Organize IT

Several years ago I signed up to a gym. My attendance was patchy at best, despite all my intentions and it took a further two years, and changing to a different gym, before I finally got into a routine of going every week. Looking back, I think a lot of the problem was that I expected immediate results. I tried so many routines both at the gym and at home, from trying to go for regular jogs to simply doing pushups at home, only to ditch them within a month. My motivation would disappear because it was so heavily dependent on short term results. As any regular gym-goer will probably agree, results don’t happen overnight.

This short term attitude stopped me from doing so many things for so many years, particularly the books I’m currently writing. Because it didn’t necessarily ‘click’ with me straight away, I’d put the notepad away in frustration and forget about it. Thankfully I’ve got a grip of it, with a little help from the tips covered below. I’m writing regularly and seeing improvement from going to the gym. But it’s not easy.

It turns out that our brain has two sides that are constantly competing between satisfying short term rewards and long term gains (I’m being simplistic here, if you want the science read this). If you’ve ever been on a diet and walked past the cake display in a shop, you’ve probably felt that battle raging inside of you. Because in modern society it’s so easy to satisfy that short term side of you (no waiting around because of the internet, easy access to things because of transport, etc.) and there are so many temptations put right in front of you, for many people this internal battle now represents a well-disciplined army taking on a leaderless rabble.

So, we need to balance this battle. Below are my five tips for doing just that:

• Be aware of that internal battle
  If you’ve ever wondered why you’re always impulse buying, or why you can never say no to a cigarette, now you know what’s going on in your head. Being aware that there really is a short term versus long term battle raging, really gives you a new perspective on those daily challenges you have.
• Break your work down into bitesize chunks
  Short term rewards, whether it be that cigarette packet in your coat, the doughnut on the table or that nice shirt on the clothes rack, are often tangible and right in front of you. Long term goals are generally anything but, and encompass all sorts of planning, tasks and projects to achieve. So, make those goals tangible. Break them down into bitesize chunks of activity that you can do in the short term, and which are actionable.
• Be consistent
  Remember what it’s like when going to the gym. You won’t see results immediately. You won’t get a muscled or toned body in a few weeks no matter how hard you exercise. But if you go regularly and consistently, eventually it will happen and you will notice a difference. The same applies for whatever goal you have.
• Be happy with each individual step you take
  One of the simplest thrills is doing something. That little buzz when you finish a report or finally finish tidying your bedroom is vastly underestimated. Plus there isn’t any guilt attached to it, unlike when you buy a new TV on impulse knowing full well your credit card is almost maxed out. Taking small steps forward satisfies both your short-term hunger and long-term appetite, because you’re getting the buzz of doing something you like and also the satisfaction of knowing your moving forward with that future goal.
• Focus on today
  What? Achieve long term goals by pandering to our short term side? Yes, that’s basically it, and why not? If you’re thinking about what you need to do today to push forward with your goals, that fuzzy future which causes us so much confusion and inaction becomes an irrelevance. We all get demotivated when we contemplate the year and a half it will take to do this or the six months it will take to do that. There’s no way around that so… just focus on today instead!

Related reading

• Ask The Readers: Can Personal Development Be Taught?
• Best Of Organize IT: February 2009
• Write An Article For Organize IT
• Productivity Tips #15: Focus On That Which Matters Most
• New Years Fever! Why Now Is Not The Time For Introspection