Tag: learning

Changing priorities and opinions

People will change as a result of the circumstances that surround them. We all do, and we all should, as our priorities change.

If you are the same person now that you were 10 years ago, ask yourself, why? Are you still learning and growing? Do you only care for yourself or do you have others to care for now? It’s OK that people change over the years. If they didn’t, that wouldn’t be normal. I would hope that your beliefs from when you’re 18 years old and not allowed to legally drink change when you’re a 30-year old with kids, a 50-year old starting to think about retirement, or a 75-year old thinking about the future of your grandkids when you’re gone.

Your core values, morals, and ethics should be constant. But don’t demonize a person for changing their mind on specific topics. As they are presented more information, they should be receptive to changing their thoughts based on the new information they’ve received.

Ability

There is natural ability (what you’re capable with very little training) and there is learned ability (effort that you put in to increase your overall ceiling for achievement). Don’t rely too much on natural ability. This can lead to overconfidence and a lackadaisical approach to learning, growing, or improving. Don’t discredit yourself thinking that you don’t have much natural ability either. You are more capable than you believe. If you don’t believe in yourself, you’re less likely to step out of your comfort zone and try to tackle new challenges that can help you grow.

Action and inaction

Stop reading (and watching/listening) so much and go think on your own. You need silence for creativity and for clarity. Ironically, you shouldn’t fill up every moment with doing something in order to be the most productive.

By the same token, stop reading and start doing. You can always accumulate more knowledge. Don’t use learning more about a subject as an excuse to procrastinate doing whatever it is you’re learning about. If you wait until you know everything to get started then you’ll never actually get started. Start doing it and continue to learn along the way.

Protecting your time

Be intentional with your time. Protect it…not just from others asking you to do things, but also from yourself. It’s easy to binge watch a show. Be careful so that the 30 minute show doesn’t become a two hour watch session. It’s easy to consume social media. If you keep a social media account, make sure that you’re not mindlessly surfing through their carefully crafted content specifically targeted at delivering the most compelling stories to keep you on their website.

How can you be intentional with your time where you’re doing something to improve your knowledge AND what would make you feel better (long term)? Instead of consuming shallow, surface level content (including tv shows, social media posts, and even many magazine articles), try reading something with more depth.

Start small. Try reading 10 pages per day (from a book). Over the course of the year, this will equate to 3,650 pages per year. If an average book is 250 pages, you will have read between 14-15 books for the year! If you do this for ten years, you will have read 140-150 books.

So many people quit reading or only occasionally read after graduating high school or college. Be different. Set yourself apart from the collective average. Use your time intentionally. And then use your newly acquired knowledge to further yourself in your career or change your life for the better.

Short term sacrifices for long term gains

Everybody has their own “thing” that they want right now – something that makes them feel good or gives them joy in some way. And while we should always work at being happy, we should also prioritize our future selves over our current selves more often than not. If you always live for optimum happiness/pleasure and are not willing to make any short term sacrifices, understand that you’re doing so at the expense of your future.

This can be the case for anything from your financial health, to mental, physical, and beyond. For example, if you want to buy a new expensive product instead of buying a used one (or better yet, not buying anything at all), you have less money to save or invest. If you want to sit around and watch mindless tv, you are sacrificing time which you could be reading or working on a project. And if you want to eat fast food five days per week, you are sacrificing your wasteline and clogging you arteries with trans fats and saturated fats.

Each decision you make today affects you in the future. If you can somehow manage to align what you like doing and what is healthiest for your future self, that’s where you can really make big wins because it won’t feel like you’re sacrificing anything. It all starts with changing your habits for the better. Talk a 5-10 minute walk after every meal. Exercise for 60 minutes per day (it can be cumulative). Eat non-processed foods that consist of a variety of vegetables, lean meats, nuts, seeds, some fruits, little starch, and no extra/added sugars. Meditate, pray, or write down what you’re grateful for when you wake up. Read at least 10 minutes per day. Try to make it a game to see how little you can spend each week. Other than investing and paying for your mortgage/rent, utilities, cell phone, car/car maintenance, and groceries, do you need to spend on anything else or can you wait? The longer you can hold off or sacrifice on doing things that don’t promote long term benefits, the better off you’ll be.