Uncommon Amongst Uncommon: A Concept to Take Your Life to The Next Level

Competition breeds competence.

Levelling up is a different high altogether. It’s nothing short of a drug.

It’s when you’re able to look at your life over a period of months and realise that you’ve completely changed as a person. You can tell that your life has literally levelled up.

However, what I’ve come to understand is levelling up is not the same as simply growing. Growth is a part of levelling up, however, in addition to growth, you need some extraordinary mental models to help you level up. One such concept is ‘Uncommon Amongst Uncommon’.

This is a concept I learned after reading the book Can’t Hurt Me by David Goggins.

David Goggins is a retired Navy SEAL and an ultramarathon runner. He’s also held the world record for maximum pullups in a day in the past, closing in at a beastly 4030. Yes. 4030. In a day. People call him the hardest man on planet Earth.

In his book, he talks about the mindset that made him who he is. Among the many life-changing concepts, one is the idea of being uncommon amongst the uncommon.

You see, Navy SEALs are already amongst the most uncommon people on Earth. An average Joe cannot keep up with a Navy SEAL. But David Goggins? He was the kind of Navy SEAL with whom even other Navy SEALs could not keep up.

Navy SEALS were uncommon. David Goggins was uncommon amongst uncommon. That's what David shared in his memoir. I loved the concept and thought about it a lot.

One of my favourite ways to access higher-level thinking is to use a new concept by someone else and try to elaborate on it as much as I can. That’s what I did with David’s concept. And this is what I learned.

In keeping with the concept, we can form 4 basic levels for us.

• Level 1: Common amongst the common.
• Level 2: Uncommon amongst the common.
• Level 3: Common amongst the uncommon.
• Level 4: Uncommon amongst the uncommon.

Of course, the boundaries are not very strict, but you get the idea. For instance, I’m quite fit compared to the average person. Means, I’m uncommon amongst the common. But in the gym, I’m not the fittest — which makes me common amongst the uncommon.

This model gives you only 4 levels, but of course, you can stretch out the spectrum a bit. For instance, if you’re common amongst the uncommon — “common” is your position, and “uncommon” is the room you’re in. This model has only two rooms — “common” and “uncommon.” If you can create more rooms, for instance, “Amateur — Intermediate — Pro”, you can create more levels.

All of this is just to make the concept easier to understand. The underlying concept is this: look around the room you’re in, and ask yourself if you’re among the top in the room, or among the average.

If you’re among the average, figure out how to move to the top of that room. And then upgrade the room you’re in. And if you’re already at the top of that room, straight away move to the next room.

Moving to the next room can be in real life — you can start hanging out with people better than you — or psychological — you can start (healthily) comparing yourself to above-average people unlike earlier.

But here’s the thing about changing the room. It’s not easy on your ego. When you’re uncommon amongst common, and you compare yourself with common people, you’ll feel great about yourself. But then, suddenly, you change the room, and you’re at the bottom of the new room. And comparisons with others in that room won’t inflate your ego like earlier. In fact, it might make you feel bad about yourself.

However, you need to see the bigger picture. It’s a short term hit to your ego, but what you’ll learn in this new room is something you could have never been able to learn in your earlier room.

Many people are unable to shift rooms because they have fragile egos. It takes a deliberate and taxing effort of the mind to first change the room, and then, to stay in it long enough in spite of your ego being hurt. However, it’s necessary if you want to level up in life.

This concept might make you cringe. Why compare ourselves to others in the first place? After all, we’ve been taught that our only competition is us. However, if I’m being honest, believing that is helpful at times when you want to take care of your mental health, but it can be disastrous as well. Here’s why:

Try watching a Wimbledon women’s final from the 1950s. The game doesn’t look that professional if you compare it to today. In fact, I’m confident that even I can play that well. And in all candour, I’m a shitty tennis player.

And then, watch a tennis match from this year. The difference in the level of the game is palpable. Your jaw will be on the floor seeing a player like Naomi Osaka kicking ass. It’s insane how much the game has evolved.

But the game has evolved so much because of competition. Competition breeds competence. If there was no competition, the human race would not evolve at the rate at which it is evolving today.

So if you want to evolve as well, being competitive is necessary. Of course, no one is denying that it can be tough on your mental health, but I truly believe we can learn to be competitive while taking care of our mental health.

What helps me is to be excited when I encounter someone better than me, instead of being sad. I get excited about the fact that I can absorb this person’s tricks and get better myself. So even though I’m extremely competitive, and I shift rooms often, my mental health is just fine.

So to conclude: look around the room you’re in. Get to the top of that room. Then upgrade your room. Instead of being sad about the fact that you’re at the bottom of this room, get excited about the fact you’re going to learn so much in this new room. Then get to the top of that room. Keep repeating forever.

That’ll make you unstoppable.