Time Boxing by pokerwithoutcards
Time boxing is the act of sectioning off a particular amount of time for an activity.
One way it can be used is to stop procrastination and move into action.
In other words if you tell yourself, “I am only going to spend 30 minutes on this project,” you might spend more than 30, but the promise that you have permission from yourself to quit after that time is very reassuring. It gets you to take action.
The other way it can be used is to control how your working. I forgot what the “law” is called, but essentially there’s a doctrine that states that a task inflates itself to the amount of time allocated to it.
That means if you act as if you have unlimited time for a particular task, you will spend a long time on details that perhaps does not impact the final result that much if at all.
If, instead, you allocate a certain amount of time, you will do ONLY those things that are necessary to move it into completion.
Example:
“I want to clean up my house”
Problems: Too big chunk, unspecified, looks/sounds/feels like a big task.
Solutions:
a) Chunk down. “I will clean off this desk, that desk, and this other thing.”
GET SPECIFIC. Get as specific as you need to be. If it appears overwhelming, keep chunking down and do a few steps at a time.
You can solve any goal by simply taking it a few steps at a time. The biggest challenge in anything that you have to do is to GET STARTED and take action. Make a plan, and then LAUNCH immediately.
b) Time box. “I will spend only an hour today cleaning up the kitchen. If I get the kitchen clean before then, I get to stop. If I’m still working in the kitchen after an hour has passed, I get to stop.”
By setting up rules for how you will do it, you actually DO something towards the task, and you relieve yourself from any guilt.
Use these things in your life, and you will be successful.
Taking Action by Exiled
Hey Everyone,
When most people think of personal development we think about self help tapes, Tony Robbins, motivational speakers and so on. The reason is most of those things mentioned all have something to do with the field of personal development.
We spend thousands of dollars and invest our time into changing our lives for the better. We got to these events and reads the books learning new techniques, new ways of thinking and taking notice of how we are feeling.
The Personal Development field is one of the biggest money makers in the world. Millions of tapes, books and speakers are providing their message. The truth is most of these people are successful and have followed certain blueprints that lead to them being successful.
Other times the person is only successful because he is a really good con artist, but hey the con artist was smart enough to think of the idea in the first place.
Okay, back to the meat of this post.
We go to these events and we get pumped up and ready for massive change. In other cases, we ready the books and listen to the tapes and reflect upon our lives while listening. Once we finish we know things are going to be different. We know our lives can never be the same.
Then when we fast forward a few months into the future these same people are in the same place they were before or worst. Why? Why spend the amount of time, energy and money for these products yet some people never even finish the tape set. Why?
Why would people spend so much money and time and then not change anything about their lives. These people have received great information, but how come most people never become successful or become rich?
Is it because this information doesn’t work or is it because you got ripped off. One could say these things but I tend to think thats not the problem at all. Remember, knowledge and information isn’t power. Someone once said Knowledge and information is nothing more then unorganized information.
For some reason people tend to think all you have to do is gain some new information and success is bound. Well thinking positive may be better than thinking negative, but if you just sit on your butt and hope you may never see success.
So what is the difference between those who make the information work and those who don’t. Its really quite simple and its how I’ve done pretty well for myself. Its nothing more than two simple words, which are “Taking Action”.
I know some of you are like I already know that, well if you do how come your not where you want to be. Gaining information is just the first step, the second step is to act upon this information and take action. You must take action every single day to reach your goals.
Some people tend to think you must make massive amounts of action and that’s not the case. Just a little step each day in the right direction and you will get there. Some people tend to take action for a few days and then stop when life starts to get hard.
The real winners are the ones who take small steps in the right direction with each step getting you closure and closure. Some people who want to get in better shape try to make it a habit to get on the treadmill everyday for 30 min when they never stepped on one in their life.
So instead of doing 30 min every day why not just get on for 5 to 10 min and get your body and mind used to the idea.
In realitiy, nothing can get done without taking action. It all starts with a idea, but without action a idea is nothing more then just a idea. So gather information, know what you want and just take action.
Now this doesn’t mean everything will be perfect in your life, but how can you get down the road if you don’t leave the house. Personally it is the people who move toward what they want and take action that seem to be the ones who can say this self improvement tape worked for me or Tony Robbins changed my life.
We can’t blame them for supplying the information and then when it doesn’t work blame them because we didn’t take action. So once again TAKE ACTION and move toward change. Once again this is just my opinion and we all know there are many ways that lead to the same road.
REPLY by pokerwithoutcards:
It took me probably 20 times hearing my good friends say this to me before I got it. They kept saying, “Take action, bro, you need to stop thinking and do things.”
And now I understand the value of it. Most people only contemplate and they do a bunch of future predicting about how it’s going to turn out.
Felix Dennis says in his book “How to Get Rich” (he is a multi-millionaire) that ideas hardly even matter if the follow-through is good. In other words you could have a shitty idea with great follow-through and make it work, but..
EVEN THE BEST IDEA IN THE WORLD WILL NOT WORK IF YOU DON’T FOLLOW THROUGH ON IT.
Oscar and I had an idea for a coaching program. Are we at the “ideal” place in our business? Of course not – we always want to be bigger and better.
Are we MUCH farther ahead and better off for taking action and LAUNCHING? Yes. And we’ve had a TON of fun in the process and we’ve met a lot of great people.
If you read, listen to, or watch enough self improvement stuff, you will hear this point over and over again. You MUST take action and -do- something.
Yes, it won’t be perfect at first. It’s just bound to happen.
Now I can stand up in front of a room and, with true authority tell people what works and what doesn’t. Theory-based knowledge is great for mental stimulation, but useless in the real world.
Thanks for the post, Josh. Great topic.
