Set clear goals!

Not knowing what steps to take has been my number one motivation killer. There is nothing that can make me hate any task faster than feeling insecure about what to do. And there is nothing that can make me end up doing something non-productive than this either.

I’ve of course read about the importance of goal setting countless times. But how much this affects both my productivity and the joy that I feel while creating has alluded me until recently. I’ve literally gotten maybe five times more efficient by just having the steps that I need to take written down, in as clear and specific language as possible. 

I know that this must have something to do with how our brains function, but I’m not really sure how. I think that it probably has something to do with how we waste enormous cognitive resources on having to decide what to do over and over again. This would also be in line with psychological findings about what is called “decision fatigue”, which basically says that we have a finite amount of energy for making decisions during the day. 

I would like to conclude with a reflection. It’s becoming more and more clear to me that there are numerous ways that we can improve our day to day lives to make everything run smoother. And that many of these things are common knowledge if we just go look for it. But most of us don’t. Most of us just keep doing things the way we’ve always done them. And so we keep getting the same results.

Will this benefit me? Part 3

This can also be applied to other areas of my life. Wanting to get things done, I keep bashing my head against the wall, even if I’m worn out. This leads to me doing things ineffective and sooner or later I crash. What if I instead of doing this, simply rest when I need to rest and take care of the stuff that I need to do when I’m well rested and can do them effectively?

Will this benefit me? Part 2

I think that some clarification is in order. What I don’t mean by this, is that I should just force myself to comply with a rigid life where I only do things that are good for me. Anyone can come up with such a plan, but few will be able to follow it. What I’m talking about is to arrange my life consciously, so that I have a plan that works and that I want to follow. 

Will this benefit me? Part 1

Here comes three little posts about how to make life easier. 

I’m a big movie fan. But besides watching movies because I like them, I also use them to relax. But now and then, quite frequently actually, things end up taking more time than I’ve planned. But when the evening comes, I’m dead set on watching the movie that I’ve planned seeing, even if I know that I need to go to bed, because I have to get up early the next day. So I watch the movie anyway, sleep too little and end up causing more stress, instead of relieving stress, which is one of the primary purposes of watching the movie. So, what if I, instead of doing this, save the movie for later? It could even be a nice, unplanned treat that I give to myself some other day, instead of doing some boring chore that I’ve scheduled, as long as it’s a chore that I can postpone.

Changing plans

As I’m writing this, I could have felt a lot better if I had changed my plans the day before. Things ended up taking longer than I had planned and it turned out that I couldn’t do a few other things either. But I still went ahead with the rest of my plans, which left me slow and tired today, when I easily could have just decided to do something else. I am often inflexible in this manner.