The Rules You Never Agreed To

Most of the rules you follow were never written down. Somebody did it first, everyone after them got in line, and now it feels like the way things are. A lot of what feels like "the rules" is just a line nobody checked. Two questions will tell you which is which.

The line around the block

My cousin and I bought festival tickets a year ahead and counted down for months. When we finally got there, the first thing we saw was a line wrapped around the block. Hundreds of people standing in the sun, inching forward.

So we got in it, because that's what you do when there's a line.

After a while I asked the group ahead of us if this was the line to get in. "Yeah," one guy said, without looking up. "This is the line."

Something about that bothered me. He'd answered the way you answer a question you've never actually thought about. So I left my cousin holding our spot and walked up to the front to look for myself.

The line ended at a merch tent. Hundreds of people were waiting to buy T-shirts, and most of them had no idea.

The real entrance was around the corner. It was a much shorter line, and it was moving. We were inside in about ten minutes.

Nobody checked

That line is a pretty good picture of how a lot of life works. You go to college because that's the line. You take the stable job, work forty hours, and run your week the way your first boss ran his, because that's the line. When someone asks why, the honest answer is "that's how it's done," which really means that's how the last person did it.

Some rules are real. There are laws, promises you made, and right and wrong. But an enormous number of things that feel like rules turn out, when you walk up and look, to be someone else's habit.

Two questions for any line

When you catch yourself doing something just because "that's how it's done," ask:

1. Who actually wrote this? Is it a law, a contract, or a promise? Or does it trace back to "that's what the person before me did"?
2. What actually happens if I don't? Not what you're afraid will happen. What really happens. Sometimes it's a real consequence, and you keep the rule. Surprisingly often, it's nothing.

If it traces back to a real reason, follow it. If it traces back to "that's just what we do," you've found a merch tent.

It only took one person and about two minutes to find out what that festival line really was. That's usually all it takes: being willing to feel a little dumb stepping out of line, just in case the crowd is wrong.

The crowd usually isn't right. They just got there first.

What the research says

The pull of a crowd. In a 1969 study on a busy New York sidewalk, researchers had people stop and stare up at an empty sixth-floor window. The more people who stared, the more passersby looked up and stopped too. With a group of fifteen staring at nothing, most people walking by looked up. A crowd doesn't have to be right to be convincing. It just has to be a crowd. (Milgram, Bickman & Berkowitz, 1969)

If what's holding you in line is what people will say when you step out, read how to stop caring what people think.

This week

1. Find one line you're standing in. Something you do only because it's how it's done. Write it down.
2. Ask the two questions. Who wrote this? What actually happens if I don't?
3. If it's just a line, try it differently once. Don't announce it. Just do it, and see what happens.