When giving up is winning
Perhaps you’ve attended the same classes I have. Self improvement, time management, fitness training, or business coaching. While it is exciting to embrace the idea that we can in fact improve, often times we are setting ourselves up for disappointment because we are in fact, fighting with ourselves. Welcome to Friday’s Food for Thought, brought to you by Open Mortgage, where better is possible.
The odyssey of self-discovery and improvement has many rewards. What often is ignored is when we should quit pushing the same rock uphill and instead reevaluate if we are forcing ourselves into someone else’s ideals or or own.
Time is more than a sequence of events or controlling how we interact with our daily obligations. Chaos, abnormally long hours, diminished health, strained relationships, and procrastination are all good indicators that the wheels have begun to fall off the wagon. One of the biggest traps we can fall into is the quest for efficiency versus being strategic. Let me give you an example.
Is your workload unmanageable? Does your to-do list far exceed your available time? You could be getting a reality check. In our ‘do-more’ society being busy has been mistaken as the hallmark of success.
Perhaps one of the crowning achievements of civilization is music. It impacts our emotional state of mind, energy and focus within seconds. “People’s minds tend to wander, “and we know that a wandering mind is unhappy,” Dr. Soodsaid. “Most of that time, we are focusing on the imperfections of life. Music can bring us back to the present moment” said Dr. Amit Sood, who practices integrative medicine at the Mayo Clinic. Do you need some melodic relief?
I am bracing myself. For what? The fact that my once quiet gym will be crowded with those starting their New Year’s resolutions. The good news is that by February there should be plenty of room and machines to choose from during my early morning workout. All kidding aside, resolutions do hold some value but many fail.
If you find yourself constantly distracted at the office unable to work on a task, it’s time to leave. Too often the tyranny of the urgent robs our time and prevents us from dedicating our attention and time to projects.
Despite being a highly-organized individual, I still grapple with worry. Last year with a looming deadline ahead I had an epiphany. As I began to chip away at my unsavory project it hit me- a phrase that was almost audible in my mind- “Action Defers Anxiety”.
“Change is as good as a vacation”. Perhaps. With today’s portable digital technology, many of us can enjoy the benefits of working remotely outside of the office.
There is a lot we were never taught in school. Beyond learning how to cook in high school home economics class most of us were never taught how to be productive. Like most professionals my indoctrination into the tenets of productivity was a self-taught effort fraught with countless mistakes, missteps and the satisfaction of finding a system that works.