To get a better life, I have to do the work
Hey friends,
At the end of the day most times, I feel overwhelmed and unhappy. Even though I write what I want to do at the beginning of the day. I find out that when it gets to the time for me to do the work, I either procrastinate or just do something else like scrolling through my Twitter feed.
I decided this has to stop. To gain clarity on what is wrong with me, I opened a Roam page and I started writing. I engaged my self in a brain dump sort of.
I divided the brain dump into three sections: My current state, The reason for my current state?, and How can I solve this?
My current state
In this section, I just poured all my heart/unhappiness into the Roam page. I wrote about what is currently happening.
I have been learning about productivity. But productivity-wise, I am not still happy with the state of my life. I came to understand that it is one thing to learn strategies and methods to live a productive and happier life, it is another thing to implement these strategies. I know the theory, but I'm not practising it.
The reason for my current state?
After pouring out my heart about my current state, to further understand why I'm in that state. I dug into reason for my current state.
I found out the two major reasons are: I lack discipline and I don't want to embrace boredom. Each activity I do at each point in time, I know whether it's the right or wrong thing to do at that time. But when I think of it and I know it's the wrong thing, I just kill the thought and continue. For example, I might be at my desk, I know I'm supposed to stop texting and get to work. I just kill the thought and continue texting.
How can I solve this?
Now I know my current state and the reason why I'm in my current state. I went on to write on how to solve them.
I should be more self-aware. Every time I evaluate my current activity, and it's not what I'm supposed to be doing at that time. The next thing I should do is to leave that thing at that point and jump on the right thing irrespective of my feeling at the time. I understand it's hard, It's boring. From what I've read, and what I'm in turn preaching, it's people who keep going even when the process is boring are those who become successful in the end.
In summary
I understand I'm not doing what I'm learning. I'm not doing anything with the knowledge I have. I'm just sharing it.
To get a better life, I have to do the work.
I must always evaluate whether my current activity is appropriate for that time, and when it is not, I should have the discipline to jump to the appropriate activity irrespective of my feelings at the time.
To be successful, I need to embrace the boring process.
All in all, I should have DISCIPLINE in abundance.
Engaging in this brain dump was the single best thing that I did during this week. It helped me get back on the right path again. If you think you are overwhelmed or unhappy. I recommend you do the same also. It works.
Have a great week!
Daniel
My Favourite Things This Week
1 - Article - I found this Medium post on tips for new interns useful. It was just on time because I was just offered the position of a Research Student at TREP LABS this week.
2 - YouTube - Countries around the world are trying to reduce the amount of fossil fuel they use. Norway is giving incentives to people that use electric cars. Hence, more Teslas in Norway. This video by Vox explains it in full.
Quote of the Week
It’s not that you don’t know what to do, but rather that you don’t have the discipline to make yourself do what you should do, whether you feel like it or not.
From No Excuses! by Brian Tracy. Resurfaced with Readwise.