knight

To interrogate one's most pressing problem each evening through a structured self-catechism of questions and answers, converting anxiety into a numbered sequence of concrete steps.

Each evening, sit in a quiet place with no screens and conduct the Knight Catechism on whatever problem occupies your mind. Ask and answer these questions in order, out loud or on paper: What do I know for certain? What else do I know? What does the future most likely hold, whether I want it to or not? What is step one? What is step two? Do not stop until each answer is specific and concrete. Anxiety lives in the space between a problem and a plan. The catechism closes it.

Phil Knight used his nightly self-catechism during one of Blue Ribbon Sports' most precarious periods. His sole supplier, the Japanese shoe company Onitsuka, was actively working to replace him, and the survival of Blue Ribbon Sports hung on decisions he had to get right with almost no margin. Each night Knight would run six miles, then administer the same structured interrogation: What do you know? What else do you know? What does the future hold? What's Step One? What's Step Two? He forced each answer to be specific, honest, and actionable, moving from what he knew to what he could not change to what he would do next. Knight called the practice his "self-catechism."

He was losing sleep over a partnership falling apart, so he knighted after dinner, walking himself through the catechism until he had four moves written on a napkin and the panic was gone.