Love your approach to Systems Thinking—it’s such a game-changer for sustainable growth! I’m planning to take a similar route this year, inspired by James Clear’s idea of focusing on systems over goals. For me, it’s about building small, consistent habits around writing, engagement, and feedback loops—those tiny daily wins that keep the momentum going without feeling like I’m chasing the moon. Looking forward to seeing how your system evolves!
Glad you liked my approach! I also like the small but consistent habits building route and I can definitely relate to having tiny wins as a motivator to continue moving forward. Consistency building is honestly the best advice I can give to everyone out there, I can't deny there were times last year, especially at the beginning where I thought about flat out abandoning this project, but I'm glad I pushed through those negative feelings and was consistent about posting.
Great thinking! And a very good conversation topic.
Substack is indeed a system, but I wonder if the different parts are identifiable, or if there are hidden objects and camouflaged connections. If everything is as it seems, that is, and if it stays the same — long enough for describing it.
The next question is then if it is possible to tweak the system in any way, or if the knowledge about it only can be used to pick the path to traverse on your journey through it. Is Substack like a book with many threads, such as they are sometimes made for children? A Fun game. Or if it is a playing field where your own actions have an influence on the very shape of the game.
Describing the world is definitely good for seeing your own place in it, and this alone is valuable. In fact, the lack of seeing your position in the game could be a reason for quitting a job.
Making this understanding actionable would then be the tip of the iceberg. A smaller part, but the most visible, the one you can keep drawing up for yourself and others when you want to explain your strategy.
Looking forward to seeing what people are thinking about this. Maybe most participants in this game just enjoy the thrill of never really knowing how it works, and they would be less happy for knowing why they are not moving (fast enough) or whatever is their wish? And knowing how it works, may mean to them that they know that they cannot win — which could be rather demotivating to some.
Social media thrive on the users not knowing what is going on. That translates, in our primitive brains, to a world of opportunities. A world in which we can win.
But social media is not meant for everybody to win. Rather, to let a few become big winners and very visibly so, another few become lower level winners, earning money and getting known. But the majority of users are there to feed the system with their work, money, and excitement that they spread around to attract more participants.
Another aspect: What would happen if we all knew what it would take to get thousands of paid subscribers and write exactly enough of the right kind for this setup to work on a stable basis?
Well, then everybody would do it, and the system wouldn't work anymore. It would become overloaded, gamed against its preconditions.
"Bruce Almighty", a movie with Jim Carrey, indicated that same problem when Carrey, having become God, let everybody win the lottery. Couldn't work, as there wasn't enough money for everybody to get the big win.
I think that you will find, that social media is a chance system. It is difficult to map, but if you do it, you will see some serious feedback-loops in play, basically on every action ever taken by anyone. The system will adapt to the knowledge available in the system, and therefore become increasingly difficult to win over — plus, the whole system and its careful mapping can, at any time, be pushed aside by the hidden factors: the acts of the system owners.
This is extremely insightful and interesting. I like to believe that this medium is more of the "playing field where my actions shape the very shape of the game". But I could be just telling myself that to fool into thinking I have more control than I really do.
I also found interesting the thing you said about how the system would crash if it becomes overloaded (everybody is successful), this is particularly true for platforms that monetize creators (YouTube and Tik Tok to name a few). These platforms simply can't afford to give everyone a winning lottery ticket, which leads me to believe they level the playfield in the background.
I don't know if Substack itself rewards the top performers from their own pocket. Maybe one day I'll be in that position and will communicate my findings 😉
Thanks for the thoughtful response! Hope you enjoyed the post.
Systems help you with your goals, especially when you don't feel like it. I remember the first time i heard "system thinking", I thought it was a technical process to doing everything. well turns out, it's technical but along the way it leads to simpler ways of achieving your goals.
I'll be applying some or all of these too and see how things evolve around here. Thanks for sharing, Hugo.
Love your approach to Systems Thinking—it’s such a game-changer for sustainable growth! I’m planning to take a similar route this year, inspired by James Clear’s idea of focusing on systems over goals. For me, it’s about building small, consistent habits around writing, engagement, and feedback loops—those tiny daily wins that keep the momentum going without feeling like I’m chasing the moon. Looking forward to seeing how your system evolves!
Glad you liked my approach! I also like the small but consistent habits building route and I can definitely relate to having tiny wins as a motivator to continue moving forward. Consistency building is honestly the best advice I can give to everyone out there, I can't deny there were times last year, especially at the beginning where I thought about flat out abandoning this project, but I'm glad I pushed through those negative feelings and was consistent about posting.
Great thinking! And a very good conversation topic.
Substack is indeed a system, but I wonder if the different parts are identifiable, or if there are hidden objects and camouflaged connections. If everything is as it seems, that is, and if it stays the same — long enough for describing it.
The next question is then if it is possible to tweak the system in any way, or if the knowledge about it only can be used to pick the path to traverse on your journey through it. Is Substack like a book with many threads, such as they are sometimes made for children? A Fun game. Or if it is a playing field where your own actions have an influence on the very shape of the game.
Describing the world is definitely good for seeing your own place in it, and this alone is valuable. In fact, the lack of seeing your position in the game could be a reason for quitting a job.
Making this understanding actionable would then be the tip of the iceberg. A smaller part, but the most visible, the one you can keep drawing up for yourself and others when you want to explain your strategy.
Looking forward to seeing what people are thinking about this. Maybe most participants in this game just enjoy the thrill of never really knowing how it works, and they would be less happy for knowing why they are not moving (fast enough) or whatever is their wish? And knowing how it works, may mean to them that they know that they cannot win — which could be rather demotivating to some.
Social media thrive on the users not knowing what is going on. That translates, in our primitive brains, to a world of opportunities. A world in which we can win.
But social media is not meant for everybody to win. Rather, to let a few become big winners and very visibly so, another few become lower level winners, earning money and getting known. But the majority of users are there to feed the system with their work, money, and excitement that they spread around to attract more participants.
Another aspect: What would happen if we all knew what it would take to get thousands of paid subscribers and write exactly enough of the right kind for this setup to work on a stable basis?
Well, then everybody would do it, and the system wouldn't work anymore. It would become overloaded, gamed against its preconditions.
"Bruce Almighty", a movie with Jim Carrey, indicated that same problem when Carrey, having become God, let everybody win the lottery. Couldn't work, as there wasn't enough money for everybody to get the big win.
I think that you will find, that social media is a chance system. It is difficult to map, but if you do it, you will see some serious feedback-loops in play, basically on every action ever taken by anyone. The system will adapt to the knowledge available in the system, and therefore become increasingly difficult to win over — plus, the whole system and its careful mapping can, at any time, be pushed aside by the hidden factors: the acts of the system owners.
This is extremely insightful and interesting. I like to believe that this medium is more of the "playing field where my actions shape the very shape of the game". But I could be just telling myself that to fool into thinking I have more control than I really do.
I also found interesting the thing you said about how the system would crash if it becomes overloaded (everybody is successful), this is particularly true for platforms that monetize creators (YouTube and Tik Tok to name a few). These platforms simply can't afford to give everyone a winning lottery ticket, which leads me to believe they level the playfield in the background.
I don't know if Substack itself rewards the top performers from their own pocket. Maybe one day I'll be in that position and will communicate my findings 😉
Thanks for the thoughtful response! Hope you enjoyed the post.
Systems help you with your goals, especially when you don't feel like it. I remember the first time i heard "system thinking", I thought it was a technical process to doing everything. well turns out, it's technical but along the way it leads to simpler ways of achieving your goals.
I'll be applying some or all of these too and see how things evolve around here. Thanks for sharing, Hugo.