Often when I'm traveling, I run into former students in airports. (There are many of them out there—I've been teaching for 15 years.) I'm always happy to see them and to catch up with what's going on in their lives. Many of these former students have had significant events in their lives since they graduated from Kellogg: getting new jobs, getting promoted, getting married, having children. But every few weeks, the encounter is a little different: for some of these former students, life hasn't turned out the way they expected.

I had one of these encounters while I was at Chicago's O'Hare Airport. A former student appeared tense and nervous, so when I asked him, “How's it going?” I was prepared to hear some bad news.

“To tell you the truth, not so good,” he told me. “I'm traveling all the time for my job. I have two young boys now and I have no relationship with them.” Then came the kicker: “Harry, I'm so surprised.”

I said I was sorry to hear that, then asked how much time he spends with his sons.

“I don't really spend any time with them at all. I'm hardly home.”

And I wondered: why is he surprised that he doesn't have a relationship with his sons?

Another incident occurred recently, just before class. I noticed one of my students was clearly upset. When I asked her what was wrong, she told me her grandfather had passed away a few days ago. It was such a shock, she said. She had wanted to spend more time with him, to get his insights on life, but now he was gone. “It happened so suddenly,” she told me. “I was so surprised.”

I expressed my condolences and then asked how old her grandfather was.

“One hundred and two.”

At the risk of sounding insensitive, I have to tell you: when someone who has lived to be more than a century old passes away, that's not “sudden.” Given his age, when was she planning to get together with him—in six months? A year? Of course, I didn't say any of those things, but I have to admit that I was tempted to ask, “Why are you surprised?”

Make no mistake, I have compassion for others. Everyone has disappointments, setbacks, and sadness in their lives, and I'm no exception. A relationship breaks up. You don't get the job you wanted, or the promotion you worked so hard for goes to somebody else. Someone you love and care deeply about passes away. All of this is very unfortunate, but it really shouldn't be a surprise—not if you're self-reflective.

BECOMING MORE AWARE

Self-reflection isn't a crystal ball. You won't be able to project every possibility and its outcome. But with regular self-reflection, you'll become more self-aware. You'll become increasingly attuned to every facet of your life, especially those areas that you haven't paid enough attention to. You'll pick up on the cues when your life is out of balance and you're running into trouble. With self-examination, you know when it's been too long since you've checked in with a close friend or family member. You'll keep tabs on your health, sleep habits, spirituality, time for leisure or fun—or whatever your priorities are. That alone will greatly reduce many of those “surprises” because you'll be proactive about making changes to ward off many problems and upsets. And for those you can't avoid, as I outlined in chapter 1, you'll do the right thing and the best you can do.

This all seems so straightforward, and yet some people have a hard time grasping how self-reflection can minimize surprises that have “suddenly” upended their lives. The more I think about it, the more I realize that intelligence seems to be inversely proportional to being able to minimize surprises. As I've observed, some of the brightest, most conscientious, and driven people are often the most prone to falling victim to surprises.

Let me give you an example. I can't tell you how many students come to my office to discuss two job offers they're weighing. Often these job offers are from consulting or investment banking firms. For a young associate joining these firms, it's going to be extremely demanding.

The first thing I ask is why they are pursuing this path. Nearly every time, they don't have a real answer. They haven't spent much time thinking about it. Now these are some of the best students, and yet they have trouble answering the question “Why do you want to take this particular type of job?” With a little probing, it usually boils down to the simple fact that they're following other top students who are taking this path. Their thinking is “If they're doing this, then I should, too.”

The issue is they're focusing on what someone else is doing. That's a formula for living a life that probably won't be the best for you. Consider the example of another former student I ran into while I was waiting for a flight at New York's LaGuardia Airport. As we caught up with each other, she explained that she was working 90 hours a week, traveling 90 percent of the time, and spending very little time with her fiancé.

When she told me she was surprised that she had no personal time, I thought, “Did you not read the job description before you signed up?” A Google search of burnout in management consulting and investment banking will give you an eyeful. Most insightful of all would be to talk with someone whose values and priorities align with yours who is in that field and ask the question “What's your life like?”

Now, for some people, life on the road is exactly what they want. Ram Charan, the famed management consultant, earned a reputation not only for counseling the top CEOs in the world but also for traveling constantly. As a Fortune profile of him from several years ago stated, “Charan never stops. He sleeps in a hotel every night . . . except when he's sleeping on a plane or, rarely, in someone's house.”¹ But this is Ram's choice—he is wired for this kind of lifestyle and he clearly enjoys it. He realizes what he's choosing and is not surprised.

In the same way, how you spend your 168 must be based on your individual choices. If you decide you're going to take that job with a lot of travel, understand what that really means. Whatever you do, make sure you go into it with your eyes wide open. Whether you become the next road warrior consultant, or you open a tea shop in a small town, give it real thought. You need to be self-reflective: does this job or other life choice support or undermine what matters most to me? Will I be able to pursue a balanced life as I define it? Or am I getting myself into something that will result in me being out of balance most of the time?

You have multiple life buckets, remember? Friends, fun, sports, going to movies—all these leisure activities may be very important to you. So is having time for work and getting ahead in your career. (I get it—I was chairman and CEO of a $12 billion health care company with more than 50,000 employees.) But if you aren't self-reflective, some of your life buckets are going to be overflowing and others will be empty—and you'll be surprised.

THE COST—AND CONSEQUENCE—OF BEING UNAWARE

People who aren't self-reflective are constantly surprised. Something they didn't expect occurs, and they get blindsided. Usually they have no idea what just happened, why it happened, or what to do next. The reason they are constantly surprised is fairly simple: if you aren't aware of how you spend your time, you won't have a grasp of what matters most. If you're unaware, it's easy to convince yourself that “everything is fine” and that you'll have time to take care of things “later.” Then a week turns into a month, then six months, then a year. . . During that time, the people you say are most important may not be waiting around for you. They've moved on—sometimes literally. One guy I knew was traveling so much that when he was finally home and his significant other wasn't there, he didn't think much about it. It never occurred to him to wonder why. Then he found out that she had actually left several months earlier—and he never even noticed.

All of us are capable of rationalization. People might be tempted to say, “Hey, 50 percent of relationships don't seem to last anyway. It's unfortunate that my relationship ended, but at least I've got my children.” But children aren't blind to the fact that Mom or Dad hasn't been around for the past few years. When a parent who has been mostly absent for the past four or five years suddenly decides it's time for some “quality” time together, it shouldn't be a surprise when the children prefer not to have them around.

I don't say this to embarrass or judge anyone. It's not my place to say how people should live their lives. I won't recommend choices for you or anyone else. Everyone is different! You need to decide what works for you according to your values and what matters most to you.

As you know by now, I believe self-reflection is the best way to determine whether your life is really working for you. You'll see where things are starting to come apart—the relationship that's damaged, the friendship that's strained, the health risks you're trying to ignore, your irritability because you aren't sleeping enough or taking care of yourself. The sooner you notice when things are off, the quicker you can intervene by rebalancing. Remember, no one is in balance all the time—or even most of the time. We're constantly pursuing life balance because the reality is we are very busy people who are often out of balance! We're traveling for business, we're juggling family responsibilities, we're trying to enjoy leisure activities.

If you don't check in with yourself through self-reflection, it's easy to become one-sided. You're down to one or two life buckets, while the other areas of your life are empty. And what happens in those neglected parts of your life? You guessed it—that's where you get “surprised.”

COGNITIVE DISSONANCE

Many years ago, a senior executive—let's call him Bill—came to see me on a Friday afternoon to ask for some advice. Things weren't going well for him, Bill told me. He was having problems with his spouse and his three children. “Harry, you're married, and you've got five kids. I thought you could share some perspective with me.”

I told him I'd be happy to sit down and listen. Although I never think of myself as having the answers, I do have opinions. “How about getting together on Saturday?”

“Can't,” Bill told me. “I'm golfing all day Saturday.”

“No problem. How about Sunday? You can come over any time after church.”

“Yeah, I'm actually golfing on Sunday, too.”

Now, I have nothing against golf, but I do know that it takes about five hours to play 18 holes. Two days of golf equals 10 hours. Maybe golf was very important to Bill. Maybe he was a fabulous golfer, and this was a real passion for him. If so, spending a good portion of the weekend golfing might make sense for him. However, the problem, from what I could tell, was Bill said family time was a big priority, but his actions conflicted with his words.

That's what psychologists call cognitive dissonance. Your beliefs, behaviors, and attitude are inconsistent—or, to express it more simply, you say one thing and do another. Dissonance is another way of saying unbalanced, and the more it persists, the more uncomfortable and miserable we become.

To discuss the concept of cognitive dissonance further, I reached out to my friend Daven Morrison, a board-certified psychiatrist with Morrison Associates, Ltd., who works closely with companies and executives on areas related to decision-making and performance. Daven explained that the fundamental function of the brain is to find and match patterns, which helps make life predictable: sunrise to sunset, summer changing into winter. We see an object—say something as simple as a pencil or a candle—and we know from past experience how it works. But if we come across one of those trick birthday candles that you can't blow out, it doesn't match our expectation of how the world is supposed to work. The result is a kind of cognitive dissonance.

On a more dramatic scale, a natural disaster such as an earthquake or a tornado can rock our world: we go from a calm and predictable day to devastation a few hours later. But even then, Daven said, the human mind is able to recover more quickly from the shock of a natural disaster than when we're betrayed by another person. In the same way, when someone we admire and whom we think of as leading a values-based life does something unethical or illegal, Daven said, “it shakes the ground we stand on.”

Although outside events and the behaviors of others can upset us, we also bring it on ourselves when our actions are inconsistent with our values. Complicating matters, humans have the capacity to rationalize just about anything. For example, in his studies of white-collar crime and fraud, Daven discovered that many people say they intended to pay back the money they took, which to their mind meant they didn't see it as stealing. Others felt they were justified—they were “owed” more than they received. They'd never describe themselves as greedy. And there can be group dynamics that encourage and ingrain behaviors that would usually be unthinkable for the individual.

Unethical and criminal behaviors are extreme examples of actions that conflict with our values. On a less dramatic scale, there are many things we do every day that are out of alignment. A simple example is when we say that we value being healthy—we want to exercise more and eat better. We put on exercise clothes to go to the gym, but instead head over to a fast food restaurant for a double burger and an extra-large order of fries. Afterward, there is bound to be rationalization and bargaining with one's self (“Tomorrow I'll work out twice as much.”) and probably some shame and guilt. Even addictions, infidelity, and other serious behavioral issues can get rationalized away: “if no one knows, no one gets hurt.” That results in a guaranteed collision between what someone is telling themselves and what will happen when their behaviors are discovered.

Cognitive dissonance can even take root in our concept of time. We have an unrealistic expectation of all that we can do in one day. One young professional described her life as working two jobs, going to school, spending time with friends, and enjoying leisure activities. After a few weeks, reality hit—and hard. She was exhausted and upset and couldn't figure out what had gone wrong. Had she counted the number of hours for each activity and plotted them into the 168-hour life grid, she'd see that her view of the world required a 185-hour week—not reality!

The solution is self-reflection. Otherwise, it will be very difficult to see where and how you're out of alignment with your values. You simply won't recognize when your life is inconsistent with your values. It may be that you aren't sure what your values are. Or, even if you have a loose concept of what's most important, you're not really comfortable with the kind of self-examination it takes to be honest with yourself. A case in point: the average person knows that each of us is going to die. Yet a study by AARP found that 60 percent of people have no will or estate planning.² Self-awareness, then, is the only way to reduce imbalance, live in alignment with our values, and stay grounded in reality.

This type of reflection brings up profound, existential questions that call for deeper evaluation of how we spend our time. “Is my life meaningful? Am I making a difference—and if so, how?” “These are difficult questions to talk through,” Daven said. “When we think about our end of life, it's hard to look at it.”

For some people, the response may be to recoil from these tough questions. They'd rather push aside worries over whether they should change their health habits or address an addiction. But for others, it can be a wake-up call to examine the reality of how and where they spend their time and the dissonance between their words and actions.

“With existential things, we're usually so uncomfortable with the question that we are only aware of the tip of the iceberg, and so we address our worry superficially—for example, through exercise or working harder. Yet sometimes the discomfort does not go away just by working in this way. When this happens, there's something deeper going on—a root cause tied to questions we may not be able to fully answer,” Daven said. “The real work is understanding what is possible to understand and coming to peace with what we cannot. Daily reflection and deeper self-reflection in general help with this distress by reminding us of what we believe in, that we're not alone, and that others we love and care about will carry on in meaningful ways and with our influence.”

The more each of us is willing to question what's really going on and how we really feel, the more likely we'll stay true to our values and continue to be guided by our moral compass.

To engage in this type of self-examination, you must take time by yourself to reflect on the deep and probing questions. As I discussed in chapter 1, you must also seek the input and perspective of valued, trusted people whose values match yours. And, as we discuss in chapter 3, you may benefit from a supportive community for making positive changes in your life. But it always comes back to you.

What that looks like is up to each individual. One person's choices will be different from another's. That doesn't make one person right and another wrong. Balance can only come from being true to ourselves by making choices that are authentic to us and our priorities, with the self-awareness of the likely outcome or consequences.

When I think of Bill, the executive I knew many years ago, it was clear in our conversations that he wasn't self-reflective. He was looking for me to give him some quick-fix advice—like taking the family on a vacation or other check-the-box activities. He wasn't willing to sit down and ask himself what his values were and what mattered most to him. If he had, he would be able to make choices for himself that enabled him to have the life he wanted—whether that meant more or less golf, more or less family time, or anything else. He needed to figure out what was really most important. If that was golf, then he'd have to own that and be honest with himself. Because he said he wanted to have a stronger relationship with his family, however, he needed to take a look at how he was spending his 168 hours a week.

WHEN LIFE GETS COMPLICATED

I don't know anybody who has a simple life. For most of us, it's complicated. We're juggling a million things, and some of those things are really big responsibilities—like children. I know from experience just how challenging it can be for a two-career couple with children to figure out how to balance everything without being surprised.

When Julie and I had our first child, Suzie, we were both working full-time. We didn't make enough money to hire live-in help, so when Julie went back to work, we decided to take Suzie to day care. This required a lot of coordination. Our solution was to be really planful to keep things running as smoothly as possible. Self-reflection also helped identify what could go wrong so we could have a contingency plan. We needed to know what we would do when something occurred so we wouldn't be panicked and scrambling. In other words, we didn't want to be surprised—especially because at the center of that surprise would be our child!

Every day, Julie and I knew who was dropping Suzie off at day care at seven-thirty in the morning and who was going to pick her up at five-thirty. Sometimes that was Julie and sometimes that was me. But there were times when neither of us could pick up Suzie—flights were delayed, we were stuck at work. When that happened, we didn't panic because we knew ahead of time what we would do: we contacted a good friend of ours who had agreed well in advance to be our backup. If neither Julie nor I could get to the day care by five-thirty, our friend was there.

I can't think of a better example of the importance of planning ahead and knowing what you'd do if things don't go as planned. You can't afford to pretend that nothing will ever go wrong. Believe me, when you're sitting in LaGuardia Airport and your flight is delayed three hours, you don't want to wonder who is going to pick up your child at day care.

As I said, we are works in progress. Sometimes, even when we're planful, things get complicated—like when our second child, Andrew, was born. Julie had taken off two months for maternity leave and then returned to her job. On her first day back to work, I took both three-year-old Suzie and two-month-old Andrew to day care.

It was a routine for me by this time: go to day care, drop off Suzie, go to the office. On this particular morning, I had to give a presentation to the board of directors. I parked my car at the office and grabbed my briefcase. Just then I noticed Andrew was still in the back, in his car seat. (And yes, I was surprised.)

I had been so used to dropping off Suzie, I completely forgot I was now dropping off two children. By this time, Andrew was starting to cry. I called my assistant and explained that someone else was going to have to make the first presentation at the board meeting. I had to go back to Evanston to drop off Andrew.

When I arrived, the woman who ran the day care was waiting for me at the door. “I was wondering when you would realize that Andrew was in the back seat of your car.”

I still get teased about that one.

The message here is life gets complicated and we have to rebalance constantly. There are new projects at work, issues with the children, elderly parents who need more care. No matter how well we plan, life throws us curve balls. We have to be ready to take on those things that can and will go wrong by being self-reflective and self-aware.

SURPRISES WON'T WAIT UNTIL IT'S CONVENIENT

In my classes when I discuss the importance of being self-reflective to minimize the surprises, there are always students who tell me that they're going to approach it differently. Their plan is to work as hard as they can for the first few years after graduation, make as much money as possible, and then they can ease up and get things in balance. Often, these are the students who are entertaining one of those job offers that involves 90-hour weeks and constant travel.

This is nothing new: I've seen my peers try the same thing. But if you're not self-aware, it can result in a series of problems. So before they sign up, my advice is that they think about several things. First, how will that align with their life right now? If they plan to get married and have children (not everyone does), then how will intense job pressure affect their family life?

The second issue is how long they intend to work as hard as they can. Two years? Three? What happens if it turns into five or ten? The problem is once you turn it on, it's hard to turn off. You get promoted, the money is good, and it's hard to step away. Now, if that's what you really want, then go for it. Just make sure that you self-reflect on your choices so you won't be surprised. Your life buckets are going to look different from other people's, and the biggest bucket is going to be your work. It's like people who are all in on one aspect of their lives—training for the Olympics, trying to make it to the big time as a musician or other performer. These pursuits will consume a very big part of their 168 hours a week, with little room left over. The same is true for those road warrior consultants who leave home first thing Monday morning (and sometimes Sunday night) and are lucky if they get to come home Thursday night and work in their home office on Friday. Then, a few days later, it's back on the road again.

If you want to do that (or feel you have to do that) for the money or to build your career, then understand the sacrifices you're going to make. There is nothing wrong with that as long as you know the implications and avoid surprises later. However, it's a very real risk—I've seen it among recent graduates and my peers. Even if your personal relationships stay intact, the fact is you won't be around very much. You'll miss birthdays and family parties. If you decide to have children, your baby's first steps will be recorded on a smartphone and sent to you. No judgment here—just be aware of the trade-offs so that you're not surprised.

Now here's the third point. Let's say you have reached the point in your career when you can slow down or take a step back. You have one problem: how do you do that? Are all those things that weren't important to you for three or five years suddenly important? You missed your daughter's soccer games from first through third grades, so what is going to make the fourth-grade soccer games more engaging for you? And what about your daughter? She knows you weren't there for the first three years, so if you're suddenly at the field for every practice and game, she'll wonder what's going on. Will she really want you there?

NO AGE LIMIT ON SURPRISES

When it comes to being surprised, there's no age limit. You can be blindsided at 80 just as you can at 18. And the reason is the same: a lack of self-reflection. Although self-reflection is a habit you can adopt at any age, there is a big advantage to getting into the habit when you're young. The younger you are when you begin practicing self-reflection, the more surprises you can avoid in your life.

One student I know graduated with a music performance degree from a well-regarded music conservatory and gave himself a year to decide what to do next. When that year was up, he didn't have a plan, so he decided to go to graduate school by default. He went to the only school that accepted him. Needless to say, it was not the greatest experience, didn't help his career, and added to his significant student debt. Had he been self-reflective, he probably would have made choices that were proactive and not just reactive. Most likely he would have realized that he needed input from some trusted advisors whose values and priorities were aligned with his to help him figure it out. Instead, he's right back where he was after getting his undergraduate degree: no professional job and no real plan.

Among middle-aged people, I've noticed that a lot of the surprises are on the home front. Once people get into their mid-40s and are doing well in their careers, they immediately decide it's time for that big house with six bedrooms. Every time you talk to them, they're meeting with architects and contractors to build that dream home—which is fast on its way to becoming a nightmare. It takes twice as long to build and costs way more than they budgeted. But finally it's done and the family moves in.

Flash forward about a decade. The kids are out of the house and there they are, two people in a place that's just too big. Now they want to sell that house. You have to wonder: didn't they realize, ten years ago, that their children were going to grow up and go out on their own? Apparently not, because every time they see that for sale sign on the lawn, they're surprised.

This type of thinking never stops. Many of my friends from high school, college, and graduate school are thinking about retirement. In the last few months before they stop working, they don't talk about anything other than how they can't wait to retire. Then they'll have all the time in the world to do everything they've ever wanted to do.

So what happens? Immediately after retiring, they take a month-long trip and then, when they come home, they play golf every day for two weeks. And then it's Monday morning. That's what happened to Sam, who announced to his wife, Jean, that now they could have lunch together every day.

Jean, however, had news for Sam: “You know, I've gotten used to not having lunch with you for 35 years. You being home for lunch now will be incredibly inconvenient for me.”

For all those years when Sam was going 100 miles an hour in his job, he never really thought about what he would do when he retired. When retirement was on the horizon, he never put together a plan for volunteering or taking up a hobby. He had no plan at all. Now that he's retired, he has no idea what to do for the next 20 or 30 years and, to him, it's actually very surprising.