Here’s a few tidbits, gaggle of truisms that you might find useful.
The 80/20 rule.
The Pareto principle (also known as the 80–20 rule, the law of the vital few, and the principle of factor sparsity) states that, for many events, roughly 80% of the effects come from 20% of the causes. (Check out the wikipedia article for more background).
Basically this means 80% of the audience opinion will come from 20% of the lecture. 20% of the comedy set jokes will generate 80% of the laughter.
So does this mean that we could perhaps drop 80% of what we do and trim our efforts down to the 20% that “get the job done”? Maybe…, but it is not certain. Some times the 80% is part of the process.
Many songs are 80% silence and 20% notes. What if we removed the silence and trimmed the song down to just the notes?
I suspect that in many situations a little “trim” is in order. But, let’s not be too quick to judge what is the 20% and what is the 80%.
Parkinson’s Law.
Parkinson’s law is the adage that “work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion”. (wikipedia) Or, in other words, you can probably get the job done faster than you think. E.J. Gold refers to this as the busy desk syndrome. Meaning if you want to get something done fast put it on the desk of someone that is busy. A busy person has great throughput. A non-busy person might look like they would have more time available to do your task. But, Parkinson’s Law tells us that however few tasks they currently have the work they do for those tasks has expanded to fill available time.
If you want to get more done in a day, schedule more. Don’t fall into the trap of thinking you need to clear space for a new project. Just shoehorn it in. The time necessary for other projects will shift to accommodate. However, it is possible to shoehorn in way too much. If this starts to happen refer to the 80/20 rule (see above). 80% of your quality of life comes from 20% of what you do. Be sure to make time for the 20%.
Batching.
A bunch of small tasks when attacked individually can be more daunting to approach. One way to solve this is to batch those smaller activities into a lump of consecutive tasks.
Yep our brains are silly enough that a bunch of small tasks lumped together under a common banner looks smaller than when confronted individually. Go figure.
So if you find yourself procrastinating your way around a set of small tasks, then lump them together. Keep the total time for the congregate to less than one hour. You may be very surprised at the results.
What goes around comes around.
Some folks have referred to this as “First, give value. Then, get value. Not the other way around.” I prefer “What goes around comes around.”
Whether it be respect, money, help, love, kindness, or opportunity give first — don’t wait for tit before giving tat. And don’t count on tit just because you are putting out a lot of tat. In fact, take whatever accounting journal you may be keeping and throw it out. Why? See next topic.
The World Is Not Fair — But Good Though.
If you are expecting fair you have not been paying much attention. You don’t know your history, you haven’t been watching folks around you, and you seem to have blanked out on the previous part of your life. There is simply no evidence that the world (or universe) is fair. It is mathematical, but not fair. The bad guys don’t always get it in the end — leastwise if you limit your perspective to this one lifetime. If you consider the effect of karma, then yeah bad guys reap the karmic results. Just don’t expect that to translate into anything you might think of as “just desserts”.
So what is the deal with the “but good though” part. Well, see below for “If you don’t play, you can’t win.” Being in the world provides an arena, a forum, a stage where we can learn and evolve. If you don’t particularly like that, then get off the wheel. After a few millennia floating in the Voidness of The Void, Eternal, and Uncreated you might look on this game with a little more generosity of attitude.
If you don’t play, you can’t win.
Pretty much self-explanatory to anyone that has spent time in a casino. If you have no chips on the table you can’t get paid. Granted dreamers and wishful thinkers might think (sorry thinking might not be the correct verb here) that somehow they can win by being in close proximity. Talk to the “pit boss”. He or she will set you straight — right after they stop rolling on the floor laughing.
Be Causal Not Casual.
Being causal means to be at cause — being a person that acts, happens, or exists in such a way that some specific thing happens as a result; the producer of an effect
Being casual means to be “without definite or serious intention; careless or offhand,” “seeming or tending to be indifferent to what is happening; apathetic; unconcerned,” “irregular; occasional,” “accidental”.
You can be in motion, responsible, taking part in your life. Or, you can sleep through the process and just let stuff happen based on the hungers, attractions, and repulsions of the machine.
Failures are a step forward not backwards.
Something you knew intimately as a child was that failure was not a bad thing. A failure simply meant “that is not how to get the result I was looking for.” Doesn’t mean it was a bad thing. In fact, that thing that failed to accomplish the current aim might be jim cracky good at accomplishing a different aim. Putting a worm on a hook and throwing it into the lake might fail as a method of patching a hole in your socks. But, later if you should end up having a goal of catching fish or spending a quiet afternoon at the lake it might succeed very well.
Each failure will clearly demonstrate yet one more method of not succeeding at the task — whatever it may be.
Of course, if you are paying no attention to what you are doing then it will be pretty darn difficult to step forward or in any other way learn from your failures.
Don’t be mean. You don’t have to be mean.
Yep, as Buckaroo Banzi says: “Don’t be mean. You don’t have to be mean.” Not only is it not necessary, it’s a bad idea — especially to yourself.
There are so many people that jump at every opportunity to beat themselves up. Can’t get you to take the garbage out. But, even hint there is a cause for being mean to yourself and you’re all over it.
Don’t do that.
“But I’m doing it because of xxxxxxx.” Whatever “xxxxxxx” is, there is a better way to handle that then being mean. Mean is not a good behavior changer. It isn’t even a particularly good punishment — if that’s the goal.
Once you fully define for yourself whatever you are hoping to solve by being mean, I guarantee you there is a better way to handle it. And the better you define this whatever, the easier it will be for you to find an alternate resolution.