Your Operating System Is Outdated

It is WayMaker Wednesday. Time to run a diagnostic on the code that is quietly running your life.

## The Question

If you could see the version number on your personal operating system, what year would it be from?

## The Thought

Every one of us runs on an operating system — the beliefs, reflexes, and assumptions that fire before we think. How you handle conflict, money, authority, vulnerability. All OS-level.
Most of that code was written by someone else. A parent who said "if you want it done right, do it yourself." A breakup that taught you vulnerability was dangerous. A boss who showed you that authority means control. Installed at ten or twenty. Still running at forty-five.
I see this constantly. A founder brilliant at strategy but unable to delegate. When we dig in, we find the code: a childhood lesson that trusting others leads to disappointment. The business is not stuck because of the team. It is stuck because of a line of code installed thirty years ago.
The fix is not more effort. It is going into the source and asking: "Do I still believe this? Does this still serve the person I am becoming?"
You would not run a business on ten-year-old software. Stop running your life on it.

## Put It Into Action

Run a diagnostic this week. Pick one area where you keep getting the same frustrating result.

- **Ask: "What do I believe about this that I have never questioned?" Write it down.**
- Ask: "Who installed this?" A parent, a coach, a painful experience?
- Ask: "Is this still true?" Not was it ever true. Is it true NOW?
- If not, rewrite it. Literally write the updated belief. Read it daily for a week. You are overwriting legacy code.

*We all know someone stuck in a loop. They do not need more advice. They need a system update. Send them this.*

Forge Forward,
Jon Mayo