self-improvement | The Caleb Barney Collection

A quick reminder to not take life too seriously

Unless the events that are happening to you are life-altering such as a birth, a death, a job change, a (fill in the blank)… if it’s something that is a one-time event that can change the rest of your life, then don’t take it too seriously. It’s not that big of a deal in the grand scheme of things. Will one night of poor sleep affect you for the next 10 years of your life? Will one missed work out mean that you are shortening your lifespan? Will one bad performance or bad review kill your career or business? Get into the habit of asking yourself, “will I even remember this happened to me a month from now?” (let alone ten years or more from now).

Of course, if you let these small things happen often enough, they will affect your life. But you don’t need to stress yourself out by overemphasizing the importance of every single event, every meal, every bedtime, or every workout. Do the right thing most of the time, but don’t stress. Everything is going to be ok.

Measuring success

The popular thing to say is to stop comparing yourself to others. I agree with that to a degree. It should not be your primary focus. You need to measure your performance by asking yourself if you did the best you could. After all, if I compared my three-point shooting to Steph Curry’s, I would feel pretty bad about myself. But if I put in the dedicated practice everyday to get better, that’s all I could ask for.

But at a certain point, if you really want to become better, you have to measure your performance against others. Competition brings out the best in you. Otherwise it’s too easy to get complacent. It’s almost like when you’re working out. Your body can go a lot further than you let it, if only you allowed yourself to really open up/push yourself. But if you’re only working out by yourself, it’s easy to take your foot off the gas pedal. Plus, if you’re never around people who are better than you at something, how will you know what is possible? If they can do something, so can you. You just have to work for it.

So, yes…you shouldn’t primarily be focusing on comparing yourself or your situation to others. BUT that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t look around to find motivation to better yourself. If you’re the best at “X” then you need to find others who can push you to new limits.

Failing as a way to move forward

Failing is learning. Do you think a professional golfer has never lost a golf ball, a basketball player hasn’t missed a shot, or a baseball player didn’t strike out to end the game? You will never be 100% successful in everything you try. Embrace failures. If you only attempt to do things you already know you can do, your improvement will be limited. It’s ok to fail! The key is to learn from those failures – to bounce back and try again! True winners don’t let failures keep them down.

Making choices

Every decision you make is a choice. Are you choosing to do something that will make you better? For example, did you choose to hit the snooze button this morning or did you wake up when you said you would work out? Did you choose to eat a salad for lunch instead of fast food? Did you choose not to go to the store last week which is why you don’t have healthy food options in your house? Did you choose to have one or two extra alcoholic beverages last night? Did you choose to read anything today?

People complain about how busy they are, but busyness is a choice too. Are you choosing to be busy or are you choosing to be productive?

Make a choice right now. You don’t have to stress about being perfect all day. Just start with your next decision.

Don’t withhold feedback

Telling the truth can be really, really hard sometimes. It can be uncomfortable because you want to make other people feel good (or, you at least don’t want to make them feel bad).

But if you withhold the truth, you are actually hurting them. How can they improve what they’re doing or how they’re acting if nobody confronts them about it? What if they don’t have the awareness to realize that anything is wrong in the first place? Make the difficult decision to tell them what they need to hear, even when it’s easier to tell them what they want to hear.