You can be cool too..when you do what you already ‘know’ to do.
“I know.”
That’s what I hear from one of my sons on a daily basis. It’s the automatic line his mouth spits out whenever I remind him of something or call him out on something that should’ve been done…but is not.
“Dude, you should take 15 minutes and just do it now, then it’s done and off your plate (‘it’ being anything he needs to do).”
“I know.”
“Hey buddy. Please put the lawn chair away.”
“I know.”
Lawn chair now thrown onto floor in the garage.
“Please go and hang the lawn chair on the wall hook in the garage and get it off the floor.”
“I know.”
Right now, some of you without kids are saying to yourself, “When I have kids they’ll do what I say the first time.”
That’s cute that you think that now.
Back to the story…
Me, now standing toe to toe with a ticked off 13 year old who has been rudely inconvenienced by my simple request. Nevermind, that if the chair was put on the wall hook right away we wouldn’t still be using our precious brain cells and oxygen 3 hours later resolving this issue.
But….
“He knows.”
Simplicity Works
The scenario I mention above happened a few days ago at my house. And, it is really funny in a stupid kind of way that we wasted part of our lives having that discussion.
All he needed to do was hang up a lawn chair. 1 minute and 30 seconds tops. That’s it. Over. Done. Move on.
But, my little ‘know-it-all” complicated it simply because he didn’t do the first simple thing that needed to be done.
Don’t we do the same though? I know I frequently complicate things for myself, which then go on to cause stress and bigger problems.
Below, are 3 simple things you already “know,” but probably are not doing and it’s making your life harder. This week, try to actually do what you “know” to do and see how it works out for you!
Here they are in no particular order:
1. Plan your day the night before.
I was really good at this for a while. Lately, I’ve slacked. The result has been a life of reaction instead of intentional and purposeful work.
When we plan the night before, our mind starts working on it as we sleep. The cool thing about this is that you wake up and hit the ground running instead of wasting half the day farting around and looking busy.
2. Do your highest impact activities first thing each day.
In order to reach our goals we need to take small, focused steps each day. These little steps done consistently over time will take you to your goals.
Unfortunately, most of us have huge ‘to do’ lists and have no idea what the top 3-4 things are…the high impact things.
Here’s an assignment for you today:
- Write down everything you do each week
- Write down your top 3 goals (career or life)
- Answer this: What are the top 3 things on the list of everything I do that will get me closer to my goals?
- Put those 3 things on your calendar for tomorrow morning.
- Do those 3 things first. Then, move on to the rest of the list.
- Repeat until goals are reached.
3. Take care of yourself.
In America, we are a fat, sad and broke bunch of people. I love this country (I’m a US Marine), but wow…are we out of shape.
Our personal income and happiness levels have shrunk with every pound we gain.
We eat crap. We don’t sleep or move our bodies enough. Our lives are crammed full of processed food and more and more ‘stuff.’
When you take care of your mind, soul and body you will be happier, more optimistic, have more energy and be stronger in every way. This will lead to you being more productive and reaching more of your goals. You’ll have more energy for your kids, your work and everything else in your life.
There are many things that we “know” we should be doing. The list for all of us could be longer. But, today…this week…this month…let’s focus on these 3 things.
