Bread and Butter Personal Development!

[ULFBERHT]

Aw yeah! I know that lately, Leo has been taking a turn for the more mystical, esoteric, and profound. That's cool. I love the content, but I was journaling today and I realized that I had some important insights about the more mundane aspects of personal development that have been working really well for me lately, so I'd thought I'd share.

New habits only hurt for the first little bit:

I noticed a pretty significant pattern as it pertains to good habit acquisition: it only hurts for a little bit. You know that pang of resistance you get when you first try to start something new? Well, I've implemented a few new habits lately, and I found that those pangs are strong at first but tend to subside after a month or so. Depending on the habit it may take more or less time, but this is the general pattern I've noticed with habit acquisition. Lately I've been getting up at 4:20 am, lifting every morning in my garage, studying everyday, doing affirmations/ visualizations every night, and working on a concentration practice everyday. My habits aren't perfect yet, but they're pretty strong. I noticed that after enough time they get to feeling pretty natural, and then it hurts NOT to do them. New, healthy habits are closer at hand than you think.

The amazing power of to-do lists:

To-do lists, both daily and long term, are probably one of the most under-utilized productivity tools out there. I work as a millwork engineer, and late last year my boss and I decided that we could boost our shop's productivity and efficiency if we got a CNC router to machine our parts. To get us prepared to make this shift in technology, I knew there was a laundry list of technical things I had to work out on our engineering software to get us on the right track. So, I wrote down everything I needed to do on a whiteboard next to my desk and starting chipping away at those goals everyday. The progress I've made is substantial and my boss has been loving the output. Basically, if it goes on the whiteboard, sooner or later it gets done. I've even noticed that sometimes I'll have spontaneous solutions to problems that have been plaguing me, although most of the time I've just got to sit down and work things out.

This to-do list has been so powerful that I've implemented it into my daily life as a time-management and productivity tool. Every night I sit down for five minutes and write out what I'd like to accomplish the next day. I don't always get to everything or do everything perfectly, but it beats having everything rolling around my head and stressing about deadlines and obligations. If you're trying to get your foot in the door with basic PD, you ain't too good for to-do lists.

 

Just show up:

In addition to working full-time, I'm also working toward a degree as part of fulfilling my life purpose plan. I've noticed that even though I like school and that I've developed a reliable study habit, sometimes I don't want to do the work. What I've realized is that drudgery is not a bug, it's a feature, at least in my experience. You have to make peace with the fact even though you may have a beautiful life purpose plan, part of that plan must necessarily be to just sit your butt in the chair and do the work. I've found that viewing drudgery as an opportunity to build your character instead of something to avoid at all costs takes the sting out of a loathsome study session or a difficult task at work. It's all serving a grander purpose. That said, just show up. Do it badly, if you have to, but just show up and get something done as opposed to nothing. Doing nothing is the black hole of PD. Doing something imperfectly is the path.

 

[d0ornokey]

[DoubleYou]

Thanks for this. 

 

[PT89]

@ULFBERHT  great post, love the "just show up" mentality.