Everything we do in life has consequences, either good or bad.
Everything we do is a choice that will have some consequence. Even the decision to do nothing is a choice that will have consequences, most of them unforeseen.
If you see someone getting attacked on the street and you do nothing, you’re making a choice to carry out a certain action as opposed to another action you might take.
Your decision will have repercussions for the victim, the perpetrator, for you, for those close to you by extension, and for society at large.
Nothing we do happens in a vacuum.
The Law of Consequence is one of the immutable laws of the universe. It’s a law because it works even when we don’t want it to—even when we don’t think it is working.
We don’t have to do anything to make this law work. It happens by itself no matter what we do.
If we think it isn’t working, that’s just another way of saying we didn’t see the consequences.
On the flipside, if you choose to help that person in need, that will also have consequences—most of them we will never see.
The consequences will affect the victim, the perpetrator, you, those closest to you, and by extension, society at large.
If we do a good action, we get a good consequence, both internally and externally.
If we do a negative action, we get a negative consequence, both internally and externally.
There is nothing we can do to stop this from happening. Thinking we can stop it or escape this law is pure delusion.
This is why the rewards of investing in our own development are always guaranteed. If we put in the work to improve, the results will pay off. This result is inevitable.
There is a second component to this law that few people understand.
Even fewer people understand this than understand the first component of the law—and even more people try to escape it and stop it from happening.
The consequences of any particular action are always cumulative. They compound over time the longer we carry out that particular action.
Say you ate junk food five times a day for fifteen years and you gained three hundred pounds.
If you suddenly ate a salad and then went straight back to your normal way of eating, nothing would happen.
Eating that salad would have absolutely no effect on your life, your weight, or your sense of self-worth.
Conversely, imagine you ate healthy, exercised, and took meticulous care of yourself in every way for fifteen years.
Then the day comes when you go out and eat an ice cream sundae before you go straight back to your normal lifestyle.
That ice cream sundae wouldn’t hurt you at all. You wouldn’t gain a single pound from eating it.
You would have to completely reverse the process in order to wind up in the same position as the person who ate crappy food every day and weighted four hundred pounds.
The effects would accumulate over time. The longer you followed either of these paths, the more profound the results would become.
Imagine you never touched drugs until suddenly, in a moment of lunacy, you snorted a line of cocaine.
That action would have an immediate consequence, but it wouldn’t be life-changing—not unless you kept doing it.
If you never did it again, it probably wouldn’t have any long-term negative consequences at all.
It would have long-term negative consequences if you kept doing it.
The long-term negative consequences would compound the longer you kept doing it.
Eventually, the long-term negative consequences could accumulate to the point where you lost your health, your finances, your job, your family, your freedom, and ultimately, even your life.
Think of any area of your life. Whatever result you’re looking for, it will accumulate the longer you keep doing it.
If you do it once or in short bursts, you won’t see any result. The result compounds with time. You have to keep doing it for a long time to build the result that you want—or to avoid the result that you don’t want.
The same goes for positive consequences. Putting up a website and offering a product for sale won’t make you rich. Making a bunch of YouTube videos won’t make you rich.
Everything in business compounds over time. If you work for a company, your presence there compounds over time.
If you give it your all-out effort, your results will improve the longer those above you see you putting in the effort.
By the same token, if you don’t put in the effort, those above you will see that, too. Their opinion of you will diminish over time.
They’ll see that this way of life is entrenched in your character. They won’t expect you to do anything else—and they’ll be right.
On the other hand, you might suddenly one day have a lightbulb moment and start putting in the effort.
The results would compound over time. No one would trust you at first or think much of your efforts. They wouldn’t trust you to stick it out.
It would take a long time of you continually putting in the effort and taking the initiative before your superiors let themselves believe that you were sincere in your desire to change.
The same is true for all change.
If you suddenly start a new healthy lifestyle—or a business—or a self-improvement program, no one will believe you’re sincere or that you’ll keep doing it.
These people aren’t malicious. They’re basing their assessment on the accumulated actions of years of your own behavior—maybe even decades of your behavior.
It’s going to take an equivalent accumulated amount of time to convince them that you’re committed to doing things differently.
The good news is that the positive consequences will accumulate. This is the other facet to this universally immutable law.
The longer you keep doing positive actions, the more the positive consequences compound.
The bottom line is that other people’s opinion of you is just another consequence of your actions—either good or bad.
It won’t change just because you did something once…..or twice…..or ten times. Their opinion of you won’t change just because you changed.
Their opinion—either good or bad—will compound based on your actions.
If you continue to improve, their opinion of you will improve. If you continue to deteriorate, their opinion of you will deteriorate—and rightfully so.
This process will happen.
It’s inevitable.
It’s as inevitable as the sun rising tomorrow morning and setting tomorrow night. None of us can escape it.
The solution is to harness the power of this compounding effect and ride the wave in our favor.
All we have to do is continue to do the right actions and reap the resulting benefits.
They, too, will come inevitably, just as the negative consequences will inevitably come as a result of negative actions.
The choice is always ours—and this is another area where we always control the outcome.
Thinking we can escape this law or stop it from happening is the definition of insanity and will only bring pain and tragedy into our lives.
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