Productivity gurus and life coaches like to use the term “life hack” to define strategies or techniques that help you manage your time and be more efficient. Us normal folks call it “Shit that makes life simple.”
A friend of mine bought a new bookshelf last month that she’s plonked in the middle of a wall in her bedroom. It’s her “To Read” bookshelf. She’s set a personal goal of reading 100 books this year and has put about 20 or so books on that shelf as a reminder to read before bed every night in order to reach her goal. When she’s finished with those 20, she’ll add 20 more to that shelf.
I like this idea of making it easier to do the things you want to do and, more importantly, making it harder to do those you don’t.
I want to start approaching more trade publication and custom content editors next week but I’m not going to be able to do that if I make it harder for myself, like most of us typically do. If each time I want to approach a new editor, I have to write a new Letter of Introduction, I’m not going to do it. Instead, I have a variety of different Letters of Introduction already pre-written for different kinds of editors. In each one, I highlight different specialties. When I come across a client that would be perfect for me, I simply pick an LOI that I have, change a few words and I’m done. I can send out dozens, hundreds of Letters of Introductions this way and not have to waste an entire day coming up with something for someone who may not even bother to respond.
I want to do more marketing, so I’m constantly finding ways to simplify it. I have a one-paragraph LOI that works great for LinkedIn, a one-sentence LOI that’s perfect for Twitter. It took me a while to come up with them, but now that I have, I don’t have to keep putting off my marketing because I’m not in the mood to write an LOI. It’s already written. All I need to do is spend the two minutes to send it.
Just as important, in my opinion, is to make it harder to do the things you don’t want to do. Facebook is a distraction for me, so I’ve logged out of my account on my browser and deleted the password that the browser had saved. Every time I want to access Facebook, I now have to re-enter my login e-mail and password, and since it takes more effort to do this, I find that I don’t frequent Facebook as much as I used to.
Another thing I don’t like to do anymore is work until 2 a.m. I used to be on a night schedule when I was single, then later after my son was born. Midnight to 3 a.m. was the only time I had with enough peace and quiet to handle anything that required serious thought. But my habit of working through the night has remained a recurring lifestyle problem for me, a result of obsessiveness, workaholism, and being Indian, and this year I decided that I was done with it once and for all. So I needed to find a way to make it difficult for me to work after 8 p.m.
I did the only logical thing I could think to do—I made sure that I no longer brought the laptop to bed, that if I needed to work, I’d have to drag myself to the office. This usually isn’t a problem and I quite enjoy working in the office, but a couple of months ago, when the heater broke, I didn’t get it fixed.
Working in a cold office in the middle of a Delhi winter with no heating at 2 a.m.? I don’t think so. I’m now in bed with a book every day by 10 p.m.
I’ve begun to realize lately that most of us berate ourselves because we believe that when we don’t achieve something that we’ve committed ourselves to, it’s a reflection on our willpower. If I really wanted to write that novel, we say to ourselves, I would have found some way to do it. But maybe the problem isn’t your willpower; maybe the reason you’re unable to do something for any length of time is because you’re making it too damn hard.
What can you do today to make your goals easier for you to achieve?
What obstacles are you going to put in your way to ensure that the things you shouldn’t be doing remain undone?