Please Note: The Following is a guest post by Bamboo Forest of Pun Intended.

How often do we make choices that are valueless?

Truth is we do it all the time, mostly because we’re not aware we’re compromising our life.

No sane person throws money away. But many of us throw time away. Are you using the currency of your life, time, to generate the greatest value possible?

Currency of Our Lives

What are your goals in life? Do you want a beautiful girlfriend? Want more money? Maybe you want to be happier. All positive goals that increase value in your life.

Problems occur when how you spend your time isn’t used creating the value you truly want. Spending your time in ways that aren’t generating much value is like having a suitcase filled with 100 dollar bills and spending all afternoon at the toy store buying G.I. Joes.

–If you want to be an amazing blogger, consider watching less TV and reading more.

–If you want to be happier, consider doing more happy inducing activities and focusing your mind more on positive thoughts.

–If you want to be physically fit, consider eating healthier and exercising more.

–If you want a beautiful girlfriend, consider approaching more girls regardless of how many failures you’ve had. Past failures don’t hurt you. But ceasing from moving onward to more opportunities that could be successful, definitely does.

As you see from above examples, our time usage either creates value we want or wastes it on activities that don’t. Even worse, our activities often take us much further away from what we truly want in our lives.

Choose What Gives You The Greatest Value

What creates the greatest value for your life isn’t always obvious. Sometimes there are two roads to travel, yet one provides far more value than the other.

I spent three years studying Wing Chun Kung Fu at a superb martial arts school. The instruction was unparalleled and as a result I became very skillful very quickly. Wing Chun is my favorite style of martial arts, too.

But looking back, this school didn’t give me enough of my most cherished value: how the whole experience makes me feel.

Before this school I studied elsewhere in another state. The instruction there wasn’t as good and it also wasn’t teaching my favorite style. But I felt greater connection with fellow students and more warmth than at the “better” school.

Had I been clear on what provides me the greatest value when I was looking for a new school, I would have chosen a different one with more students I connect with and a more uplifting atmosphere. Those factors are much more important to me than the level of instruction or the style being taught.

By being clear on what provides you the most value, you’ll choose the most valuable option for your life.

Avoid What’s Valueless

Many things in life are almost valueless. I say ‘almost’ because bad decisions made in life can be used to help others avoid those same bad decisions. And doing so is a huge act of kindness, filled with value.

That said, let’s examine things that don’t offer value:

Embarrassment. Here’s truth you must internalize: You’ll never regret being embarrassed, but you will regret failing to act out of fear of becoming embarrassed. Read that one hundred times. Then apply immediately.

What has greater value? Approaching a guy or girl which can lead to a lifelong relationship. Or, avoiding approaching out of fear of becoming embarrassed? See what I’m talking about?

You have to determine your choices based on the value they can give you. Make it your mission to live a value FILLED life!

How about self improvement? Are there actions you can take that’ll help you become your best but will also make you feel uncomfortable? Avoiding feelings of discomfort has zero value. Experiencing discomfort doesn’t even take anything away from you. In fact, avoiding it creates self-imposed barriers to reaping more value than you can fathom.

For example, if you have a bad habit that you find very difficult to kick, do whatever’s necessary to overcome it. Go see a life coach, hypnotherapist, support group, whatever. This may be uncomfortable for you, but living how you want to live is invaluable! Discomfort? That’s temporary and not worth compromising how great your life can be.

Generate Value by Giving It to Others

Creating value for ourselves isn’t just about improving our own lives. When we give others value, we’re effectively making our own lives more valuable.

One of the simplest ways to give to others is having self mastery over yourself and being kind to others. When you lose your temper, for example, you’re not giving any value to others. You’re actually diminishing how others feel, which can’t be considered valuable.

When passing someone in the street, saying hello and smiling, you’re doing a great act of kindness, making them feel good and giving tremendous value to them.

Other things such as giving charity and being a considerate neighbor are enormously valuable.

We won’t live on this earth forever, but people will continue after we’re gone. Do you want your mark to encourage goodness in the world or do you want your mark to have made it more difficult for others to be their best? How valuable do you want your life to have been while living in this world?

Doesn’t matter where you are in this life. Doesn’t matter what you’ve done or how many mistakes you’ve made. That’s totally irrelevant to using your time, right now, in the most valuable ways possible for you and others.

Begin.

Bamboo Forest created an online timer that helps you KILL procrastination. He also writes for Pun Intended, a blog that will make you laugh and feel inspired. Be sure to grab his RSS feed for more great articles.

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The more we hone our productivity skills the more rigid we often become.  We determine which routines work the best and allow maximum results with minimum effort.  Yet we are always going to be faced with unforeseen circumstances that keep us from sticking to our daily plan for success and this is when we need to regroup and make the most of what we have to work with.

As a little bump in the road, I had to stay home for the morning to take care of Tyson while Liz got back some of the sleep she was unable to receive after an unusually active night.  At first I was a little thrown off, but I quickly saw the silver lining as I was able to spend this time with one of my most favoritest dudes.

So I just wanted to use this as an opportunity to remind myself as well as the Motivate Thyself readers that there’s always lemonade to be made with the often abundant lemons that life deals us.  Don’t let these unforeseen circumstances throw you off or keep you from reaching your goals.  Just accept the situation, make the proper adjustments and appreciate what you’ve been given to work with.  Then, at the end of the day, you can look back and see the strides you made in spite of, as well as because of, these unique events.

Eric Hamm

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I’ve had my hands full over the last 3 months with a new baby boy, a new business and less sleep than I’d prefer.  I’ve been trying to keep up with all my ‘to-dos’ and not neglect any of the many avenues of online communication that I’ve been able to enjoy over the past year.  Unfortunately I’ve had to let my personal posts on this blog slip as well as my voice on Twitter and in the comments of my favorite blogs.  I call myself a blogger and yet I’ve done very little in the way of actual blogging.

About a week ago Liz and I began to talk about the fact that my home office had served its purpose to allow me to help out while Tyson was getting past those first few months of infancy, but that it was no longer a benefit, but a hindrance to both of us.  For me, dealing with two hyperactive dogs and a baby while trying to run multiple businesses was not working out.  My focus was constantly in a diluted state and seemed to be stuck on a reboot loop.

For Liz, it was the fact that my constant presence in our home hindered her ability to get into a solid routine.  She felt that if I wasn’t there she would be forced to get things done instead of asking for my assistance throughout the day.  She wanted to have the house to herself during the day so she could take care of her responsibilities with zero distraction from my comings and goings.

Basically, we needed to have our own space and time apart.  So renting some office space seemed to be the logical next step.

Natural Light

So I popped online and found a few vacancies in an office building just 2 minutes from our house.  It was a building I was familiar with as I had setup some computer equipment in one of the very offices I was going to possibly rent.  So I popped over there for a tour and found two possibilities.  Both were about 100 square feet but one had a window and the other did not.  Though a bit cheaper, the one without the window felt like a fluorescently lit cave, while the other required no light other than the natural sunlight that came through the large window.  The latter option was a no-brainer.

So I quickly signed the lease and started moving in ASAP.  It was quite obvious to me that this was going to be one of the best business moves I’ve made in quite some time.

Uninterrupted BLISS!!

It’s amazing to me how much more clear your thoughts are and how much more you can get done when uninterrupted space is provided.  For someone who is riddled with ADHD I found my productivity at home to be atrocious.  Even when I did have some quiet time I could never quite shake that largely distracting anticipation that Tyson may pipe up at any moment or the dogs may decide to alert us that a squirrel was making its way across our back yard.  It’s only now that I sit in my new office space, disconnected from any and all unforeseen distractions, that I can calmly type out this post, knowing it will get done and be checked off my list.

I can’t stress enough how important this move has been, even after only a few hours of test drive.  Kind of like love at first sight, you need nothing more than the first wiff to understand the future affect of its presence in your life.  I have no doubt that my future days will be filled with greater strides and an overall more effective focus.  Now it’s just a matter of learning how Liz’s day went.

Eric

How do you categorize something with the title ‘How To Be Successful’?  Do you file it under ‘Goals’?  I mean, success is all about accomplishment, right?  Or maybe you should put it under ‘Health’.  Good health, to many, is a number one priority in life.  What about ‘Relationships’?  Doesn’t a strong relationship make for a better life?

As we set out to define how to be successful and touch on what I believe makes for a successful human being, we have to keep in mind that success is truly in the eye of the beholder.  So it’s not about a specific prize, a ‘holy grail’ if you will, but the ability to successfully pursue those things in your life that bring you the greatest purpose and satisfaction.

Meet Bill

Bill is a forty something entrepreneur from Chicago, raised in a fairly average home, with average parents and an average lifestyle.  Bill did OK in school and even made it halfway through college.  After two years of hitting the books hard, Bill decided that school had played its part in his life and it was time to move on.  So at the expense of his parents peace of mind, Bill dropped out and started looking for work.

Fast forward by about 20 years and you will see Bill, working in one of his many offices, running his successful international company that he built for the ground up.  To put it plainly, Bill is a wealthy man.  Not just financially, but Bill has managed to maintain good physical health, land the love of his life and still put aside time for his precious children.  Bill is no superman, but he knows what he wants and is dedicated to living that lifestyle that fits his idea of success.  It’s not about fame or fortune, but staying true to his clear vision of what life should be like for him and his family.

Meet John

John, also from Chicago and pushing the same forty year old status, is not so happy in his current situation.  Coming from a similar background, but managing to make it all the way through college, John now finds himself struggling to get by.

About ten years back, John got divorced.  A marriage that was doomed from the start, this relationship defined Johns inability to sense a healthy situation.  From the middle management position that brings him zero satisfaction, to the devastating debt he’s accrued over years of trying to buy his own happiness, John is lost when it comes to defining his desires and properly pursuing them through the necessary channels.  Not only is John not successful, but he’s depressed by the fact that he may only be half way through his lackluster life.

Switching Places

One cold winter morning Bill received a phone call.  It was his accountant and Bill could tell that the news was not the good kind.  “What is it Joe?” Bill asked his CPA.  “I’m sorry to be the one to tell you this, Bill, but your company has gone bankrupt.”  “What?!  How can this be?!  There were no signs of this.  Last quarter alone brought us an increase of 15%.  Where is this coming from?”

For the next 30 minutes, Joe explained how some of his employees had been embezzling money from the company for the last 2 years.  They managed to doctor the books so the stolen funds did not seem to be missing.  By the time they were caught, the companies financial infrastructure had been deteriorated and could do nothing but collapse.  Bill was both devastated and broke.

Around that same time, John had found out that after a distant, wealthy relative had passed away, he had come into a small fortune and a large piece of property.  John was elated!  He felt that all his troubles were over and he could finally enjoy life.  He quit his job (burning bridges with his spiteful departure) and moved into his new, much larger, home in the suburbs.  John was finally successful…or so he thought.

A year has passed…

Both Bill and John had now had time to ease into their new situations.  The sting of Bill’s great fall had dulled and John’s new found happiness was starting to dwindle.

Shortly after Bill lost everything, he started working in the same company that John had left.  Coming in as a cashier, Bill quickly moved up the ladder as assistant manager and then manager.  To help lighten his load, Bill’s wife began working part time.  Their kids were in school so they could manage all of this without missing out on the life they previously enjoyed.  Bill valued family above all else and he was not about to let these unfortunate circumstances take away time with his wife and kids.

From the very get go, John had managed to put a massive dent into his new found fortune.  Going on spending sprees, buying all the things that used to seem out of reach, John was determined to debunk the idea that money can’t buy happiness.

He also began hanging out in bars as he hoped to meet Mrs. right.  Using the phrase, “Drinks are on me!” time and time again, John was constantly trying to attract others with his fake confidence and half hidden insecurities.  But when rejection seemed even more prevalent, John slowly found his way back into his discouraged state of mind.

5 years later…

About two years after starting his position as a cashier and then quickly moving up, Bill had learned everything he possibly could about the business he was working in.  Not willing to settle for less, Bill began the process of starting his own company that would sell the same products, but to an International audience.  Before too long, Bill and his family had found themselves right back in their sweet spot, opportunities abound.

John’s situation was not quite the same.  Managing to waste most of is willed wealth in the first 3 years of his obtaining it, John was now looking for work to pay down some of the debt.  With no other choice but to sell his home, John started apartment hunting in the city and crawling back to his old job.  Unfortunately, after his bridge burning departure, instead of re-entering as a manager, John had to start back at the bottom, ringing up customers as he pined over what went wrong.

Interestingly enough, Bill had been the one to buy John’s house in the ‘burbs.  By that summer, there were fresh flowers in the garden, clean cut grass and the sense that a heart transplant had taken place in that home.  Even the neighbors seemed happier as their new next door tenants finally did justice to the beauty of that big old house.

What is success?

People often say that success is a state of mind.  That if you want to be satisfied with life, be satisfied with life.  But this doesn’t deal with the fact that a desired destination requires the proper mindset and discomfort in the current state.  Not that we can’t be satisfied every step of the way, but that if that satisfaction becomes too comfortable, we risk standing stagnant, never venturing forth into the world of possibility.

John was all about comfort.  A man of the moment, he never planned for the future or learned from his past.  John’s vision of success was extremely insignificant as he accepted his new found fortune as a quick fix for boredom and low self-esteem.

While John spent a lot of his time figuring out how he was going to spend his next dollar, he missed out on the big picture.  He couldn’t seem to visualize the pitiful life he lived.  He was oblivious to his lack of relational connection.  He mistook money for a brief moment of fun, while great opportunity floated on by.

Bill, on the other hand, was less interested in when his next lunch break was and more so in the possibilities that were right around the corner.  He fed off the love of his family and never grew restless as he worked hard to pull himself back up.  He enjoyed each moment, but couldn’t help be aware of a much bigger picture.

Where John could see his job as nothing more than a way to pay his bills, Bill was taking every opportunity to learn from his new circumstances.  Neither one was given more from the start, but while John was lost in his own sea of self-medicating escapism, Bill knew nothing more than a healthy, happy life.

To answer the question, ‘How To Be Successful’, we have to see the key ingredient to success.  It’s our mindset that makes or breaks our ability to succeed.  It’s our comfort or discomfort in different circumstances that determines our direction.  Just like John could no more be successful than then sky could be orange, Bill was incapable of settling for less than success.  For Bill, it wasn’t a matter of thinking through each situation and determining which way to fork when following the road to greater opportunity, but instead it was his natural instinct that led the way.  Just like a cat could never be comfortable in water, neither could Bill just sit in a situation that failed to bring him and his family closer to their own personal goals.

10 Keys To A Successful Human Being

I wrote a guest post on this at Pick The Brain called ‘10 Traits of a Successful Human Being‘, if you’d like to go further with the topic, but here are 10 more tips to expand on my points.

1. Know How To Be Happy: If you don’t know the ingredients of a complicated recipe, I’d suggest that you find them before you start cracking open eggs.  If you are unable to be happy right where you are (not necessarily satisfied, but happy), than you will have a hard time reaching your goals.  Distraction is one of our greatest deterrents to success and few things take away our focus more than being unhappy.
2. Know How To Motivate Yourself: No one is going to push you harder or more effectively than yourself.  It is up to us to light our own internal fires and push ahead with vigor.  We need to know the ins and outs of our deepest desires, the triggers to our forward motion.  Dreams are made and goals are set, but with out proper self-motivation, we’re dead in the water.
3. Know how to love and be loved: We assume that because we have feelings, we know how to enjoy a healthy relationship, but anyone who has enjoyed a successful one, knows it’s a lot of hard work.  If we are unable to enjoy those around us, how can we consider ourselves a success.  There are many millionaire misers out there who are no more successful than a homeless person sleeping on the streets.
4. Know that the steps to success come one at a time: In this hectic 21st century society, it is so easy to be deceived into thinking that taking on the World has to happen all at once.  The fact is, this mentality does nothing more than overload us with busyness.  To be successful we need to be efficient in our pursuit of goals and a deluge of to-dos is not going to get us there.
5. Know the value of JUST ENOUGH: John never knew exactly what he wanted.  All he knew was that he never had it.  Bill, on the other hand, always new his sweet spot in life and rarely wandered far from this place.  Being successful in life isn’t about how much we have, but how close we are to having JUST ENOUGH.
6. Know how to deal with negative feedback: Whether it be constructive criticism or hateful slander, we can be assured that our road to success will be bumpy as we endure the blows of those around us.  We can’t afford to be unprepared.  Motivation turns into momentum, but improperly filtered feedback will stop us dead in our tracks.
7. Know how to relax: As important as motivation, rejuvenation is certainly a key to success.  Knowing how to get a good night’s sleep as well as reaching a relaxed state in the heart of a stressful situation is crucial for both current satisfaction and future destination.
8. Know how to get out of your comfort zone: One of the greatest deterrents for success is our inability to breach the boundaries of our comfort zones.  Fear of the unknown, coupled with a soft, un-calloused psyche, we see no other option, but to stagnate.
9. Know how to avoid self-destructing: We often have the perfect plan in our heads as we start our journey of success.  We base our future actions on what we believe is right around the corner.  But what happens when things go much differently?  How do we react when stage 2 can’t happen because stage 1 took us in a different direction?  We must remain flexible and ready to adjust our course when necessary.  We can’t control life, but we can control our reaction to it.
10. Know that it’s never to late to change your life: Whether we’ve been stuck in a hole all our lives or have just recently fallen into one, there’s no time like the present to dig ourselves out and make the move toward our own brand of success.  To know how to be successful is to know that tomorrow is ALWAYS a new day.

Final Thoughts

John’s vision was anything but robust.  Easily distracted by activities of insignificance, John could never truly know a life of success.  He was condemned by a minute mindset and falsely established idea of happiness.  John wasn’t unsuccessful, he was completely blind to it.

Bill may have seen his days both on the top and on the bottom, but as far as he was concerned, it was all apart of the journey.  Never seeking a definite destination, Bill only desired wisdom, good health and strong relationships with those around him.  For Bill, success was a mindset that turned into a positive physical outcome, not a single action that resulted in riches. You could take away Bill’s achievements, but you could never separate him from his passion for prosperity.

“Try not to become a man of success, but rather try to become a man of value.” ~ Albert Einstein

Eric

If you want to delve deeper into this question of how to be successful, I would encourage you to check out these additional articles:

• 5 Fundamentals for Success in Life
• When Success Becomes Meaningless, It’s Time to Drop Out
• Re-Centering: Finding Your Way Back To The Life You Meant To Live
• Sink or Swim
• The Personal Development Dilemma: Striving Vs Self-Acceptance
• What is YOUR value and how do you MAXIMIZE it?
• Personal Development Roadblocks – “The Situation”
• How To Start A Small Business
• The Tradeoffs Of Owning Your Own Business Vs Working A Day Job
• Ask For What You Want

The multitasking versus single-tasking debate is dead.  The fact is, what we consider multitasking is just single-tasking with multiple focus reboots.  So I’m not here to debate a dead issue, I’m here to help you become much more efficient and effective in your single-tasking efforts.  In this guide to single-tasking success I will be using the good old computer analogy as many can relate to the causes of slow computing and how this is very accurate to our own personal productivity paralysis.

Focus Reboots

A few months ago I published a post called “Minimize Your Focus Reboots“.  The basic premise of the piece was that just like a computer begins to slow down when it is taking on multiple tasks, so too does our focus begin to bog when we bombard it with multiple mental grabbers at one time.  I then took it a step further as I talked about complete focus reboots.  When something completely takes us away from the task at hand, we find that our productivity goes out the window.  Just like a computer can take forever to reboot, our focus can’t just turn off and then back on.  We have to go through the reboot process as we reload our thoughts and memories that are essential to the task in question.

Single-Tasking Success Begins With Belief

If you are not completely convinced that multitasking is a myth and that learning effective single-tasking techniques is the way to productivity progress, than this post is not for you.  The temptation to multitask is stronger than ever as our ADHD mentality tells us to take on ten things at once.  When I try to tackle a particular task and do so in a singular fashion, it is all I can do not to let my focus wander.  Not just out of boredom, but with the unrealistic idea that I can somehow take on more and still maintain my current momentum.  Like anything else, if you’re not completely convinced of the power that is possible with pure single-tasking, you’ll never reach your full productivity potential.

Effective Single-Tasking: Not Possible Without Proper Priorities

One of the reasons we insist on sticking with the myth of multitasking is our fear of forgetting our most important responsibilities.  We convince ourselves that if we keep a finger on each of our daily tasks we will never miss that check mark next to its place on our to-do list.  The problem with this mentality is that it requires that we dull our focus.  One of the great benefits of effective single-tasking is razor sharp focus that breeds our best results.

To combat this fear and ensure that our most important priorities are properly tended to, we must become expert to-do-listers.  I don’t care if you use a pen and paper, a website or a whatever form works.  The bottom line is that if it’s not noted somewhere that task ‘A’ is to be accomplished before task ‘B’ and ‘C’, we run the risk of a sleepless night as we lay in frustration, pining over our misguided efforts.  Take it from me, Mr. ADHD, if I let myself single-task the wrong priority I may find that hours have gone by with no results that needed to occur.

Effective Single-Tasking Requires A Reward

One of the reasons I default to the myth of multitasking is because it allows me to dabble in interests as I also grind out the necessities.  The more I purify my single-tasking efforts, the greater the need for a carrot on the end of the stick.  Depending on the task, if it’s truly being tackled with a singular focus, there is a strong possibility that boredom can swoop in and distract my efforts.  My mythical multitasking ways may be diluted with multiple focus reboots, but at least I keep myself entertained.

• The reward of satisfaction. The more we find single-tasking success, the greater our productivity output will become.  Each day that ends with our own personal pat on the back will be one more reminder of how good it feels to actually GET THINGS DONE.  This satisfaction is an excellent carrot to dangle as we push through the pain of a passionless task.
• Mixing it up. As I mentioned earlier, when attempting to do multiple things at one time, I dabbled in both enjoyable and grueling tasks.  This was a great tactic for sustained stimulation, but terrible for productivity.  So just apply this to proper single-tasking and you’ve got a great balance that will not only knock out the necessary to-dos, but will keep you coming back for more.  (TIP: Try to keep the fun tasks from consuming too much time.  They’re there for a refreshing reward, not a time hungry activity.)
• Clearly define your efforts. Night’s, weekends and vacations.  What do all these have in common?  They represent a clearly defined time to take a break.  Our brains need rest and relaxation to fully focus when required.  When we blur these lines that separate work from play, we inevitably blur the effectiveness of our focus.  Single-tasking, like any other attempt at productivity, will always be performed at it’s greatest potential when the proper balance is accomplished.
• Time. Our greatest recourse, time is a precious commodity we cannot afford to waste.  And yet we waste so much of it by trying to beat the system.  Stick with one thing at a time.  You’ll get it done, out of the way and off your plate.  The reward is easy to see as our time to do what we want will inevitably increase.

Don’t Take It From Me, Take It From Your Dell

Based on the idea that multitasking is a myth and single-tasking is the only way we truly focus, the question turns from ‘multitasking or single-tasking?’ to ‘how to effectively single-task?’  But if you’re not yet completely convinced of the myth of multitasking effectiveness, just look at the computer you’re sitting next to right now (or possibly holding in your hand).

Let’s say you have a stack of bills that need to be knocked out.  You sit down and start hacking away (the computer equivalent to running a virus scan).  Though this is purely busywork and requires zero deep thought, your focus still needs room to effectively get it done.  Now let’s say a friend comes over and starts to chat with you (the computer equivalent to surfing the Internet).  What happens?  As your friend chats away, your ability to efficiently pay your bills goes WAY down.  Each thought and question that comes out of their mouth takes that much more focus away from the task at hand (as you open your web browser and jump from website to website, your virus scan slows, as does your surfing session.)  If you were to tell your friend to come back in a half hour so you could finish your task, you’d be done much quicker and then have a much more meaningful conversation as you are actually able to focus completely on your friend (let the virus scan finish and THEN surf the Net.)

Single-Tasking Benefit: Always Make It To Your Destination

Let’s say you’re driving down the road, headed toward a specific destination.  On the way you decide to take a detour to say hi to a friend.  After leaving your friends house you realize how close you are to your favorite ice cream shop.  So you stop in and get a sweet treat.  A few minutes later, as you start to head back to the main road, you realize that a bathroom break is an absolute must.  Now you’ve got to find the nearest gas station with a bathroom.  Unfortunately it’s in the opposite direction of your original destination and you just realized the time; YOU’RE LATE!

I could go on and on, but you get the point.  Often times when we veer off course, we risk failing to reach our destination.  The attempt to multitask can easily end up this way.  Without the super sharp focus of our target and clarity that only comes from a singular thought process, we’re libel to fall prey to this disastrous cycle of distraction.

The More You Take On, The More Important This Becomes

Recently I launched my affordable web design business.  Already having hundreds of local computer consulting clients and a strong connection with this blogging community, I’ve quickly become busy with business.  Almost instantly I realized the downfall of my past multitasking ways.  Getting very little done while trying to do five things at once, I bit the bullet and began to dictate my duties with a one-at-a-time directive.  All of a sudden my productivity increased substantially as I excitedly checked off my tasks.  Instead of waffling back and forth, feeling overwhelmed with a myriad of focus reboots, I could finally breathe.  Before I began this new venture, I was able to get by with my attempts to take it on all at once, but now I’m sold on the fact that it is with a single-tasking focus that our greatest productivity prevails.

The 5 Steps To Single-Tasking Success

To sum it all up, here are 5 steps to make it happen.

1. Pick Your Priorities: As stated above, when picking a task to single out it’s always best to start at the top of your priorities.  Get done those things that absolutely NEED to get done.  Like I said, your sleep depends on it!
2. Limit Your Tasks: Once you’ve got your priorities straight, it’s time to narrow the days tasks to just a few.  I like to stick with 2 to 4 must-dos and then mix in 1 or 2 light ones for a break in between.  (My ADHD can only handle so much of a single-task.)
3. Remove Distractions: Turn off your phone, email, Twitter, etc…  Check in a few times if needed, but keep it to a minimum.
4. Track Your Progress: Keep yourself driven by seeing the positive results that follow your single-tasking success.  Then, use your charted progress to improve and get more done in the future.  It’s all about momentum!
5. Clearly Define Your Downtime: At the end of the day/week, we all need to clock-out.  Our brains need a clear contrast between work and play.  Keep this line well defined and you will be rewarded with your highest level of productivity.

Eric

To follow up on yesterday’s post, I’d like to go over a few new features and explain how you can use them to get the most out of this blog.  First of all, if you came here yesterday from your RSS reader or Email you probably only saw SOME of the changes I made to the theme.  Be sure to go to the HOME page so you can see the new ‘featured’ layout.  Not only does it look more ‘slick’ , but it showcases the content in a more effect manor.

Secondly, you’ll notice the category tabs that now reside under the header.  I went ahead and re-associated my categories to more specifically reflect the posts.  Hopefully this will allow for some of my older posts to be seen and not just buried forever.

Now, as far as comments are concerned.  You’ll notice the ‘reply’ link directly under each comment.  Click this if you want to reply to THAT SPECIFIC COMMENT, instead of EVERYONE.  Also, you can now create a VIDEO COMMENT.  Just click on the ‘record or choose video’ link under the comment box and you will be able to sign in to your Viddler account (you need one to create a video comment, but it’s free to sign up if you haven’t already) and then record your response right then and there.  It’s really awesome, if you ask me, and sometimes a bit easier if you have a ‘winded’ comment and don’t want to type it all out.  Also, I really look forward to actually WATCHING some of my readers and not just reading their words.

In regard to the video comments, I plan on using them much more myself.  To be honest, my time is becoming more and more limited and typing out replies is just ONE MORE THING on my plate.  This might sound petty, but being able to just SAY what I want to say as apposed to typing it is more appealing to me.  So I hope you don’t mind me speaking my comments more and more.  My hope is that it will actually create MORE discussion, not less.

If I were to point out one specific way to get the most out of “Motivate Thyself”, it would be to post/say a comment and look at my initial post as the STARTING point for learning and discussion, not the beginning, middle and end.  Often times I find that it’s only after writing the post and then reading the comments that I truly grasp the entire focus of the content.  And sometimes I even change my mind after reading what some of you have to say.  I would love it if the discussion could keep going and we could dig a little deeper.  Commenting once and then never returning to that particular post is certainly not going to allow for deeper discussion.  So if you want to get the most out of “Motivate Thyself”, see yourself as a true participant in the discussion, not just a drive by reader.  Just some thoughts. (I only say this to encourage further discussion, not complain.  I enjoy ANY comment you feel you can share.) 

I hope you’re enjoying the new face-lift and look forward to seeing (notice I said SEEING) some of your comments in the near future.  Until then…

Eric

If you’ve read most of my posts thus far you’ve most certainly come across my referring to the whole carrot and the stick analogy. I feel it is very important that we all have things that we can place in the forefront of our minds to help us maintain the drive we need to meet our goals. But just having that carrot dangling in front of us is often times not enough. I have found that it is equally important that we let the World know about our carrots so we will feel THAT much more driven to pursue them.

Think about it. If you have a dream to do something that no one knows about and then one day you decide to just let it go, who’s going to question you? Will anybody even know that you HAD that dream? Will anybody care that you are letting it go? But if you had told others that this was something you were pursuing, you will inevitably get the occasional question about these pursuits. Depending on how many people know about it, you may be asked to give an update on these pursuits on a regular basis. I know that when I get excited about a new goal and make that known to those around me, I find that the next time I see them they are excited to find out how it’s going.

Here are some reasons why this is so important.

• The more people that know about your carrots, the harder it will be to stop pursuing them. Knowing that others will be asking about your progress will put extra pressure on you to make that progress. Without any outside force pushing you to move forward, it will be that much easier to just quit when things get tough.

• Talking about something is a great way to make it more real to you. The more you express, often times in detail, those things that you passionately seek, you will find that they become more clear in your mind and even more effective as a way to fuel your drive.

• The more you express these interests the better chance of finding others with the same or similar desires. Having like minded people to cheer you on is always more effective than getting encouragement from those that just don’t understand. These kinds of people are a great asset to helping you reach your goals and never give up.

• The more you talk about your passions and those things that drive you to better your life, the more you will encourage others and give them a reason to do the same. It’s a great thing to finally reach a goal, but to encourage others in the process makes it even better.

In light of this post I wanted to be the first to share one of those carrots that I pursue. It’s freedom. Freedom to live my life the way I feel is best for myself and my family. The freedom to work when I choose and the flexibility to have total control over my schedule. I want to be able to a take trip when we want to take a trip and not just when the rest of the World says it’s OK. My pursuit is for a lifestyle that encourages the imagination and the growth of a healthy spirit.

Over the last couple of years I have been making changes in my life to move closer to these goals. As I still have a ways to go, I am encouraged by my clear picture of what it is that I desire. So I’d like to encourage you to clarify those things for yourself and share them with the World. Make these dreams known and you will strengthen your resolve to acquire them.

BE SURE to check out my video interview with DARREN ROWSE of ProBlogger at The Blueprint.

“So how was YOUR day? Did you get much done?”

“Well, I guess. I started off OK, but then I got sidetracked for a couple of hours. Then So and So came over and we talked for awhile. By the time they left, the day was pretty much shot anyway, so I just set my To-Do list aside and decided to mess with it tomorrow.”

I don’t know about you, but this kind of thing used to happen to me all the time. I would start the day off with a positive mindset and a list of things that I was GOING to accomplish, but then I would get sidetracked or start to procrastinate and eventually throw in the towel. The idea was that my momentum was gone so I wouldn’t be able to get much done with the time left in the day and I’d be better off starting fresh in the morning.

Sounds reasonable, right? WRONG!!! This is a terrible way of doing things if you are REALLY trying to get things done. By going this rout you are giving into your lazy side and letting it win. You might think that you are not giving in by intending to continue your tasks the following morning, but your lazy side knows that tomorrow is a new day for IT as well. You will be just as tempted to repeat these unproductive habits as you were the day before. And not only this, but you will be throwing away the precious time that is still left in that day.

How to recover from this.

It’s quite simple actually. Just hit RESET! When your computer gets bogged down, resetting it is the best way to refresh its performance. Here is what I do when I have procrastinated half the day away and still want to get things done.

• Go into a quiet room (turn the lights off if it helps), close your eyes and clear your head. Focus on your breathing and just relax. This is your actual reset button. You are recreating the experience of getting up first thing in the morning.

• After a short time of doing this (how ever long it takes to reboot) go strait to the place you normally plan for your day (office, dinner table, etc…) Get out a piece of paper and re-create your To-Do list.  Be sure not to use the old one. The idea is to restart, and using the old list will just remind you of what you DIDN’T get done. Write out the new list as if it’s the first time you’ve seen the tasks. Assuming that a chunk of your day is already gone, make sure to create the list according to the time left. There’s no advantage to running around like a crazy person as you try to do a full day’s tasks in half the time. The point here is to try to recover what’s left of the day.

• Once you’ve re-created your list it is important that you think positively. Remind yourself that you would normally have been on the couch watching TV, but are instead taking responsibility and ‘Getting Things Done’. Be excited that you are actually pulling yourself out of the rut of procrastination that you would have normally laid in for the rest of the day. Then use this positive energy to start knocking out the things on the list.

• At the end of the day be sure to make note of the things you accomplished. Point out to yourself the fact that these are things that would have otherwise been put off until tomorrow and that, even then, they might not have gotten done.

• Finally, write out a new To-Do list for the following day. Not only will THIS now be accomplished, but you can then see all the things that would not have been accomplished had you continued to procrastinate and pushed your responsibilities onto tomorrow.

There are three reasons why this ability to RESET is SO important.

1: How ever you react to certain situations you are training yourself to be a certain way. If you give in once, then it will be easier to give in the next time. And it just goes down hill from there. Anyone can keep up a strong momentum, but what we are doing here is much harder and a much more crucial skill. We are going from a dead stop to positive momentum in the same day.

2: How you end your day has a great affect on how you start the next one. So if you had thrown in the towel you would not only be less productive on THAT day, but you wouldn’t be giving the following day any momentum to work with.

3: One of the goals I have when I make my To-Do list is to accomplish some of the things that will help me get closer to my life goals and dreams. Every day that I REALLY push through my lazy side and ‘Get Things Done’ is one day closer to reaching those goals. So it is that much more important that when I have a rough start, I am still able to finish strong. There is nothing more un-motivating to the pursuit of your dreams than to be no closer to them from one day to the next.

It’s hard enough setting a goal and following it through to completion. But when that goal conflicts with other important things in your life, it’s nearly impossible.

Whether we like it or not we are creatures with priorities. We naturally put one need over another. And if we set a goal that will eventually conflict with something in our lives that is of more importance to us, we will just be wasting our time.

A lot of ideas seem great in the beginning. Let’s say you decide that you want to spend more time with your family. Maybe your job keeps you from having consistent hours and you always feel that it hinders you from being able to plan time with your loved ones. So you decide to start looking into other ways of making money that will allow for more flexibility and better hours. Sounds great, right?

So now let’s say you decided on a direction. This direction requires that you spend most of your ‘off time’ hours working on building the ‘better job’. Early on you realize that it is going to take years of dedication and many of your precious ‘free time’ hours to even come close to getting where you need to be. But the idea of spending more time with your family keeps you focused and pushing forward.

After six months you notice that your progress is less than you expected at this point. You family keeps complaining that you they never see you anymore and they just want it to be like was before you set out on this venture. You keep telling them, as well as yourself, that you are doing this for every one’s own good. But your motivation is dwindling as you become less and less convinced that you are on the right path.

What’s wrong with this situation?

Is it a bad thing to try and ‘upgrade’ your job in an attempt to have more time with your family? Absolutely not! Is there anything wrong with putting in some extra hours and making a few sacrifices for the better good of the future? Many times this is essential to living the life that you and your family desire. So why are things going so poorly?

For us to meet a goal we have to lay out the best, most efficient path for us to follow as we pursue it. If the path we’ve laid is filled with obstacles that are stronger than our drive (higher priorities for example) than we will eventually fail. The problem with the above scenario was that the person was doing the exact opposite of what they wanted to accomplish, while they were pursuing the goal. In other words, the more this person tried to allow for time with their family, the less time they spent with their family. This goal was doomed from the start. The obstacle of a neglected family was too great to overcome. So what is a person to do in a situation life this?

I am a big promoter of positive change. I see a situation like this and will be the first to encourage the person to make the changes necessary to get out of the time consuming job so they can live the life that they desire. But you need to first lay out the path to the goal and look for these obstacles. If you find some, try to make the necessary adjustments that will allow for an eventual arrival to your desired goal.

In this case, this person should have found a way to involve their family. Make it so they feel apart of the process. Have it set up so there is required interaction as you pursue your goal. This may not be the quality time that you and your family desire, but if you all know that you are working together to change this, your chances of success are much greater than if you were to go it alone.

So next time you go to set a goal, don’t just look at the beginning and the end. Chart the path in the middle. Look for obstacles along the way and make sure they won’t be too great to overcome. If they are, than try to determine a path around them. This may sometimes mean that it takes longer to reach a goal than originally planned, but this is always better than not reaching your goals at all. I find that many failed attempts are not the result of lack of trying, but instead the lack of planning.

“Set priorities for your goals. A major part of successful living lies in the ability to put first things first. Indeed, the reason most major goals are not achieved is that we spend our time doing second things first.” Author Unknown.

One thing that drives us to passionately pursue our desired career is the vision of those who have succeeded.  We see individuals who have deciphered the secret to success and parade around in the limelight, chanting that they wouldn’t change a thing.  They’re asked to tell of their tale, the road that led them to the promised land and we’re met with some canned response about following your dreams and never giving up, “Because I didn’t, and look where I am now!” they would say.

But this paradox that I am talking about concerns the possibility of a life wasted, chasing after a dream.  Out of those few at the top of the mountain, how many others have died on the way up, never even tasting the slightest bit of sweet success?  And yet if we don’t seek our goals and dreams, we are most likely going to sit at the bottom of the mountain anyway.

Some would suggest that it is better to enjoy the basics of life and stop pining for more.  I love this idea, but have never been able to feel settled with it.  I’m a driven person, but I think it’s just human nature to dream big and journey ahead.  This is much of what keeps us going as a species.  Without that constant carrot dangling in our midst, we would surely have less passion to spice up our lives.  It’s all a great paradox!

So what’s the answer?

This is certainly a post that can give no definitive direction.  Its goal is to raise more questions than it answers.  But I must admit a certain leaning of opinion on the matter.

As much as I like the concept of sitting on a porch swing, my arm around Liz, gazing off into the distance, I could never be this way.  I love to enjoy those moments, don’t get me wrong, but I find that they are only sweet when contrasted against the spice of the pursuit.

I believe the problem with many failed pursuits and shattered dreams is more about the tactics than the destination.  You can have two individuals with the same starting point and finish line and yet watch one live a life of joy and excitement, while the other wallows in their constant frustration.  I’m not saying the one succeeded and the other did not, but that one properly pursued their passion while the other poisoned their life with it.  This is the difference between success no matter what and failure is not an option.  The first perspective knows that their success comes from their willingness to try, while the latter is enslaved by the fear of the end result.  Both are in pursuit, but only one can truly be happy at the same time.

ALSO, if you’re interested in learning how I birthed the “Motivate Thyself” blog design, check out my post on The Blueprint about ‘WordPress Theme Design Tips‘.