Category: Uncategorized

Sharpening the saw

Just like the analogy of “sharpening the saw,” you need to take time to sharpen your body and mind. Take the time to prepare for the future. When you a sharpening the blade of a saw, you may feel unproductive because you’re not actually “using” the saw to cut something down. But, in reality, you’re being extremely productive. Because of you being proactive in sharpening the saw, it ensures that when you do go to use it, it will be more efficient and cut more effectively with less energy being expended.

This is why it is important to work on “sharpening” your body and your mind. Eating healthy foods, working out, and stretching (which I enjoy the least, but need the most) are a few ways to sharpen your body. Reading, writing, drawing, painting, doing puzzles, building things, and meditating are ways you can sharpen your mind.

By working on yourself today, reducing your weaknesses or improving your strengths, you prepare yourself for the work of tomorrow to be easier. If your training is harder than the actual event, the event will seem easy to you and you’ll be able to perform better than the competition.

Are you teaching yourself to be resilient?

When life doesn’t go as planned (and it hardly ever does), roll with the punches. Build your resilience. Don’t quit when things get tough. That is when you need to stick it out. Adapt and overcome. If you succeed and still want to quit, do it then, but not before. Otherwise you will train yourself to become a quitter.

Capacities

Be careful not to judge other people’s capacity to do/withstand something. Not only are there different types of capacities/limits, such as mental, physical, or emotional capacities, but everyone is different in what their capacities are for each type. For example, you may be incredibly strong physically, but maybe you’re overburdened at home and your emotional capacity is very low.

Another thing to realize is our capacities are fluid, as they are constantly changing depending on what is going on in our lives. Maybe you just lost your job, your significant other decided to leave you (taking the dog too), and you were diagnosed with cancer. While your emotional capacity may normally be very high, you would probably be at the tipping point where even something very small which would normally not affect you makes you break down and cry.

These are just a couple of reasons why you should not judge others, but especially if you don’t have a good understanding of who they are and what their typical capacities/capabilities are. What you see from others is only a snapshot for where they are at any one particular time in their life.

Instead of judging others before you really get to know them, default to giving people the benefit of the doubt. They can be down one day, or even for a brief period in time, but after you’ve gotten to know them and their story, eventually you will have a better understanding of what their typical capacities are.

Just like anything else, we all have the ability to strengthen and improve each capacity. Are you working on improving yours? If you’re working with someone, or partnering with them, do you know if they are willing to work on improving theirs? You should not focus on where you (or others) are currently, but on where you (and they) are going based on their daily actions.

Success leaves clues

Who are you modeling your actions and behaviors from? Who has already succeeded in what you’re trying to accomplish? How did they do this?

Try to tease out the similarities between multiple people who have achieved success in whatever field in which you are interested. What sets them apart from their peers? Is it their mindset? Their overall strategy? What specific tactics did they use to obtain the results you desire and are there any pitfalls by using those same tactics? Will they still work in today’s world or are the tactics outdated? For example, if that person did something in 1980, the specific tactics they performed may or may not work today. But can you figure out the concept behind what worked and apply that to fit in today’s market?

Success leaves clues. It is up to you to investigate and determine how others’ successes can help improve your situation.

Being proactive

Do you know the worst part about trying to be proactive?

You can’t quantify the results. How can you say that you saved “x” dollars or “y” lives for an event that didn’t happen because you took action to prevent it from happening? And how do you absolutely know that if you hadn’t acted the way you had, that an event would have played out the way you thought? There are no guarantees.

But you can’t look at it that way. You have to take the best action you believe possible with the information you have at hand. Because what’s more expensive? Going to the doctor AFTER you got sick? Or NOT having to go to the doctor because you took care of yourself?

You might as well pay a little more right now to use a gym membership, to pay for and eat healthy foods, and to sharpen your mind. At first, it’s more expensive than sitting on the couch, eating potato chips, but what are your future costs? Try to be proactive and make the best decisions not only for the now, but also for the future.