Category: Action
Moving Fast Is Key
Sometimes speed is the only thing that matters. When you need to get things done, moving fast is key. Rest at your leisure.
Try to sprint through your work day and personal admin. Get through it as quickly as you can. If you linger, you are just wasting precious moments of your life in limbo.
One of the best tricks to use is to imagine you are going on holiday tomorrow. Since you will be leaving at 6am, there will be no time to complete anything in the morning. Therefore, you will need to get those things done today and tonight. Along with packing, of course.
Adding this pressure is good. Firstly, you trick your mind into assuming you need to get things done. Secondly, your priority list will shift around. Many things you don’t need to do will fall by the wayside. Those critical items will be squeezed in. You will type faster, have shorter phone calls and keep on point in all communication.
Think of each 15 minutes as a sprint. Set yourself a milestone to reach in that 15 minutes. Set the timer on your clock, phone or computer. Then, dash for the Done ✅.
Surprise yourself with how much you can do. Oh, and it will feel great having completed so much. All those lingering items just gone from the list.
Moving fast is key.
Your Choices Create You
With every choice you make, you create your future. Each decision about people, places and things matter. Your choices create you as you select environment, friends and behaviours.
All the choices you have made have got you where you are now. Your decisions have influenced where you live. They also determined your income, family makeup, clothes you wear and hobbies you have.
Every choice you have made, big or small, has moved you in a direction. Your current situation is a result of all those decisions. Hopefully it is mostly good. If there are any areas you would like to change, you need to make different decisions for your future.
Want to stop drinking? Make different decisions than you do now. Decide to not go to the pub. Or, if you do, drink tea, water or soft drinks. Don’t bring alcohol into the house and you won’t be able to drink at home.
If you want to get your fitness up, then you need to start exercising more. Stop smoking or vaping. Eat healthier foods. Hang around different people. You will succeed quicker if you have healthier people around you. Also, decide to see yourself as a fit and healthy person. This one decision will have a huge impact on your results.
Your choices create you. Keep making better ones every day.
Keep It Courteous
It is fine to have a difference of opinion. It is one way for us to learn about things we weren’t aware of before. But keep it courteous.
If you find yourself getting agitated and speaking more rapidly, it is time to take a breather. Take a few deep breathes and try to regroup on the key topic again. Alternatively, you could try to get back on to a point that you both agreed on. Then you could build from there.
Refrain from handing out an insult, no matter how much you want to or they ‘deserve it.’ Insults weaken your position. People who don’t have a strong grasp of the facts or have a weak case, might try to sway the crowd with an unnecessary comment. Don’t fall to this.
Take some breaths. Regroup your thoughts. Concede an agreeable part of the point. But stay away from the emotional comment. It may play to your audience (see yesterday’s post), but even many of them will notice you ran out of solid material. You get a short term ‘win’ but don’t really look like a winner.
It may not feel as good as unloading on someone and making derisory comments, but you will be better for it.
Keep it courteous.
Play To Your Crowd
If you want cheers, adulation and support, this is your strategy. If you want the easy route to happiness, play to your crowd.
It is so much easier to play to your cheering, adoring fans. You can bring them along and know what they like. You know their trigger points. Getting them to cheer you on and encourage your commentary happens with ease.
However, this often means they hold an opposing view on the topic compared to many others. So rather than rile people up into some agitated mob, you could use your power for good.
You could weave in elements of the topic which could bring some closer together. Not going for the dramatic in tone and vocabulary could take some of the emotion and heat out of the topic. Adding some useful and balanced information would help people understand the issue better.
The challenge is, this takes a very brave person to do it. Many people prefer the limelight and the euphoria. Few want to do what is better for society for fear of being cast out of their tribe.
When considering what is better, be clear if it is better for you or the greater good. You could help mend fences and build a better future.
Try to inform and influence rather than simply play to your crowd.
Quality Time Defined
Is quality time what you want or what they want? If one of you isn’t delighted, is it still quality time? It’s time to have quality time defined.
Deciding you are going for a walk with a friend, who doesn’t enjoy walking, might not be the best idea of quality time. Do you both have to enjoy the activity, discussion or company? Or is it ok if just one of you do?
When you spend some of your day with your young child, is it enough to just enjoy being together? Or do you need to enjoy the event too? Is it quality time either way?
Encouraging your child to try something with you might seem like a good idea. You will be expanding their horizons and possibly adding a new, burgeoning skill to their repertoire. This is brilliant if they thoroughly enjoyed it. However, if they were not very interested or engaged, is it still quality time?
Is a shared memory considered quality time, even if it is not a brilliant or positive one? Perhaps they learned a lesson, or you did. If it came from a difficult experience, but something good came from it, does it fit the description?
In summary, life will be different for you with quality time defined.
Find Your Fit
We spend quite a bit of life searching. We are looking for something and we want it to be the best thing available. If you find your fit, you should stick with it.
Think of how much time is spent trying out new restaurants or trying on new clothes. Some people like Steve Jobs had a great idea. Find the clothes you love and buy a dozen of them. Then you can wear the same thing every day.
Some people have restaurants they love so they can eat there every day. They know their preferred meal, drink and dessert or pudding.
There is a fine line between searching for the very best for you and settling with good enough. The idea of good enough might mean for now or forever. But sometimes the time, energy and decision making going into something can be too much. You can go overboard with research and expectations.
There are lots of key elements of life in this idea. Aim for the best. Simplify. Find joy. It’s a heck yes or no. Do your research. The 80/20 rule. Reduce decision making. Consistency and discipline are key.
It is a good idea to explore every once in a while. However, for the most part, once you find your fit, stick with it.
Look For Light Everyday
Try this. Every day for the next 7 days find the good in everything you can. Look for the light everyday. Sometimes it can be hard to see. This is especially true if you tend to find something wrong or things that could or should be better.
Appreciate whatever it is for just being there. Remember that the world is just people trying to do their thing as best they can in their moment. Sure everything could be perfect. We should all think perfectly and speak perfectly and have perfect manners. Of course though, perfect in just the vision you have in your mind.
Your idea of perfect might be the opposite to my idea of it. You might think people should get free strawberry ice cream every day. I might think perfect is free vanilla ice cream.
But if you can look for the good in people, places and events, you will train your mind to be happier or at least more appreciative. If we train our mind one way, it can be hard to train it another way. So it is better if you can train it just once. Try to have positive thoughts.
Look for light everyday. Let it become easier with practice.
