Looking back, I believe my last two posts reflected two existential anxieties:
(1) Productivity and time management
(2) The insecurities inherent in imposter syndrome, a product of various factors, such as starting a business without clear “tutoring” or mentoring.
Every freelancer or entrepreneur knows that we go through several cycles each month; one of them is the defeatist one, in which we doubt almost everything around us. Especially when our actions are not bringing the results we seek.
No matter what they tell you: starting a business is NOT easy, although it is very rewarding.
I already gave a very personal view in the post: Starting a Business in Spain. There I outlined a series of attitudes that I considered key to undertaking any project, among them:
- Order
- Cleanliness
- Discipline
- Adaptability
- Good manners
- Open-mindedness
- Creativity and imagination
- Show your work
- Have clear objectives
- Learn to sell
- Have fun
- Be authentic
- Collaborate
It was a post very much inspired by the birth of my son.
I enjoyed rereading it almost two years later, and I realize that I advanced in some things, but my worries grew, as your decisions now involve one more person.
Furthermore, combining working from home (which I no longer do; I’m now in a coworking space) with having a child is difficult.
When you reach a certain level of work, it becomes a snowball; it grows, and that’s positive, but it involves many challenges.
There is work, the problem is time management. Especially when you realize you’re getting into more and more projects, and growth could only happen in two ways:
- Outsourcing
- Hiring staff
I outsourced some aspects, from accounting to small tasks. But it’s always difficult in the service sector, where you can’t automate some aspects, and your vision and experience are hard to convey to a third person.
Be that as it may, I realized that worries stem from a problem of perception and thought. I must be in a positive phase!
But I came across a fantastic book by a speaker, magician, and comedian: Mago More. The book is titled: “Superpowers of Success for Normal People.”
If you haven’t read it, I recommend it. It’s a very affordable book, where all proceeds from its sales go to support two charitable causes.
It had been a while since I read such a lucid, sincere, and inspiring reflection. I doubt the author will read this post, but I hope to meet him someday and give him my thanks.
His story is admirable (you have to read the book to understand it). He is not the typical “method” salesman; it’s a book he wrote selflessly, and from humility and simplicity, he manages to give us a complete methodology to improve many aspects of our personal and professional lives.
I saw myself reflected in some of the problems he addresses, especially at an organizational level. That feeling of chaos and stress that seems like a vicious circle.
He discusses the “infinite,” a very simple concept that encompasses everything that absorbs us day by day (emails, calls, budgets, etc.), and distances us from our true goals.
Thanks to his advice, I now handle this “infinite” better, which used to generate a very high stress factor for me.
I want to highlight three aspects of his book:
Goals
I myself have talked on this blog about the objectives of a website, but on a personal and professional level, we don’t realize that we don’t set our goals clearly and concisely.
It’s as Scott Adams, creator of Dilbert, says: A lot of people want many things, but they are not objectives, they are just mere desires that don’t translate into action.
I myself have spoken on several occasions about objectives. But don’t you find that we know how to do something, but we don’t always do it well?
And you hear the theory over and over again, but you still do it wrong?
Sometimes it’s an event, other times a talk, a book, or a movie, whatever it may be, but something happens that inspires you and leads you to true change.
It’s as if you always knew it, but that action triggers its true understanding.
The fact is that Mago More points out something super simple, but true: “Goals must be concrete, not abstract, as you don’t have a plan to address them.” I liked the example he gives: It’s not the same to exercise as to walk 10 km a day.
By defining a concrete, measurable, achievable, yet challenging enough goal to induce small change, we take action. But for this, we need two key attitudes:
Willpower and self-control
I always quote Kahneman; I consider him one of my favorite authors. More uses his principles of fast and slow thinking, plus an analogy proposed by social psychologist Jonathan Haidt, from his book The Happiness Hypothesis, to explain part of our behaviors: the metaphor of the elephant and the rider.
It’s as if our mind is driven by an elephant. Impulsive, emotional, irrational, it seeks immediate gratification and is lazy by nature.
On the elephant, we have a small, rational rider who likes to plan, is slower, logical, and always tries to control the elephant’s strength (but doesn’t always succeed).
That impulsiveness of the elephant, of wanting to do everything now, diminishes our willpower. But willpower is key to deferring immediate gratification and increasing self-control.
As in everything, willpower needs training. As More points out:
“There are five techniques to prevent our elephant from running wild: the first is to delay gratification, the second is to avoid temptations, the third is called pre-commitment, the fourth is to awaken the rider, and the fifth consists of training the elephant not to get distracted through the technique of meditation.”
Mago More
The whole purpose of training our elephant and setting goals is to be able to create habits. Why? Because habits operate on autopilot. They don’t force us to think, so we don’t expend willpower.
“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.”
Aristotle
Motivation and method
As we well know, even if we start a new habit, time can work against us.
How do we stay motivated? Well, More suggests that we should identify and write down those habits that will help us achieve our dreams.
We must trick the brain by introducing distractions and rewards when we don’t feel like doing something.
More points out that it’s always better to have a bad method than no method at all, and if you learn to organize yourself a little within the chaos, you will have enough peace of mind to bring out the best in yourself.
He uses a quote that you’ve probably seen from Bruce Lee:
Translated:
Empty your mind, be formless, shapeless, like water. If you put water into a cup, it becomes the cup. If you put water into a bottle, it becomes the bottle. If you put it in a teapot, it becomes the teapot. Water can flow or it can crash. Be water, my friend.
Bruce Lee
Almost at the end of More’s book, he makes an incredible analysis of the movie: Groundhog Day by Bill Murray.
He suggests that we all live Groundhog Day, blaming circumstances, when in reality, change lies within ourselves. Honestly, the best €6 I’ve spent in years.
Thank you, José Luis Izquierdo Martín (his real name). I loved your book and apply many principles of your system. I haven’t yet managed to incorporate all the habits I set for myself, but I’m following your advice and taking them one by one.
He has a video on YouTube titled: Willpower. The talk and reflection are very good; I hope you enjoy it:
I will write about this same topic again in a couple of years; my son will be four by then, and I will tell you about my progress 😉
See you next month.
