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Using systems and habits to improve your life is a proven method to succeed. It requires seeing the work as a system and then adjusting your thoughts and behaviors to be able to take advantage of your opportunities in life.
How we look at something is very important. Most of us probably feel we are pretty unbiased and can judge a situation objectively. But the reality is that our perspective will always influence our opinion of a situation.
This is why there are so many differing opinions. We take all of our life experience and form a perspective. In order to see things differently we have to find a way to break away from our habitual thinking.
Read MoreOne the key factors when trying to change habits or improve your habits is repetition. The patterned repetition in our lives is what forms our habits. The more we do something the more likely it will stick.
But repetition is too often overlooked in our lives until there is a problem. We continue to make poor choices until the accumulation becomes overwhelming and we are left with a major problem.
Read MoreToday I was taking advantage of the nice weather we have been having and decided to get out the bike. I was riding my usual route and came to a steep hill in the middle of a park.
Normally I dread this hill. I always seem to struggle a little and it feels like it just keeps going and going. When I finally reach the top I always need to slow down my pace to catch my breath.
Read MoreInstant gratification is something that everyone experiences. Giving in to what we should do for a short-term pleasure always seems to make sense at the time. But long-term success requires a much different approach.
The way to long-term success is actually to give up the idea that we need everything now and instead learn how to leverage time.
Read MoreWe are constantly bombarded with messages of more. Marketers are always trying to convince us that we need their product or service. We value success by seeing who has more fame, more money, more awards, etc.
But do we really need more? A few years ago Herm Edwards, a former NFL coach, spoke to the NFL rookies before the start of their first season playing professional football. What is interesting is that he didn’t spend all his time talking about football. He talked about the players’ life outside of football.
Read MoreFollowing the systems and habits approach, you can start to find ways to improve. You can focus on small improvements and then systematize them to form positive habits. But how do you determine what to improve?
Recently I went to a popular pizza place in Cleveland. The restaurant was very busy and dealing with the typically large lunch crowd. But the ordering process at this particular pizza place can be extremely painful to customers because they don’t employ thought-out systems to run this particular process within their business.
Read MoreSetting goals is an important aspect to business and personal growth. Plenty of articles, books, and videos go into how to craft the perfect goal. Some emphasize that they need to be written down while others focus on setting precise dates.
But trying to create the perfect goal is completely useless unless you understand and focus on the process of achieving that goal.
Read MoreMost people think of innovation as a flash of genius, a sudden realization that changes the course of the world. In an instant everything changes.
But if you explore popular innovations you will see that there is typically a different path. The path of innovation seems more like evolution than it does a stroke of genius.
Read MoreThere are many misconceptions about systems and habits. Many believe that being systematic in one’s approach to a goal will negate the ability to pivot and be flexible. They tend to feel that there is a continuum with flexible and creative on one side and the opposite end systematic and habitual.
But this is not the case. The Tao Te Ching is an incredible book that dives into the paradoxical nature of things. It shows that opposites tend to exist together, rather than separately.
Read MoreIn order to build trust in any situation, we have to demonstrate consistency in our behaviors and in our decisions. Without consistency there isn’t trust. But trust is one of those areas where many feel entitlement. They don’t realize that earning trust means consistently doing the right thing.
A great advantage of looking systematically at problems and opportunities and implementing habit changes is that this will automatically build trust. Others will see the consistency and it will translate into trust that you will behave in a certain way.
Read MoreSuccess often comes at a price that many of us are not willing to pay. Most examples of extreme success come in the way of someone who had enormous sacrifice in order to reach the top.
While this may sound like a great example to follow, it isn’t. Life requires balance. Yet balance gets completely ignored when we are enamored by some glowing success story. But the story behind the success often has a much different lesson.
Read MoreMost of my articles speak to the perspective of looking at improvement from a systematic mindset. Or I spend time elaborating on basic principles of systems and how to form habits to reach a goal.
But these are really the fundamental basics. They are incredibly important but in order to truly improve and grow you will need to expand behind this basic understanding of systems.
Read MoreMistakes happen. Regardless of who you are you will experience times when you do something that puts you in a bad situation. This is something that can’t be avoided. But what is interesting is that your response after the mistake is up to you.
In The Art of Learning by chess champion Josh Waitzkin the author discusses the downward spiral that occurs when an initial mistake is made and subsequently turns into a series of mistakes.
Read MoreI enjoy watching sports, especially football. Every week there are examples of every type of outcome. Some teams win and some lose and week-to-week the analysts seem to make too much out of each game. One loss and suddenly everybody thinks this team is a failure. After a strong performance a player is suddenly in the race for the Heisman trophy.
But somehow teams continue to stump the analysts with performances that don’t seem to fit with their previous body of work. It’s as though football is more complex than a few X’s and O’s.
Read MoreChange is something that most people try to avoid. Consistency tends to bring comfort and change tends to invoke anxious feelings.
But nothing good has ever happened without change. Change has preceded every great thing in your life. Landing that great new job, getting a promotion, finding a new love, moving to a new apartment, having a new child are all examples of times when change causes something great in our lives.
Read MoreAs humans we tend to judge one another. It is ingrained in us to make judgments and form opinions of others. We say that Jeff is nice or that Sue is an aggressive sales person. We say that you don’t want to cross Thomas or that Julie is always there when you need help.
While most of us feel that we are identifying embedded characteristics of someone, we aren’t always correct. The reality is that our judgment of someone might be completely different than another person’s judgment of that same person.
Read MoreThere are numerous benefits to taking the slow and methodical, systems and habits approach to your goals. One benefit that can be overlooked but is very valuable is that people tend to focus on what you consistently do rather than a single occurrence.
Read More“Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.” Helen Keller is quoted often in motivational articles to show that anything is possible. Despite enormous physical limitations, Helen Keller rises above her inability to see or hear to live an extraordinary life.
Her actual quote is actually a bit longer. She said, “Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.”
Read MoreFor some reason our society views letting go the same as giving up. If we let go of some control people mistakenly believe that we gave up. But I have found that there is a great need in all of our lives to let go but not to give up.
Read MoreOur lives are becoming increasingly complex. As we get older and start to add responsibilities we start to get overwhelmed. We add family, career, hobbies, vacations, investments, etc. All of these things add to the complexities in life.
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