, look at the case of Lesley the fencer. She forced herself to struggle along for a couple of months, then came the poof Paul referred to. Same with my own physical transformation; I did not enjoy the first two months of battling to adopt an exercise regimen.
I struggled to develop the habit, and I almost quit. But when a staff member at the gym asked me if I’d had a good workout, and I realized that it had been pretty good, I had another epiphany: it was starting to not suck. And if it could not suck, then one day it could be enjoyable. In that moment, I promised myself I would keep exercising until I died. I met the poof partway, and over the next nine months, I lost fifty pounds of fat and gained twenty pounds of muscle. I’ve become a lifelong exerciser, going so far as to qualify for the Boston Marathon after seeing the horrific bombing in 2013, so I could run it the following year and be part of taking back the finish line from the terror of that day.
Time for another task.
Start thinking about what baby steps you can engage in to meet the poof partway. What is your desired outcome in terms of ultimate motivation? What is the peak of inspired Mount Everest in terms of what you could achieve for your life situation? Visualize that peak and what it would look like to be transported there, bypassing all intervening steps.
Now imagine the transporter device is broken and you need to hike a step at a time. Maybe not all the steps, but at least some. You can’t stand around and wait for someone to fix the transporter. You need to start climbing.
What does the hike look like?
What is the first step?
Visualize your primary wish of this new person you’d like to be, whether it involves changes in activity level, diet, attitude, career, budgeting, education, a combination of any of these things, or some other things. Now forget that the transporter device exists.
What is the logical slow-and-steady path to achieve the goal? What is the first baby step? What is the second? The third? Start to map it out. Create the beginnings of a plan to just get started. It’s okay to seek help from a professional or otherwise knowledgeable person in formulating this plan.
Because the reality is, you may need to walk that path for a time. You may need to hike a while. But if you’re attuned to the possibility of epiphany on that journey of many baby steps, the transporter may one day pick you up and materialize you at the peak. Or not quite at the peak, but a lot closer to the top, at least.
Sometimes the process is passive. It’s something that happens to you, arriving unbidden. Other times, you must act.
Lace up those boots, because the poof is worth climbing toward.
The sudden-leap formula, which Ingraham described both as “way easier” and “completely irresistible,” warrants further investigation so you can understand why it’s worth the striving. Forced marches of motivation have a high failure rate, with not many people achieving lasting behavior change via such methods. This raises the question: What is the success rate of the quantum leap?
To uncover that, it is first important to gain deeper understanding of the mechanics of quantum change.
A Void in Need of Filling
“It’s like a switch has been thrown and you’ve gone from where you used to be to somewhere else, and the intervening steps didn’t occur,” Rob Sawyer said. “That’s a quantum change.”
Sawyer’s own change causing dramatic weight loss was quantum in nature. He spoke of twenty years at his sedentary job of being a writer leading to gaining significant weight, but he stayed affixed to that office chair because he had a mission.
“It was only when I won the Hugo Award for best novel [for Hominids] in 2003 when I had a void in my ambition that needed to be filled,” he said. It was the top professional achievement he could attain in his field. Afterward, this other goal of losing weight that had been hovering in the background went through a quantum change. A return to discussing electrons explains how it happened.
“The lowest level of an atom holds two electrons, and the next highest level can hold eight,” Sawyer said, explaining that you cannot push one of those lower-level electrons up to a higher state if all of those spots are occupied. But if one spot is vacated, there is an opportunity for a lower-level electron to complete a quantum leap to that higher level. It is promoted instantaneously. This is what happened for Sawyer. When he achieved ultimate career success, space was made for something else to become a top priority.
“It’s no coincidence the year after winning the Hugo I lost a third of my body weight,” Sawyer said. And true to the descriptions of it being a digital process and not analog, this or that, on or off, Rob was committed. “There was no wavering,” he said. “It was going to happen.”
Sawyer has kept the weight off more than a decade.
Make Room for Change
I have a big task for you now. So big, in fact, it needs its own header and section.
Reflect on what Sawyer said about winning the Hugo. Recall the description of how an electron at a higher level must vacate the premises prior to a lower-level electron being able to make that quantum leap to the higher energy level.
This is all about achieving a higher energy level.
And if your higher level is full, something needs to vacate it and make room for your inspiration to be instantaneously promoted, the way Rob’s desire to lose weight was.
It’s