Self-Evolution 3D

SKILL.md

---
name: self-evolution-3d
description: >
  Activate when: user says "I've been working hard but I'm not growing," development programs feel
  pointless, a leader has plateaued despite strong expertise, someone asks "how do I grow as a
  person / leader / founder," or high-quality output isn't translating into organizational influence.
  Do NOT activate when: the gap is a specific functional skill (use deliberate-practice instead);
  the person is in acute crisis (financial, health, relationship) — address the acute situation first.
---

# Self-Evolution 3D

## Overview

Treats personal growth as three orthogonal dimensions — **Height** (mission vantage), **Width** (perspective breadth), **Depth** (self-awareness accuracy) — each with a distinct mechanism and failure mode. The goal is to identify the current **growth constraint** and prescribe the targeted move; optimizing all three simultaneously produces shallow movement on each.

**Neighbor skills:** after `cognitive-evolution-stages` for stage context; before [`metacognition`](../../metacognition/SKILL.md) if Depth is constrained; with `deliberate-practice` to design treatment; with `nine-level-cognitive-tower` for vertical context.
## When to Use

- "I've been working hard but I'm not growing" / "how do I grow as a person / leader / founder?"
- Development programs produce knowledge but not capability change.
- High performer plateaued in leadership despite strong functional expertise.
- High-quality work not translating to organizational influence.

**When NOT to use:** specific functional skill gap (use deliberate-practice); acute crisis; external structural constraint; no honest external feedback available.

## Coaching Novices (Adaptive Front Door)

- **Engine mode:** concrete case → run The Process directly.
- **Coach mode:** user unfamiliar or effort isn't producing change → guide step by step.

In Coach mode, respond one step at a time. Each [WAIT] is a hard stop — output only that step's question, then stop.

1. Introduce three axes: upward (mission/purpose), outward (new mental models), inward (real-time self-awareness). Ask which they spend most time on — usually the strongest, not the constraint.
2. Ask which they spend *least* time on. Neglected = candidate constraint.
3. "When you're stuck, what does it look like?" Map to: Height = purpose fog; Width = same framework on everything; Depth = same mistakes in retrospect.
> **[WAIT — do not advance until user responds]**
4. "Think of the last time you were stuck internally. Which dimension was under-resourced?"
> **[WAIT — do not advance until user responds]**
5. Prescribe one specific action this month on the constraint dimension only.
> **[WAIT — do not advance until user responds]**

## The Process

**Step 1 — 3D Audit** (rate each 1–5; do not average — find the constraint)

**Height:** Can you state in one sentence why your work matters at the level of others' lives? Do difficult decisions reference larger purpose or immediate reward?

**Width:** Name 3 mental models from outside your domain applied to a real problem in the last 90 days. Do you reach for the same 1–3 frameworks automatically?

**Depth:** In your last 10 significant conflicts, how many did you understand *as they happened*? Do you observe your defensive reaction occurring, or discover it later?

**Step 2 — Identify the constraint:** lowest score *relative to demands of your current situation* — not lowest absolute score. Ask: "Which dimension, if increased one level in 90 days, would produce the greatest observable change?"

**Step 3 — Prescribe:** Height → write mission statement referencing specific people whose lives you want to change; test: does it make you willing to do something difficult? Width → read one canonical text from outside your domain; apply one concept with specific mechanism ("concept Y applies because [mechanism]"). Depth → after every significant interaction for 30 days: (1) What did I want? (2) What did I do? (3) What did I observe in my reactions *while it was happening*?

**Step 4 — Stop-rule:** Commit to the constraint dimension for 90 days. Do not develop all three simultaneously.

### Output: 3D Growth Audit

```
Height: [score] | [evidence]    Width: [score] | [evidence]    Depth: [score] | [evidence]
Constraint: [H/W/D] — Evidence: [failure mode] — Why not others: [reasoning]
Move: [concrete, time-bounded action] — Duration: 90 days
Progress indicator: [observable behavioral change — not activity metric]
Stop-rule: I commit to [constraint dimension] only for [timeframe].
```

*→ Method in Action: [Florence Nightingale (1840s–1860s)](examples/florence-nightingale-1840s-1860s.md)*

## Dimension Packs

| Domain | Height | Width | Depth |
|---|---|---|---|
| **Founder** | Interview 5 end-chain customers; rewrite mission in their before/after | Read one non-tech book; apply one concept explicitly to current org challenge | Post-meeting 3 sentences: want / did / observed in real time |
| **Executive** | Articulate who org ultimately serves; one decision/week by that constituency | Shadow an unlike-field practitioner one day; debrief in writing | Daily 5-min: emotional state, when it shifted, what triggered it |

*Contribute packs → deciqAI repository (domain + failure mode per constrained dimension + minimum viable move).*

## Applying It Well

- Diagnose the constraint, not the average. H=5/W=5/D=2 is more constrained by Depth than H=3/W=3/D=3.
- Failure modes: Height = high ambition, low grounding. Width = high expertise, low flexibility. Depth = high intelligence, recurring interpersonal patterns.
- Calibrate Depth with external behavioral feedback — most susceptible to self-assessment distortion.
- Honor the stop-rule. Spreading attention across all three produces no breakthrough on any.

*→ Primary sources: [references/sources.md](references/sources.md)*

## Common Rationalizations

**[D] = designed upfront | [O] = observed in real use. [O] entries are more valuable.**

| Fake move | Reality |
|---|---|
| [D] "I read a lot, so I'm growing." | Width grows when you *apply* a concept from a new domain. Reading without application = familiarity, not expansion. |
| [D] "I reflect a lot, so I have good self-awareness." | Depth = catching the pattern *as it occurs*, not retrospectively. Reflection builds self-knowledge, not real-time awareness. |
| [D] "My work is meaningful, so my Height is fine." | Height is measured by what you reference in difficult decisions — personal goals or others' transformation. |
| [D] "I've been growing my whole career." | Are the same failure modes recurring? If yes, the relevant dimension hasn't grown. |
| [D] "My constraint dimension is just personality." | All three dimensions are developable. "This is how I am" is fixed mindset applied to development. |
| [D] "I don't have time for self-development." | Minimum viable moves = 15 min/day. The constraint is prioritization — itself a Depth indicator. |
| *→ Add [O] entries after each real use — paste the actual failure pattern* | *What went wrong and why* |

## Red Flags

- Scores 4–5 on all dimensions: almost always Depth distortion — seek external calibration.
- All development effort in strongest dimension: comfort-seeking masquerading as development.
- Prescribed move is abstract ("be more self-aware") not concrete and behavioral.
- Stop-rule ignored; development spread across all three simultaneously.

## Verification

- [ ] All three dimensions audited with specific behavioral evidence, not abstract self-assessment.
- [ ] External feedback used to calibrate at least Depth.
- [ ] Constraint = dimension whose improvement produces greatest observable change now (not lowest absolute score).
- [ ] Prescribed move is concrete, time-bounded, targets the constraint only.
- [ ] Stop-rule committed to; development not spread across all three. External constraint ruled out.

---

*Part of **deciqAI Knowledge Skills** — 164 open-source thinking skills that make rigor executable for AI agents. The same skills power every deciqAI agent, which runs them autonomously to operate your company. **See it run → https://www.deciqai.com/c/self-evolution-3d** · ⭐ Star the repo → https://github.com/deciqAI/knowledge-skills · Contributions welcome.*