Personal & Productivity 25 May 2006 09:35 am
Being honest
This is the third part in the series I've been writing about getting my life together.
One of my problems has been to delude myself. I have a habit of thinking that I'll do something later, procrastinating until the whole day is wasted. Electricity likes the path of least resistance, and so do people. It's easy to just sit and do nothing, but if you've done it before (who hasn't?), you'll find that it doesn't make you happy if you do it all the time. In fact, you probably feel pretty terrible about yourself and the direction you're going. Surveys have shown that while humans seek out these forms of "enjoyment" in a passive way — that is by not doing anything — they report feelings of unhappiness while they do them.
On the other hand, being active and in a state of flow makes for a happier, more enriching life that ultimately will lead to one becoming a "better" person. More educated, more accomplished, more of however one directs one's energies.
If you're like me, getting there is easier said than done. It's much easier to simply be a passive observer as life passes you by: it's easier to sit on the couch and watch TV than to mow the lawn and do some gardening, even though you might truly want a nice yard with a vegetable garden. I know I've made a habit of not doing many of the things that I actually want to accomplish by simply being inactive.
Like everyone else on the planet, I have some days that are better than others. Sometimes I like to tell myself (and others) that I'll do X just as soon as I finish doing Y. Often, Y doesn't have a set ending, so I can just keep milking being lazy as long as I like. The days that I do this are among my least satisfying.
In an effort to change this, I've decided to be honest with myself — I can always tell when I'm not going to be productive. It all goes back to that whole inertia thing. What can help the ball start rolling is to talk it out. With yourself or with someone else. I often find myself talking to my mom about how I'm not happy because I can't seem to bring myself to get off my ass. Usually the simple act of recognizing it and talking about it for a minute is enough to get me going either again because I've stalled, or for the first time that day.
You will have some bad days. I do, and so does everyone else. The trick is to simply let each day be new and separate from the day before — always keep on plugging, but remember to happy in the moment, because if you're looking toward some future day where all of your ducks will magically be in a line and everything will be perfect, you'll be sorely disappointed; your whole life will have passed you by because you were waiting for some fairytale that could never be.
