How do you (finally) focus on things that really matter?
1. For a few months now, I’ve been discovering the pleasure of rereading books that marked me.
Author Rolf Dobelli writes in The Art of the Good Life:
“The effect of reading twice isn’t twice the effect of reading once. It’s much greater—judging by my own experience, I’d put it at a factor of ten. If I retain three percent of the content after one reading, after two readings it’s up to thirty percent.”
2. Books that touched us deserve more than one reading.
Each time, we rediscover something from a different angle.
They haven’t changed, but we have…
This is the case for Stephen R. Covey’s “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People” A book I read a lot.
3. I hesitated before jumping back in, thinking:
“I know it too well.”
“I’m not going to learn anything new.”
But like every time, I’ve deepened my understanding of the principles and I feel the benefits every day.
Today I want to dig into Habit #3 “Put First Things First” and introduce you to a tool to focus on the things that really matter.
4. Being a pro at work is easier than being a pro at home.
“In my experience, high-achievers focus a great deal on becoming the person they want to be at work—and far too little on the person they want to be at home.” Clayton M. Christensen
How Will You Measure Your Life? by Clayton M. Christensen
5. Imagine this exchange with a friend.
– “What is most important in your life”.
– “My health, my family, my projects”.
– “Can we take a look at your schedule?”
– “Yes of course…”
Logic would suggest that there are activities around the important points…
Well, no!
Most of the time, there is little or no trace of these important projects…
The agenda is full of professional priorities.
6. It’s not that we don’t plan.
We find ourselves obliged to turn off the fires in quadrant 1, we don’t dare say NO to quadrant 3 and we often give in to quadrant 4.
When you see them appear in the agenda (“My family, my health, my projects”), it means that they have become “Urgent and Important”.
And it’s often too late. A health problem, a loved one who may leave, a child who is going through a difficult phase…
It’s hard to be proactive about what’s most important to us.
7. What if I told you that 30 minutes a week could make a big difference
” What’s this promise Dror.”
But it does, what works doesn’t take time. Yet the majority of people reading this would not do this. And for those who will start, at least 50% will stop after a few weeks.
Why?
As Marshall Goldsmith says “it’s easier to talk about life than to live it.”
But just because it’s hard doesn’t mean we won’t try😀. Let’s try it together.
8. Planning by adding the “role” dimension
“If your family matters most to you, when you think about all the choices you’ve made with your time in a week, does your family seem to come out on top?”Clayton M. Christensen
5 steps to change that
1. What are the most important roles in my life
2. Take your diary and see if you can see a trace of it in the coming weeks…
3. Block time slots for projects related to your roles.
4. Execute them and watch your life transform from “I wish X” to “I did this for my health, my family, my projects last week….
5. Choose a day of the week and turn this process into a routine. (30 minutes per week)
9. In the end, life is the sum of everything we do every day between sunrise and sunset.
It can be passed in quadrant 1. All the activities that throw themselves at us. Or spend time in quadrant 2 “non-urgent and important”. Those 30 minutes go right in.
10. But what do I gain by doing this?
The more time you invest in Quadrant 2 (planning, creativity, relationship), the more you free yourself from the prison of Quadrant 1 (emergencies). Your planning efforts end up taking the pressure off the urgent and important; this leaves you more and more time for what really matters.
It’s a virtuous circle that helps you become the person you want to be. (and not only at work)
Don’t dream about it anymore, become it…
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