#557 When progress seems slow
When progress seems slow
Maybe even invisible
And still, every day you show
That you know
Where you’re going
That’s where you truly grow.
When progress seems slow
Maybe even invisible
And still, every day you show
That you know
Where you’re going
That’s where you truly grow.
It rains – you keep breathing.
The sun is out – you keep breathing.
You win – you keep breathing.
You lose – you keep breathing.
You feel good – you keep breathing.
You feel bad – you keep breathing.
Whatever happens, you can keep breathing. And you can continue with what’s important to you.
Everything you’ve ever desired can be yours
If only
You stay the course
You feel bad because you don’t write.
And when you write, you feel bad because you’re scared of the inevitable day you stop writing.
That’s how you create a self-improvement prison.
And that prison has only one way out.
Intend to do what’s good for you.
Then realize that even if you don’t live up to that standard all the time, you’re still worthy of self-love and self-trust.
Focus on intention, not outcome.
Focus on cultivating elastic discipline rather than on becoming a habit hardliner.
Focus on the general direction of your life, not a day-by-day judgment of your every action.
Maintain a majority vote for who you want to be.
Realize you’re not going to be perfect today – and being perfect isn’t the goal anyway.
The meaning of your life is not in the goals you crave.
It’s not in the results you chase.
Nor is it in the habits you create.
The meaning is in what you do in this very moment.
And the next moment.
And the one after that.
The meaning is in your collection of actions. In your collection of decisions. In your collection of present moments. Wherever they take you.
The Pareto principle states that for many outcomes, roughly 80% of consequences come from 20% of causes (the “vital few”).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pareto_principle
I’m okay with publishing 80% rubbish if that’s what it takes to stumble upon something good.
But if only 20% of what I publish is any good, and I publish one post a week, then on average, I’ll only publish something insightful once every five weeks.
If I publish once a day, then on average, I’ll publish something insightful more than once a week.
This is why I’m okay with publishing a daily blog post.
It’ also why I write pages and pages of stream-of-consciousness journaling every day, most of it rubbish, whining, scattered thoughts, if that’s what it takes to get to that one insight or breakthrough. Sculpting away, day by day.
Write more rubbish, and you’ll write more good stuff too.
Volume matters.
Playing the guitar hasn’t taught me to move my hands and fingers across strings. It has taught me to persevere whenever I’m failing over and over again until suddenly, it all clicks and the words, music, or movements flow.
Yoga hasn’t taught me to put my body in awkward poses. It has taught me to be aware of – and release – the tension in my body whenever I sit, walk, stand, and run.
Taking cold showers hasn’t taught me to withstand cold water. It has taught me to know to relax whenever my body tenses up in stress and my heart starts racing.
Learning a foreign language hasn’t taught me to say the same things with different words. It has taught me that there are different ways of perceiving the wordless world around me, and expressing what I feel inside.
When we isolate insights, most of the learning is lost on us.
Learn thematically. Ask yourself, “Where else does this apply?”