Sarah owned a boutique law firm.
Clients loved working with her because they felt her passion and care.

The problem was, Sarah would do anything to avoid the "boring" stuff.

Case research, document review, contract analysis - she'd find every excuse not to do it.
She'd delegate it to junior associates even when it made more sense for her to do it herself.

Sarah convinced herself she was being smart by focusing on her strengths, but deep down, she knew she was avoiding this work because it felt incredibly draining and somehow harder than it should be.

Last month, she had to stay up until 3 am reviewing contracts for a big client because she'd been putting it off for weeks, and even then, she felt like her brain was fighting her the entire time.

Sarah told me she felt like a fraud because other lawyers seemed to breeze through this stuff, but for her, she was just stuck in the mud.

Today, Sarah not only does boring tasks, she actually finds them not boring at all.


While you are doing any task, you, without even realizing it, are using your 28 thinking skills.
When the thinking skills you need to use are strong, doing the task happens easily.
If the thinking skill you need to use is weak, doing the task is a challenge.
The struggle that Sarah had came from a weak thinking skill of perseverance.


Perseverance
​
Perseverance is your brain's ability to push through on mentally demanding or tedious tasks until they're finished, even when they feel uncomfortable.

Sarah wasn't struggling because she didn’t know how to do the task.
These tasks simply had more details and were less rewarding in the moment.

In the courtroom, Sarah got instant feedback.
She could see if her argument was working, feel the energy of the room, and get immediate responses.
But sitting alone reviewing documents? No immediate payoff, no excitement, just steady mental work that felt like it would never end.

People with strong perseverance can finish tasks that aren't immediately exciting, and they build confidence in their ability to handle challenging situations.
This way, when they delegate, they’re doing it out of empowerment, not out of desperation.

Without good perseverance, even highly capable people end up in Sarah's cycle, avoiding important work until it becomes urgent, then fighting their brain every step of the way.



With Sarah, we used 5 techniques to help improve her perseverance. I'll share with you all, and you take what works for you:


1) Move Your Challenge to a Sweet Spot

When a task is too challenging, it can be hard for your brain to do, and you just want to give up
When a task is too easy, it can be very boring, and you don’t want to do it.
We want to move tasks into the sweet spot of challenges. Not too hard, not too easy.

If a task is too challenging, finding ways to make it easier (such as breaking it down)
If a task is too easy, finding ways to make it more challenging (such as working in an unusual order)

Instead of forcing herself to push through the resistance, Sarah learned to adjust tasks to the sweet spot of challenges so her brain could feel stimulated without getting overwhelmed.


2) Gamify the Process

Turn boring tasks into games.
Set timers, create point systems, or compete against your past performance.

Sarah started timing how fast she could identify key issues in each contract and tried to beat her previous record while maintaining accuracy.



3) Recognize That Doing Boring Work is a Skill
​(This one's powerful and completely underrated)

Understand that your ability to persist through tedious tasks is actually a valuable skill in itself, and suddenly that becomes the real challenge.

Instead of "I have to get through this boring contract review," Sarah started thinking, "I'm improving my ability to sustain focus on detailed work."
The challenge is in building the skill.


4) Connect to The Bigger Purpose

Before starting any tedious task, remind yourself why it matters in the bigger picture.
Because while you may have no patience in doing the boring work, you do (hopefully!) care about why you’re doing this work in general.

Sarah would start each contract review by thinking about how a thorough analysis protects her clients and builds her reputation.
That connection gave meaning to work that otherwise felt pointless.

5) Growing your aMCC
(this is my favorite!)

The anterior midcingulate cortex (or aMCC) is the part of your brain that helps you persevere.
Every time you do a hard task and you complete a hard task, you actually grow your AMCC.
The next time you have a hard task, it becomes easier for you to do the hard task because your AMCC is stronger.

So even if right now the task is really hard for you, remembering that it's growing your AMCC will help you because you know it’s also for the future.

You can take this to a whole new level by purposely giving yourself hard tasks to do,
such as a cold plunge,
running a marathon
or doing a task you really don't like to do but you know will challenge your brain.

Addressing Objections

"These strategies sound nice, but what if the work is just genuinely boring and there's no way around it?"

Sarah thought the same thing. But what she discovered was that "boring" is often just code for "my brain isn't engaged." Once she found ways to engage her mind, the work stopped feeling boring.



Remember, when your perseverance gets stronger, you stop avoiding important work and don’t get overwhelmed by life’s challenges. You know you’ll be able to handle whatever comes your way.



Cheers to Peak Brain Performance!
​ST Rappaport
​Brain Engineer for ADHDish Business Owners