Posted by john on September 12th, 2006 — Posted in Cures For Laziness
I found a valuable article by software entrepreneur Dave Cheong called 18 Ways to Stay Focused at Work. Laziness is often a problem of lack of focus. You get involved with doing Task A, but then Task B catches your eye. Pretty soon, hours have gone by and you haven’t gotten a lot done.
My favorite of Dave’s recommendations — which I’ll be posting detailed step-by-step instructions about in the coming days — are these:
“1. Write out a daily task list and plan your day.”
This for me has been my #1 breakthrough in getting things done. Every morning, I write out a to-do list of three things (that’s it, just three measly things!) that I want to have done by the end of the day. It’s been miraculous for me. For one thing, it makes my day much clearer.
And at the end of the day, I feel like I’ve really accomplished something, so I can happily reward myself by doing something I enjoy such as reading or watching a favorite TV show. What you do to reward yourself doesn’t matter, but the key is to have something.
By the way, I’ll explain in an upcoming post why 3 is such a magic number for your to-do list.
“3. Apply time boxing.”
Dave has a good article about that called Time Boxing is an Effective Getting Things Done Strategy.
“5. Do not check personal email in the morning.”
I’ve also found it good to not check the news either. Any site that you can surf on for hours (e.g., an interesting discussion forum, Wikipedia, etc.) should be avoided like the plague!
“7. Listen to the right types of music.”
“8. Use the headphones but leave the music off.”
Silence is one of the best ways to clear the cobwebs in your mind, on a number of levels. For one thing, when you look at the brain, various things can snap us out of what I like to call that highly-productive Zone State — e.g., traffic noises, dogs barking, co-workers talking, the telephone ringing, etc.
“9. Fill up a water bottle.”
13. Clean up your desk.
I’ve discovered a super easy, super fast organizing system which I’ll be revealing shortly.
“17. Limit time on Digg, Delicious, news sites and blogs.”
Like I said in my comment to #5, aimless web surfing can be a time killer. As Dave says, “No, you don’t need to have your finger on the pulse every single minute of the day…”
18. Change your mindset and make work fun.”
I am going to be talking a LOT about this concept in the coming days. Your mindset is the magical key doing any task you want and not having to suffer through it.
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Posted by john on September 11th, 2006 — Posted in Cures For Laziness
Mark Joyner, in his free Simpleology self improvement course, says there’s no such thing laziness and procrastination, because they imply inaction.
You see, there’s no such thing as an inaction. Everything you do is an action. Sitting on your butt is an action.
And all actions have reactions. The reaction caused by sitting on your butt is that you don’t come any closer to your goal — and you probably even move away from it.
You may think you’re being lazy, but you’re really not, according to Joyner. You’re accomplishing sitting around, getting fat, and not advancing toward your goals.
I think this is a good way to look at motivation, because if you have goals you want to accomplish, you will then do the actions needed to create the reactions that get you on your path. So if you need to lose weight, you won’t watch TV (since that’s an action that causes a reaction of your body not burning calories).
“Action and reaction” is an inescapable law of the universe. You are always doing actions, which achieve reactions. “Laziness and procrastination are just the wrong actions masquerading as inactions,” says Joyner.
So now for you the only question is, what is your goal? Do you want to get fat? Flunk out of school? Go bankrupt?
Or do you want to make a million dollars? Find the woman or man of your dream? Train for a marathon?
All actions have an inevitable reaction. The key is deciding on what reaction you want.
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Posted by john on September 8th, 2006 — Posted in Cures For Laziness
Steve Irwin, the Crocodile Hunter, didn’t create his documentaries for the money, but instead because of his lifelong passion for animals. He was “a dedicated naturalist who was actively committed to highlighting the plight of threatened species, and championing the cause of conservation. Steve Irwin was a special person whose energy and enthusiasm encouraged a whole new audience to better understand and become involved in conservation and science.” (Source: Time.com’s Obituary of Irwin)
That, then, is one cure for laziness:
Discover Something You Love Doing…
And Then Become Obsessed With It.
Steve Irwin was completely genuine. He truly cared about what he did. An Australian newspaper last April revealed that Irwin quietly lobbied the Australian government to cancel plans to make a crocodile hunting industry for tourists in the Northern Territory. He wasn’t motivated by fame — only to help the crocs that he loved. (The only way the newspaper discovered it was from Freedom of Information requests.)
Irwin made millions, but lived in a modest house and drove an old jeep. He plowed most of his earnings into his Australia Zoo, the Wildlife Warriors organization he founded, and toward buying up tracts of land solely for nature conservation. Of course, there isn’t anything wrong with being motivated by money, but there’s nothing remarkable about it either. And wouldn’t be better to make money doing something you love, rather than something you have to endure?
Steve Irwin said, “My belief is that what comes across on the television is a capture of my enthusiasm and my passion for wildlife.”
If there’s something for you and me to learn from the example of the Crocodile Hunter, it is to pick a cause to live for, above and beyond just making money. What is something you could become obsessed with?
That way you’ll enjoy your work — and imagine, if you could wake up every day with just 10% of the passion that Irwin had, then any laziness you may have been feeling will simply vanish… since you’ll have something to live for and get excited about.
Question: As an excercise, let’s try this. Let’s say you’ve made enough money to live off your investments for the rest of your life. What would you then do with the extra money you make? Would you put it into buying up land for conservation? Would you donate it to cancer research? To college scholarships? To something else?
Post your comment to let me know!
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