In biology, limiting factors impede the growth of a group of organisms.

Left alone, a group of rabbits keeps reproducing until their population is greater than their environment can support. They can’t continue growing forever — the rabbits are limited by the amount of food available in the area.

In life, limiting factors slow our progress towards our goals.

Limiting factors are typically a few steps removed from the problem you initially think you’re experiencing.

Finding the limiting factor lets you diagnose (and treat) the problem behind the problem.

A limiting factor can take many forms:

• Biases

• Limiting beliefs about how the world works or your own capabilities

• Relationships that drag you down

• Knowledge you haven’t learned

• Fake ideas you need to unlearn

• Missing tools

…

When my back hurts, my first instinct is to address the problem. Maybe I do yoga or rest it.

But why does my back hurt in the first place?

I sit at a desk all day.

When visiting Peru, I walked for miles every day with no back pain.

So why am I always sitting in day-to-day life?

I choose to make money through knowledge work because I see it as more prestigious than the physical labor my body might prefer.

…

My biases encouraged me to prioritize mind over body. Knowing this, I could bring balance into my life and spend more time walking.

One way to find the limiting factor is by following your chain of thinking. Taking a few minutes to think deeply about a problem can help illuminate the invisible. Large problems become more manageable when we see the obstacle clearly.

Find the limiting factor to gain the clarity of a single task.