Creating a Better Life

The Ultimate Cure for Procrastination

The death of success comes from the delusion of “I’ll Do It Later.”

This one is even more insidious than the secret to failure that I wrote about a while back… because when we say that “I’ll do it later”, we are usually lying to ourselves on some level.

We may not intend to be lying… but we usually are.

In Success Through a Positive Mental Attitude, W. Clement Stone and Napoleon Hill have a solution for this -

Do It Now

That’s it.

Just Do It Now.

Whenever you find yourself saying “I’ll do it later”, answer yourself with the self-motivator Do It Now.

When You Can’t Do It Now

Sometimes you honestly can’t Do It Now. If you’re in the middle of something else, and the thought “Wow, the garbage needs to go out” comes up, you’ve got a couple of choices.

1.) Stop what you are doing and take the garbage out.

2.) Continue what you are doing and take the garbage out later.

The problem with “later” is that if we don’t get “take out the garbage” out of our heads, it’s going to keep popping up until it’s taken care of.

In these situations, I like to use what David Allen, author of Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress Free Productivity, calls the “Two Minute Rule.”

If it can be accomplished in two minutes or less… Do It Now.

If it can’t, capture the thought in whatever way you prefer - write it down, record it… whatever works best for you.

The “two minutes” is an arbitrary time frame. The idea behind it is to decide which of the following would take more time with the least disturbance - recording it for later action, or Doing It Now.

It may actually take 5 minutes, but if that garbage has been piling up for awhile… it may be best to just go ahead and Do It Now.

What Just Came Up For You?

While reading this, what came up for you that needs to get done, but you haven’t for whatever reason?

Why not Do It Now?

[ image credit: Piotr Lewandowski on stock.xchng ]

Do What Now?

“It is easier to act yourself into a better way of feeling than to feel yourself into a better way of action.” - O.H. Mowrer [source: Getting Things Done - The Art of Stress Free Productivity by David Allen]

I’ve always loved the above quote. I’ve also heard it put this way:

“It’s easier to act yourself into better thinking than to think yourself into better action.”

When people who practice working with the Law of Attraction try to separate their action from their thinking and feeling, they are doing themselves a disservice, and missing out on fantastic opportunities to put the concept work for them.

While our actions are preceded by our thinking, much of that thinking is beneath our consciousness. (see “Attracting All” by Joe Vitale for more on this)

But if we can’t act without some kind of thought preceding the action, what can we do to take action to improve our thinking and feeling, if we need our thinking and feeling to cause us to act? Sounds like a bit of a conundrum, but it isn’t.

Just keep the conscious thoughts, and the actions that you take, simple.

The one that’s helped me the most is straight out of Success Though a Positive Mental Attitude:

“Do It Now!”

Short, simple, and to the point. No time for my subconscious mind to argue.

Even if I’m starting to spiral into a depression, if I can catch it early enough and Do It Now, the feelings will usually improve as I start to take action.

But do what now?

Look around you.

Is there junk next to your computer that needs to be put away?
Clean it up Now.

How’s the rest of the room looking? Anything out of place?
Put it away Now.

Have you showered today?
Go wash up Now.

Brushed your teeth?
Scrub those puppies Now.

Can you see outside? Is the sun shining?
Go for a walk Now.

And so on, and so on…

It doesn’t matter that you don’t want to.

Do It Now.

Doing any of these things when you are starting to go down that road of negative thinking will usually help to bring you back. Don’t wait, don’t think any further. Just take action, and you’ll feel your thinking clearing, and your feelings improving.

Whether it’s because you are raising your vibration, or simply getting your blood pumping, or allowing your mind to focus on something other than that which is bringing you down, the bottom line is that it works.

As long as you remember to, and are willing to, Do It Now.

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This article was included in the Doing it Differently Blog Carnival, 8th Edition

Using Sickness To Get What You Want

One of the greatest principles that I learned from “Success Through a Positive Mental Attitude” was that of turning what is an apparent failure into a success.

The book mentions that one of the authors (W. Clement Stone) had the habit of saying “That’s Great!” whenever someone presented him with a problem.

Well… I’ve had a problem for about 5 days now…

I’ve been sick… it feels like the flu. I’ve been getting to the day job, but today I finally called off.

That’s Great!

Huh?

One of the things that I’m realizing about myself is that I’m really good at using illness as an excuse to get out of responsibility. I learned early on that if I can create a cold sore, or a stomach ache, or a migraine, or even an addiction, I can relieve myself of responsibility to create my world the way I want it.

But when I relieve myself of that responsibility, someone else will take it over.

And quite frankly, I’m tired of that!

I think it’s pretty interesting that I got this ill just after starting my 17 Success Principles project, and actually sticking with it for the last 10 days.

It’s like my body said “Holy Crap, this guy might actually accomplish something! Shut down the immune system, it’s not safe, it’s not safe! He’s not falling for our regular distractions… shut it down NOW!”

That’s fine. I rested up today, but it’s time to get back to work. It’s good that I got this ill… it gave me time to reflect on just how often I’ve done this in my life, whether consciously or unconsciously (from days off in school to never having to take any responsibility in jobs I’ve had.)

I take responsibility now.

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Have you ever experienced this? I know many have… as a matter of fact, this post has been rolling around in my head since this episode of the Law of Attraction Live radio show, in which one of the callers brought it up.

Maybe next time I won’t have to make myself physically ill in order to write about the stuff in my noggin.

Seven Things I Learned from Jack Canfield

Quite a while back, I listened in on a conference call with Jack Canfield (best known as the co-creator of the Chicken Soup for the Soul book series and one of the teachers featured in the movie The Secret) that was sponsored by Feed333. The notes I took on the call have been sitting on my hard drive, and I decided to review them and share the points that stuck with me the most.

1.) Canfield was a student of W. Clement Stone, who believed that the world was “plotting to do him good.” I’m a big admirer of Stone, and am currently working my way through the 17 Success Principles he and Napoleon Hill outlined in Success Through a Positive Mental Attitude. My esteem for Canfield just about doubled when he talked about this.

2.) He explained that some people are what is called “Psychologically Reversed“. This means that, in those who suffer from this condition, their subconscious minds can assume that “good is bad” and “bad is good”, which leads to all sorts of self destructive behavior… and the more the behavior is pushed against, the worse it becomes. He never directly references EFT, but explains that tapping on what EFT refers to as the karate chop point can remove the reversal.

3.) Debt is not a terrible thing. It’s sometimes an investment in the future.

4.) When it comes to the Law of Attraction, it’s not the thought - it’s the feeling that is produced by the thought that does the vibrating. This seems to be a bit different from the Abraham-Hicks viewpoint, which says that the thought vibrates, and the feeling tells us if our current dominant thought will bring us closer to what we want. I personally don’t care what’s vibrating, as long as it’s vibrating where I want it to.

5.) You can begin affirmations with the following if it feels like you are lying to yourself: “I’m now in the process of attracting all that I need to x”.

6.) The Hawthorne Effect - that which you measure and report on will improve exponentially.

7.) Be open to feedback… you’re going to get it anyway!

So feel free to leave some feedback in the comments, or via my contact page.

Get Paid to Reach Your Goals

I’ve thrown my hat in the ring and joined Aaron Potts’ 10,000 Fists to Freedom challenge. In a nutshell, Aaron is offering $100 to anyone who completes a 90 day goal that really stretches them.

I decided to take my languishing series on “Success Through a Positive Mental Attitude”, start living it rather than just writing about it (well, I haven’t even really been writing about it!), and moving it over to a new blog - 17 Success Principles. The series is done here, and has moved and been restarted there.

I don’t think there could have been a better time to do this - considering that today is my birthday. So I’ve hit 37 today… what now???

I guess it’s time to go be positive.