From: Roy Ripper (edited)
Successful people don't do what other people tell them to. So don't set goals to please other people. Do what works for you.
Set goals that help you feel great about yourself. 6 month goals are too far away. 90 day goals are better. The closer finish line makes your current actions seem more significant.
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"Simply hitting a bucket of balls is not deliberate [useful] practice, which is why most golfers don't get better.
"Hitting an eight-iron 300 times with a goal of leaving the ball within 20 feet of the pin 80 percent of the time, continually observing results and making appropriate adjustments, and doing that for hours every day - that's deliberate [useful] practice."
From: Greg Colvin, Fortune, What it takes to be great
You take a recruiter training seminar. The teacher tells you that there is a good way to approach someone you don't know when you are calling her on the phone for the first time.
Are you going to be able to go home and use that right away? Probably not. You have to practice using it to be able to do it well. That means doing it a million times.
But, according to the principles of Deliberate Practice, that's not enough. You have to break the call into its component parts and focus on practicing each one individually.
Let's say that there is a pause built into your initial phone gambit.
The trainer says, "Ask her this question then say nothing. If the candidate does not respond, wait until he does." Now, let's say that this show-down makes you uncomfortable. It seems rude.
You called a stranger and now you are trying to corner him into answering a question he might not want to answer. You aren't going to do that or you won't do it well.
In addition to all the words you are saying, that pause has to be practiced regularly. So when you are delivering your message, you don't try to improve everything at once. You just focus on that pause.
When you can do that well, you can move onto another part of the presentation.
Tips on Useful Practice: Derived From: Greg Colvin, Fortune, What it takes to be great.
1. Approach the action with the explicit goal of doing it better. Just a little better now. A lot better over time.
2. As you do the action, ask yourself: Why am I doing it this way?
3. Get feedback on your performance (from multiple sources). Make changes to improve.
4. Build mental models of anything you are interested in. It could be your industry, company, career. Add more elements to the picture over time.
You will have a better idea of your path forward: where you have to go and what you have to do to get there.
5. Occasional practice does not work.
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From: Lisa Barone
Entrepreneurs are ruling this recession. Why? Because they’re hungry and motivated. They’re out there finding business from places you wouldn’t have even thought to look. That’s the thing, people don’t want to work. They want a job and a paycheck.
While the lessons I’ve learned on this road of entrepreneurism will stay with me forever, it’s a path and a lifestyle no longer in sync with where my heart is.
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Don't lack initiative
People tell me, "I want to be a writer." OK, then write. There's no trick. No one's gonna knock on your door and ask you to write. Just write, dummy. Put your 10,000 hours in (see: Malcolm Gladwell), and be undeniable.
Don't let defeat discourage you
I got fired from Saturday Night Live and fired from my next job, a sitcom, right after. It made me gun-shy. But I lived through it. I kept going. As Charlie Kaufman said: "Do not worry about failure. Failure is a badge of honor. It means you risked failure."
Do start reflecting
I do therapy. If therapy isn't your thing, then go to church or get a Pema Chödrön book for $9 on Audible—whatever you need to do to live an examined life. It'll make your life (and the lives of people around you) exponentially richer.
Be nice to yourself
I've caught myself feeling utter disgust looking at myself naked.. If we were half as nice to ourselves as we are to any f--king stranger on the street, we'd be winning.
Don't get cosmetic surgery
Aging is like a really slow-moving horror movie. When I see people with fillers or weirdo stretched-out faces, I'm like, You look crazy.
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From: Oprah's So-Called Experts, Anne Kingston
The Winfrey TV gospel:
1. Don’t let the conversation lull for even a second
2. Be perky
3. Know your subject. Be well informed
4. Speak to the crowd as if you're talking to the only person in the world
5. Talk in sound bites and know when to shut up.
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From: What happened to Lady Gaga? - Maureen Callahan
I have a lot of experience in this area,” says one longtime label executive and producer. “Artists have a lot of help on their first albums, and they’re open to a lot of help, and they are very smart collaborators and make great work.”
Once that work results in great success, he says, the artist invariably believes they are solely responsible. “Time and again, they feel like they could have done it themselves, and if they had done it their way, it would have been even bigger,” he says.
“So they jettison the people who helped them get where they are and hire people who are less powerful, who let them do what they want. I think that may be where Lady Gaga is.”
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From: Gregory Ciotti, The Psychology of Getting More Done (in Less Time) (edited)
Why We Procrastinate
When we look at a big project we focus the hardest parts. This makes us see disaster ahead and we feel repelled by it.
Just Start Anyway
The best way to get over this bad feeling is to simply start anyway. Once started, we have a natural desire to continue a task so once you get going you will automatically keep going at least for a while.
Willpower
But how do you see it all the way through? Willpower won't do it. It's a limited resource that can be used up. So what do successful people do?
Schedule Breaks
When Anders Ericsson studied top violinists he found that when they practice they actually focus on the hard parts. So how do they maintain their commitment to hard work? They schedule breaks in the practice session.
If the brain knows that a break is coming it won't it won't be so afraid of hard work that it can't sustain. These fiddlers work 90 minutes and then break for 15. Apparently, this matches the natural requirements of your body.
Tim Ferris, however, favours the Pomodoro Technique which recommends 25 minutes of work followed by 5 minutes of rest. Then, after 4 work sessions you take 15-30 minutes of rest.
Deadlines
Deadlines also help you get work done. When drug addicts had to submit an essay on time those who wrote down when and where they would complete the essay were 90% more likely to do so. Students who set dates on their assignments also do better than those who don't.
Track Your Work
Apparently, people who make ongoing notes about their progress toward a goal do better than those who don't. Tracking progress improves performance because you become very aware when you are doing very little or wasting time. You can track your work on an Accountability Chart.
Create two-columns.
Column 1: lists the time-span of your work sessions.
Column 2: lists the tasks you completed during the session.
Don’t create any columns for your breaks.
Planning At Night
Selecting up to five priority tasks for the next day is better done at night than planning in the morning because when you are in a rush to get to work you'll easily cast it aside.
Segmenting
Since we shy away from big projects, it makes sense to split them into smaller segments. Instead of listing “Work on research project” as a daily goal, you only target parts of the research process like "finishing the introduction".
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From: John Grogan, NYT (edited)
As the book opens Ms. Abramson is enveloped by a deep depression after two life-altering events: the death of her beloved Buddy and a near-fatal accident in which Ms. Abramson was run over by a truck while walking near Times Square, requiring months of rehabilitation.
Into this “severe case of midlife blues” arrived Scout. For Ms. Abramson, a puppy was the perfect remedy. “I felt a reflexive urge to cover the top of Scout’s soft head with kisses,” she writes.
Ms. Abramson makes up “lullabies with silly lyrics” to coax Scout to sleep. She marvels at Scout’s “sultry, flirtatious look” and compares her to “a canine version of Veronica Lake, down to her blond, silky fur.”
Ms. Abramson is beyond smitten.
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From: Laura Montini on Laughable Goals (edited)
How do you reach a goal? "Make it so easy that you can't say no." (Leo Barbuta). "It should be so simple that it's laughable." (Tiago Forte)
Say your goal is to become well-read on industry news. Read two articles everyday. That's a good plan but lots of people find it too good to be true.
They can't believe that something so manageable is going to get them anywhere so they pledge to read an hour every night which is something they won't do.
Forte wanted to be able to do pushups. On day one, he and did one pushup. On day two, he did two. Two months later, he's up to 50 a day.
Do the most painless version of your goal. Even a tiny step creates momentum. Your brain wants to do the next step automatically.
Comment: This is a big issue. Small actions seem to be taking you nowhere even though the tiniest bit of imagination tells you that they will.
See also:
Procrastination Tips
Focus on Process Not Results
Do Bad Plans Cause Procrastination
Rigid Rules For Productivity
The Virtue of Short Term Goals
How To Succeed Without Willpower
20 Minute Rule for Productivity
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From: What Would Lincoln Do? (edited)
Lincoln's humor worked to keep everything in proportion. One of his favorite jokes was about a bold, clever fellow who breaks wind while carving a turkey at a party "so that all the people heard it distinctly." The hero of the joke manages to get the turkey carved in the end.
But the ludicrous situation, with its vulgar twist, served to remind Lincoln and his auditors that life is full of mishaps and embarrassments. No one should be surprised, aggrieved or affronted by this; one must simply carry on, jauntily if possible. This is an important lesson for the many frustrations and crises of politics.
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