Tact

Offending people or putting them off is not a good strategy for social or business success.  You need to use tact.

Tact – “Acute sensitivity to what is proper and appropriate in dealing with others, including the ability to speak or act without offending.”

“Tact is good taste in action.” – Diane DePoitiers

“If criticism is needed, do it tactfully.  Don’t use a sledgehammer when a fly swatter will do the job.” – Ann Landers

“Don’t flatter yourself that friendship authorizes you to say disagreeable things to your intimates.  On the contrary, the nearer you come into relation with a person, the more necessary do tact and courtesy become.” Oliver Wendell Holmes

Nervous and uptight about something that's coming?

I love reading the stoics.  They have much to teach us.

When a big event is coming up and we are nervous, we make it hard on ourselves.  We might have some negative self-talk, or we keep saying how important it is that we don’t mess this up.  We may be worried about how the audience will react or what they will think of us.  Maybe it is really important that things go our way.

We torture ourselves about it for days or weeks before.  Here’s some advice from the stoic teachers – 

“One of the most amazing things you will ever realize is that the moment in front of you is not bothering you, you are bothering yourself about the moment in front of you.” – Michael Singer

“If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the thing itself, but to your own estimate of it: and this you have the power to revoke at any moment.” -Marcus Aurelius

Being Vulnerable

You can’t move forward without being vulnerable.

You have to expose that you don’t know something or can’t do something to ask for help or take the training.

You have to face the facts.  You have to admit your weaknesses.

Practice being vulnerable.  It’s ok!  It’s the start of moving forward.

Average is not a good idea

Here’s another example –

500 years ago people consumed NO sugar.

A few hundred years ago we started nibbling on 5 pounds a year.

Now we eat 150 pounds of sugar a year on average!

Average is not a good idea.

Transformation is outside your comfort zone

Since we are a product of our habits, to get different and better results, we need to ask some obvious questions.

Transformative answers and transformative action is outside our comfort zone.

By definition, they’d have to be, because we did all the thinking and action that was inside our comfort zone already – that’s how it got to be our comfort zone.

Do something different.

Your habits create your future

People do not decide their futures.  They decide their habits, and their habits decide their futures.

Today, think about your habits and routines, and how, day after day they produced results – and how those results accumulated to get you where you are today.

Is it time to replace part of your routine with something different?

New Think Daily app available now!

My friend Josh Lees and his software friends have updated our Think Daily app.

Get it in the app store now!  Check it out!  Free as always!

Go deep

Any project you’ve ever done while leaving yourself open to distraction is not your best work.

Shut your phone (and watch) off and get better performance out of yourself.

Multitasking makes you worse at everything

Ok, you’re going to argue with me because you can walk and chew gum…

But your brain cannot do two things at a time.  What people call multitasking is really task-switching.

You focus on A for a short period (minutes, seconds) and then switch to task B, then back to A.  But you lose focus and time in the switch.  (That’s why you need to turn off all notifications on your phone when you are working.)

Multitasking is the opportunity to screw up more than one thing at a time.

Do one thing at a time.  (The most important thing  for your key future results first!)  Do it well, feel good, and move on to the next thing.

Break inertia – take the first step

A body at rest tends to remain at rest.

A body in motion tends to remain in motion.

Like – YOUR body.

Do the important things that will make a difference in your life that you have been putting off.

Sometimes, to work out, taking the step of putting your workout clothes on is the first domino.  Then just go to the place you workout.  If you just do those simple things, you will find yourself working out.

Or you clear your desk and put in front of you the information and things you need to write what you need to.  Then shut your phone off.  Then sit down.  Then type the first word….

Or you make the ingredients list for the project and put them in order.  Then get the first thing you’ll need.  Then the second.  Then clear a work space…. pretty soon – you’re doing it.

What is important that needs to get done?  It’s become a wall in your mind.  Break through that wall by taking the very first very simple step…and you are on your way.