Maintaining Motivation Through Progress Plateaus

Nothing in our life occurs at a linear rate. We do not progress, or experience change of any kind, at a constant speed. Life ebbs and flows; change, improvement , and progress within our life can occur like a burst of lightning, like a sleepy snail, or anywhere in between. This applies to all facets of life whether it is learning a new technical skill, implementing an exercise routine, dieting, producing creative output, or initiating positive changes through personal development. No matter what the subject is you will never see progress occur in a constantly straight line. There will always be progress plateaus.

Progress Plateaus

The progress plateau is a prolonged period of “no progress” that typically occurs directly before and after periods of dramatic progress. In areas of life that are subjected to frequent changes (i.e. pretty much everything) we experience those changes in short and sharp bursts and then spend the majority of our time experiencing the progress plateau.

This is just the natural cycle of progress. It is never linear. The common structure to progress is that we experience small periods of sudden drastic change (improvement spikes), sometimes followed by a small dip in progress directly afterwards, and then long periods where “nothing” occurs.

It is during this period, the long and boring time where we feel stagnated, that we can lose motivation. These periods can go for months, even years, and without a known end to the plateau in sight it is too easy to feel that our progress has stalled indefinitely. This is the single biggest reason why most people fail to implement changes in their life.

Whether it is a new diet, exercise, relationships, personal development, or just forming new habits, there will always be progress plateaus and unless you are ready for them they will undo all your hard work.

Tips for Maintaining Motivation through Progress Plateaus

It would be remiss of me to tell you that the progress plateau exists, like a monster lurking in the shadows waiting to attack you in your weakest moment, and then not tell you how you can beat it. Here are some tips on how to maintain motivation through the progress plateaus.

Tip 1: Accept the progress plateau exists

You’ve just got to face facts. The progress plateau is not some fanciful creature I invented just to scare you (and yes I am well aware that I just referred to it as a monster in the previous paragraph – that’s the beauty of poetic licence). You need to accept that the progress plateau exists.

Making a conscious decision to believe in the existence of progress plateaus means you will be more likely to identify them when they pop up. How many times have you heard a new phrase or learned something new and then you start seeing and hearing it everywhere? This happens often to most people because of the way our brains processes information. When we become aware of new facts our brains start being able to identify and categorise instances that align with that new piece of information. Without the specific facts the brain would just ignore the incoming data because it has no reference to compare it to. The same happens for progress plateaus.

By bringing the plateau into focus, we enable the brain to identify them more easily. We give ourselves a chance to realise that we are not “stagnating” or under-performing, but we are just experiencing a plateau before out next big advance. We can remind ourselves that the plateau is just the calm before the storm.

Tip 2: Look back at your entire progress

Having just accepted and identified that the lull in your progress is just a plateau you can start deriving more motivation to help you push on through toward the next improvement spike. A great way to get this motivation is to look back at the progress you have made throughout your entire journey.

The progress plateau has the ability to fool us into thinking that we haven’t achieved much. We can look back over the past few weeks and see no progress and feel disheartened. But if we take a holistic view, if we consider our entire progress from the very first day then we can start putting the plateau into perspective.

When looking for motivation it is helpful to consider how far you have come from the moment of initiation. Don’t let yourself be fooled by the recent progress. Only consider the overall trend.

This thinking is particularly relevant for dieting and exercise. I often hear about people starting a new healthy routine who experience positive and quick results early (e.g. losing several kilos) but then go through a flat period. During this time they only look back at the past few weeks (i.e. the plateau) and they lose motivation. They give up on their routine, go back to unhealthy habits, and write the whole thing off as a failure. If only they had looked at their entire progress instead of just a small segment.

Tip 3: Remember how good the sudden spikes feel

Another way to maintain motivation through the progress plateau is to remember just how good those sudden spikes of quick progress feel. Remind yourself of the happiness you felt during the last improvement spike - the positive energy, the motivation, and the smile that you couldn’t wipe off your face. Remind yourself how good it actually feels.

Now remind yourself that directly after a progress plateau comes another spike of improvement. Even though you cannot see it coming, if you stay on your course and maintain your efforts you can be sure that another spike is waiting just over the horizon. But if you give up during the plateau you never reach the next spike. You never feel those “highs” again.

Tip 4: Other people are on different progress cycles

This a reminder to only ever consider your own progress. Everyone else is operating within their own progress cycle and to weigh yourself up against someone else’s progress is a useless waste of time.

If you see someone else going through a massive improvement spike, that does not detract from your life or your opportunity for change. Be happy for them, celebrate with them, and remind yourself that your next spike is coming soon. Their progress cycle has nothing to do with yours.

Likewise, how far along they have progressed is irrelevant to you. They may have initiated their changes years ago, or they may just have come off the back of a significant improvement spike. Neither reason matters nor has anything to do with you, your progress, and your plateaus. Only look at your own progress and how far you have travelled since you started. That’s all that matters.

How do you maintain motivation through the progress plateau?

Boy Running Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Why Work Efficiency Should be Judged on Output not Time

The current system of measuring, and judging, the efficiency of most office-based work is wrong. By requiring staff to be in the office for a specific number of hours each day, and even going as far as limiting them to a specific window of time within the day to fulfill this requirement, the emphasis is on being at work longer rather than achieving better results. Focusing on time-based judgment of work is not productive. It does not allow people to work when they produce their best results, it assumes every person takes the same amount of time to do their job, and it fosters a negative psychology and atmosphere at work.

The solution is simple: the efficiency of our work needs to be judged on output, not time.

Why judging work based on time is wrong

There are many inherent problems with organising work to be solely a time-based operation. Most of these I am applying to a “standard” office-based job. There are examples in society where certain industries and organisations have deviated from the time-based assessment, but for most of the world, the norm is still to judge workers by how long they spend at work, not how much they achieve. Here are some problems with that kind of thinking:

People work better at different times

I’m a morning person which means that I am most productive in the wee hours of the morning, normally when no-one else is around and I can focus on my tasks without distraction. If I could start work early (say 6am) then I would be much more productive in my time at work. I would get at least two hours of ultra-productive work while everyone else was at home sleeping, and my overall output would improve drastically.

I’ve actually proven this in a previous job where flexible start times were allowed. It was so good for me that I was achieving more in those first few hours than I was previously doing in an entire day. By the time the rest of my team had arrived, made their coffee, and were ready to start work, I had knocked off all my critical tasks and I could attend the boring meetings without getting too frustrated.

Flexible work arrangements can go the other way too. Someone else might prefer to start at midday and work on into the evening. Maybe they are young and like to go out partying most nights, or maybe they just prefer being up a night. It doesn’t matter what the reason is, but if these people are forced into turning up to work early just to fulfill a silly time schedule then they will never bring their A-game.

Why not let people start work when it suits them? At least that way you’d be getting the best out of each employee.

Every person does not need the same time for their job

Why is it that every person in the office needs the exact same time to perform their job? Is everyone actually just robots that work at the exact same speed all day?

Even workers doing the same jobs with the same levels of responsibility within the same company can perform at very different speeds and skills. Instead of giving these workers a default amount of time to work, why not judge them based on their achievements and the quality of their work?

Judging based on output is a more accurate measure of efficiency. If you have a situation where two employees perform the same role but at different speeds then forcing them to work the same hours actually has a negative impact on the overall work environment. The more skilled, and thus more productive person will eventually reduce their output to match the lowest common denominator because there is no incentive for them to excel.

There is no incentive to excel

When everybody has to be at work for the same amount of time it creates the attitude that everyone just needs to do the bare minimum to get by. If a worker knows that they could complete a task early and then spend the rest of the day doing something they find interesting (like researching new technology to apply at work, or coming up with innovative ideas to improve their results, or even given the afternoon off) then they are likely to work harder and produce better results.

But instead of rewarding employees like this we tend to “punish” them. When someone finishes their work early the norm is to give them another (boring) task to ensure that they are working (or at least sitting at work) for the expected number of hours. The result is that the normally productive and efficient worker becomes less motivated to work harder and less motivated to produce high quality output.

When a person realizes that no matter what they do (work harder, work faster, or call in sick and go to the beach) their workload does not deviate from the expected number of hours at work then they have no motivation to produce high quality work. Because they are being judged on a time-based scale they will appropriately perform their work on the same scale. If they are given a week to do a task then you can assume that they will nearly always take a full week to do it. Even if you gave them a month to do the same task they would only finish it just before the deadline.

The employee who realises they are judged on time realises they can exploit the work environment to their favour.

It is easy for employees to exploit time-based work

At some point, all employees in a time-based environment will exploit the system. Some will do it purposefully and others will not even be aware they are doing it, but I guarantee that everyone will eventually do it.

Exploiting the time-based work environment is easy. You can continually over-estimate the time it takes to do work, you go out for “meetings” which are really just you catching up with friends, you spend half your time having coffees with colleagues, you have a long lunch because your boss is busy and wont notice, you call in sick on important days so other people get stuck with the tough work, and so on.

In a time-based work environment the employee is judged just on the amount of time between when they arrive and when they leave. In this environment there are many, many, many ways for the worker to exploit the system so that they are doing the least possible work in their allocated time. The sad part about this exploitation is that sometimes a great worker can head down this path simply because they realise that no matter how well they do their job or how much extra effort they put in, they still have to sit in that chair for the exact same time every day.

Summary

This essay could go on and on. There are many more examples of why judging work on a time-basis is wrong but these are just subsets, or combinations, of all the above points. The idea is always the same: the more a worker is judged solely on the time they spend at work, the less productive and efficient they become.

I’m speaking in generalisations here and there are always exceptions. For example, it is obviously better for an NFL team to keep playing for the entire match and not just score 40 points in the first half and then go home. But for most of society, and predominately those office workers that are bound to the desk and chair all week, this is not the case. An environment where the focus is to just work for a specific number of hours is negative and ultimately flawed. It creates the wrong attitude towards work and it fosters a culture of inefficiencies and time-wasters.

How do you judge your employees?

Growing from Adversity: What I Learned While Recovering From Lung Surgery

My wife and I had made a last-minute decision to go out for dinner. We had dressed up, driven down to a riverside dining precinct and somehow managed to secure a table for two on what looked like their busiest night. Afterwards, we planned to watch a movie and then take a late night stroll by the river. It was going to be a great night. But, just after the entre came out, I felt a sudden twinge of pain in my back as I leaned against my chair. A pain that was all too familiar.

“Oh no. Not again.” I pleaded inside my head. “Not now.”

I tried pretending as if the pain wasn’t there, squashing down the dread that had welled inside me, and hoping with every fibre of my body that it was nothing to worry about. Maybe it was just a muscular pain? But it wasn’t.

And that is how I ended up at the hospital emergency ward late on a Saturday night (as if I had nothing better to do) waiting for the official confirmation of what I already knew. My lung had collapsed. Again.

Less than three months earlier I had been in the exact same hospital, talking to the exact same emergency doctor, feeling the exact same symptoms. That time, my collapsed lung (pneumothorax for those playing at home) had been treated by inserting a pipe into my chest to drain the air and reinflate my lung. It succeeded, but the doctor warned me that I was now a 30% chance of suffering a recurrence, and if I did so that I would require surgery on my lung.

So as I sat in the emergency room for the second time in three months I felt deflated (literally and metaphorically). I knew that I had suffered another pneumothorax and I knew that meant that I was going to require lung surgery. I felt a level of sadness creep into my body that I had not felt in a long time.

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The above story is all true. As I write this it just over three weeks since I had that surgery and my view on the world has certainly changed. The time spent recovering in hospital was a great time to think. I had many hours of silence and contemplation in which my mind could wander and explore possibilities about my life that I had previously ignored. As such, I learned a lot about myself and about life in general.

Here are the three biggest things I learned while I was recovering from lung surgery.

It is OK to be sad, but it is not OK to dwell on it

If you hadn’t already noticed, I’m a positive kind of person. I like to find the fun and happy side of every situation and I always try to maintain a positive outlook on life. Even when having surgery on a major internal organ...

Yes I had that initial jolt of sadness and negativity but I have since realised that feeling that is normal. It was a very negative situation and the natural response there is to feel those negative emotions. It is OK to feel sad about things.

Sadness is a good emotion to alert us that something is not right in our life, but it is only designed as an indicator for change. We are not supposed to dwell on it or use it as our main energy source in life. Sadness is there to show us that we don’t like something and that we need to do something about it.

Sometimes bad stuff just happens. It’s not the end of the world

When bad stuff happens we have a tendency to exaggerate just how bad it is. I didn’t like the fact that I had another collapsed lung but it certainly wasn’t the end of the world, or even the end of my life.

Bad things happen and sometimes we have no control over them. But that does not mean we should whinge and moan about them. Instead we can focus on what we can control and what positive changes we can make.

While I was in hospital a few friends came to see me, including a woman who works with kids that spend the majority of their time in hospital. She told me of this one kid, a small boy, who had a rare condition that affected his lungs and resulted in him constantly requiring a tube out the side of his chest. Here I was feeling annoyed about having the tube for 3 to 4 days and this poor kid had been in hospital for 3 to 4 months with it.

But you know what else that kid had? He still had fun. He played with the other kids, he ran around (with chest drain in hand), and he could still laugh and smile. He certainly didn’t enjoy having the chest tube in but he didn’t let it become a big deal either.

Bad stuff can happen just as randomly as good stuff. But one bad incident does not preclude us from future fun and happiness. One bad incident is not the end of the world.

Balance long-term gratification and instant gratification

Another insight I gained during my stay in hospital was the need to balance long-term satisfaction (or delayed gratification) with instant gratification. More importantly I realised the need for the attitude of being willing to sacrifice one for the other.

It is too easy to get caught up on only one form of gratification in our life without considering the other. Some people live their life just by focusing on what will make them happy in each instant. This can be a positive way to live in the short-term but with a complete lack of long-term thinking people in this category find it had to achieve big things in their life.

To achieve our goals and the success we dream of, we need to use delayed gratification. But living in a way where we focus completely on delayed gratification is not the answer either. We should not spend our time working so hard to achieve a future state of happiness that we miss out on opportunities to actually be happy now. There needs to be a balance.

My surgery is the perfect example of delayed gratification because it was always my choice to have it. I could have chosen to forgo the surgery and live with the constant possibility, and fear, that I would suffer a recurrence. Instead I chose to be proactive. I chose to experience some short-term pain and suffering (i.e. sacrifice my immediate happiness) in order to prevent it from happening again for the rest of my life. A few days of pain versus a lifetime of happiness…that’s the sacrifice and balance I’m talking about.

Sometimes the “quick win” of instant gratification can be what we need - living in the now, experiencing the injection of short-term happiness and the ability to forget about our worries and have fun. But at other times we need that long-term focus - the ability to delay our gratification, to push through short-term “suffering”, to work towards a greater goal, and achieve something that will ultimately provide much more happiness.

Adversity is like a strong wind. It tears away from us all but the things that cannot be torn, so that we see ourselves as we really are. ~Arthur Golden,Memoirs of a Geisha

When experiencing adversity or hardship the key is to use it as a tool for reflection on our self. Adversity is the perfect excuse to think deeply about our life and create positive changes.

After all my thinking my head was hurting (maybe that was just the painkillers) but I felt good for it and I was back to my happy and positive self even in the face of adversity. I felt uplifted, having had the time to think about my life and coming to the conclusion that everything was still as good as I had thought. Except my lungs, but you can’t win them all.

Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net

3 Simple Ways To Stop Wasting Time

Time-wasting, procrastination, and a general sense of under achievement are themes that are becoming increasingly common across society. As we move further into an environment that is always “connected”, where we are always within reach of a computer or a smartphone, we are becoming less productive and less happy. The main reason for this is that our usage of time has changed. We feel that we do not have enough time set aside just for ourselves, to do what makes us happy as individuals, and then when we do finally get some “spare time” (I really dislike that phrase) we fritter it away on useless, unproductive, time-wasters.

It is not by accident that two of my most popular articles of all time are on this exact topic: Sometimes We All Need Some Alone Time and The Gentle Art of Not Wasting Time. People want more time and they want to be more productive.

I cannot give you more time in a physical sense but I can show you how to stop wasting your time and start using it in a more productive way. Here are my 3 simple ways to stop wasting time.

1.       Set Goals

Goals are a fantastic way to get yourself focussed and achieving more in your life. They guide your everyday decisions, determine what you do with your spare time, and they provide a massive sense of satisfaction when you manage to achieve one.

The biggest trick to setting goals is to make them quantifiable. Your progress and ultimate fulfilment of the goal depends on you being able to measure it. If you cannot measure it then how will you know when you are finished?

But measurable does not necessarily mean that all goals have to be number-based. A yes/no goal is still measurable because you either achieve it or you don’t. As long as there is a clear end-state to your goal then you will be more likely to reach it.

Tips for setting goals:

• Set often, review often - I set my new goals, and officially review past goals, on the 1^st of every month. This allows me to see what I managed to achieve last month and plan better for the current month. It also provides the opportunity to push myself by setting recurring goals higher so that I am constantly improving.
• Track progress - I track progress in a spreadsheet which tells me the percentage of progress complete for each task. Every time I do an action associated with a goal I update the spreadsheet to reflect it. It automatically tells me how much of that goal I’ve completed and whether or not that is on-track for the month. Yes, I’m THAT nerdy.
• Small chunks - I set most goals to last 1 month only. If I have a goal that will take significantly longer then I record that under “ambitions”. Then each month I pick some tasks that I can set as measurable goals to work towards those ambitions.

2.       Use Todo Lists

Todo lists are the obvious next step. Once you have a set of goals that you are working towards you need to break it down into smaller tasks that you can complete during your day to start building momentum.

That’s what lists are really for. Setting goals is a great thing to do and it provides an initial burst of positive energy but if you do not take regular steps towards your goals then they will feel unattainable. Lists are used to take that initial motivation and provide regular positive reinforcement.

The best way to use lists is on a daily basis. Each day starts with a new list that contains everything you would like to get done in that day. If you didn’t complete a task from yesterday then bring it forward onto today’s list. There are no “rules”. It’s just a list of actions.

As you complete each action you then cross it off your list, put a tick next to it, or whatever else makes you feel all warm and fuzzy, because feeling that way is the real point of having a list. Each time you finish a task you get an immediate jolt of satisfactions and happiness that motivates you to keep going. That is how goals get fulfilled.

Tips for using todo lists:

• New list every day - I write a new todo list out every day. This is done either the first thing after waking up or, when I have been particularly productive, just before I go to bed the night before. I don’t spend too much time on it here (5-10 minutes) as I just want to get a basic plan for the day.
• Carry it everywhere - My todo list is now in the form of half an index card cut down to fit in my wallet. It goes everywhere with me. This allows me to have a constant reminder about what I wanted to achieve for the day, get that immediate feedback loop going when I finish something and can cross it off, and it means I can flexible. If my availability for the day drastically changes then I can update my list to remove/add tasks that I expect to complete.
• Each day is different - I plan differently each day and I only build a todo list based on how much time I will have to work towards my goals for that particular day.  I make sure my todo list reflects my actual day because there is nothing more unsatisfying than ending a day with a todo list filled with incomplete actions.

3.       Create a routine

Routines are the mechanism to ensure you are crossing things off your todo list and moving towards your goals. They are critical for maximising your productivity and helping push through the inevitable periods where progress feels that it has stagnated.

By creating a solid and persistent routine around your goals you force yourself into constant action. If you can get into a positive routine of productivity then you are guaranteed progress towards your goals.

Turning a routine into an ingrained habit can take about 4 weeks so no matter what the routine is I recommend committing to it for at least month. It doesn’t matter if you want to go to the gym 3 days per week, spend more time on your start-up business, or just improve your fake tan. You need to commit to doing it consistently for a month.

Tips for creating routines:

• Go daily - I find daily routines easier to maintain and quicker for them to become part of our everyday habits. If I have a routine that requires a day off then I still try to fill that timeslot each day with related activities to enforce the ritual. For example, when creating a new gym ritual I will use my rest days to read up on what's new in the world of fitness.
• Pick your best times - I create my routines for the times of the day that give them the best chance of succeeding. When it comes to writing I am at my creative and productive best early in the morning so now I get up early and I write for an hour. Because morning is my most productive time I have noticed a dramatic increase in my output which means I am way more likely to maintain the early-rising routine into the future.
• Finish your tasks - When I am creating a routine I make that time solely about being productive towards my goals. The positive feeling of crossing something off your todo list can be almost addictive, and doing it every single day means the routine is way more likely to become habitual.

There you have it. That’s 3 simple ways to stop wasting time and start being productive. Now I’m wondering, what do other productivity-fanatics like me do to help them stay focussed and achieve more in life?

Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Tapping into Positive Energy Sources

Life requires energy. Just like moving a car across the road, or a plane through the sky, our actions in daily life require energy to achieve any momentum. We need energy to run our daily lives, to perform actions, and to make changes. We need energy to meet deadlines, work towards our goals, and achieve success. Simply put, we need energy to live. But often we use the wrong type of energy. We take the easy (but ultimately flawed) path of tapping into negative energy sources because it can provide instant results. Instant results come at a price though and that price is long-term unhappiness. To overcome this we need to shift our focus. We need to develop the ability harness the positive energy sources in our lives because these come with a much set of side-effects: happiness, fulfilment, and success.

Negative Energy Sources

Negative energy is energy derived from stress, anger,  anxiety, hate, and fear. These energy sources provide a quick burst of explosive energy which can be useful in certain situations, like running from pack of ravenous lions. In obvious fight-or-flight examples the usage of negative energy is simply a survival mechanism but do we have a need for such a mechanism in our current society? I don’t know about you but my encounters with ravenous lions (or any creature that is about to eat me) have had a pretty low incidence across my entire life. Zero.

Our society has progressed since simple fight-or-flight times and we no longer experience life-threatening situations on a daily basis. So without the foreshadow of possible death hanging over our heads you’d think we would all be happily smiling and laughing while we skip around town singing Kylie Minogue‘s “I should be so lucky”.

Instead we create other means to justify accessing negative energy sources. Maybe it’s a tight deadline at work, or a disagreement in a relationship, or an upcoming presentation to the board directors. These are not exactly dangerous situations (i.e. they do not have a direct link to our possible death) but we still tend to tap into the negative energy wells to power these activities.

Tapping into the negative energy sources can become the default choice for many because these energy wells typically lie just beneath the surface and are easy to access. It’s like drilling for oil when we know that we have an oil reservoir sitting just under our backyard. We know it’s there, we know how to access it, and we know it will provide a quick burst of energy. We’d be silly not to tap it right?

But this is completely the wrong way to look at it. Just because something is easy doesn’t make it right and using negative energy sources actually has a raft of negative side-effects on our lives.

Negative energy sources are “dirty” energy sources. The side-effect of using them is that they pollute the surrounding environment, degrading it, and making it unusable for anything else. And in this metaphor that environment is our life.

By tapping into these energy wells we release the latent negative energy that is stored beneath the surface. Some of it gets burned up, providing us with a short-term burst of fuel, but more of it seeps out through every nook and crevice and begins to infect our life. Before we know it, the wonderful garden that we had worked so hard on is dying and we are left with a barren plot where nothing can grow.

Worse still is that once we start tapping into negative energy it becomes highly addictive. The nature of this energy is that it provides a quick-burning explosive release fuel. It sustains us in the short-term but after the initial "high" the effects rapidly wear off and we are left with a conundrum. We could spend time seeking alternative energy sources but we already know exactly where the negative energy wells are and we know exactly how to tap them. So we tap it again. We burn more negative energy, we get the explosive “high”, and we achieve short-term goals. It’s pretty easy to see why this becomes addictive.

But this addiction is very near-sighted. It only focuses on achieving short-term and immediate goals and does nothing for our long-term ambitions. That is why we need to use positive energy sources.

Positive Energy Sources

Positive energy sources are things like  happiness, contentment, excitement, love, and these sources produce a slower, longer form of sustainable energy when compared to the quick burst that negative energy provides.

It is this slow-release feature that makes tapping into positive energy wells so much harder, psychologically speaking. There are no quick-fix results with this energy. It does not provide instant gratification and reinforcement of our decisions. Choosing positive energy sources is a long term commitment.

Because of this the initial process of tapping into a positive energy well will seem so much harder. If negative energy is like the oil reservoir lying just beneath the surface then positive energy is like solar power. The sun exists and we know that we can technically derive energy from it but doing so takes  up a lot of time, effort, and money. And the initial energy returns always feel diminished in comparison to this upfront cost.

That is exactly what tapping into positive energy is all about. Setting it up initially is a lot of work and the immediate results are not in proportion to this effort. The results will seem weak when compared to the explosive fuel that comes from negative sources but the key difference is that positive energy sources are permanent. They provide positive energy forever.

With negative sources we are constantly going back to the well to get that short burst of energy. But eventually the well dries up and we have to move on and find another negative energy source and restart the whole process. We tap it, we get addicted to the short-term burst, we constantly tap the well until it dries up and then we move on. Ad infinitum.

This is where we start seeing the true benefits of positive energy sources. Once we have gone through the initial setup we do not have to do anything else every again. We will just receive a constant stream of long-lasting positive energy.

The other benefit of this positive kind of energy is that we can easily store it to build a backup supply of energy. Each day we tap into positive sources our storage capacity of positive energy increases. This is what people talk about when describing a happy person as “bursting with energy”. Those people have managed to build up such a strong storage of positive energy that, when compared to others, it seems like happiness is just flowing out of them.

And that’s not the only reason we store positive energy. On bad days we can use our backup of positive energy to sustain our daily life. Instead of being forced to look elsewhere for energy we have a reliable and constant stream just waiting to be used. Or, in those times that we face negative situations we now have the choice to “burn” our positive energy to provide the quick solution needed rather than having to tap the negative well. Solving negative problems with positive energy? Now we’re talking!

Finally, there is one more benefit to using positive energy sources – what it does to our surrounding environment (i.e. our entire life). Positive energy sources are clean. They are our natural state and they promote a happy and healthy attitude in our lives. They provide long-term, long-lasting, slow-release energy and they do so with a relatively small upfront “cost”. It does not make sense to choose anything else to power our lives.

Think about the energy sources you use in your life. Are they negative or positive? Do you feel like you are running from one stressful situation to the next with no rest? Or are you in a state of blissful happiness where you are just bursting with positive energy? More importantly, which one would you rather be?

Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Why You Need To Create Win-Win Situations In Life

Across all facets of daily life we have interactions with other people in which we can shape their future. And sometimes we do not even have to specifically interact with a person to bring changes into their life. But no matter if it is through indirect or direct interaction, it is obvious that our individual actions have the ability to dramatically change other peoples' lives. Every action we take can be grouped into four simple categories based on the potential impact it has on our life and the lives of others. The four categories are: lose-lose, lose-win, win-lose, and win-win.

These are the four types of “offers” we can make whenever we interact with our surrounding environment, and although it may seem obvious to some that win-win is the best possible choice, too many people fail to take this option regularly. Some people simply do not think this deeply about their actions and their respective consequences, others do not care, and some are not even aware that they have a choice.

But there is always a choice and this article is going to show you why you should always try to create win-win situations.

Four Offers You Can Make The World

Lose-Lose

This is a no brainer. Not only is it the obviously bad choice but it is also the most destructive and negative option. Offering (or accepting) a lose-lose situation in life is the worst possible action you can take as it can destroy everything - friendships, careers, and relationships.

Examples of lose-lose situations include “taking someone down with you” when you get in trouble, backstabbing your friends, and making a relationship turn sour because you do not have the balls to breakup.

Lose-Win

The lose-win situation is when you are willing to accept a disadvantage (i.e. a loss) in your life so that someone else can gain an advantage. It may sound noble but unless you have utter and complete happiness in your life then offering a lose-win situation actually has a very negative impact. In fact, it is often worse than the lose-lose situation because you can convince yourself that you’ve done something good, even though the result for you is anything but.

Examples of lose-win situations are "being there" for someone when you know they wouldn’t do the same for you, giving someone the shirt off your back (literally), and not speaking up when the jerk at work eats your lunch.

Win-Lose

The win-lose situation is generally exhibited by those that like to take advantage of others. This option results in you reaping great rewards (i.e. the win) for yourself but at the expense of someone else. Sometimes the win-lose can be offered to you (i.e. by someone else who lets people “walk all over them”) but this does not mean that you have to accept it. In fact you should definitely not accept it. It is up to you to make a little bit of effort and create something positive: a win-win situation so that everyone can benefit.

Examples of win-lose situations are all forms of stealing, bullying someone (in the workplace, friendships, or relationships), and...being the jerk at work that eats someone else’s lunch!

Win-Win

At last we’ve reached what is the only true option for living a happy and wonderful life: the win-win. Making this your default option should be your top priority as it promotes an environment of mutual advantage, where everyone can prosper.

The problem is that creating win-win can often be a damn sight harder than win-lose or lose-win. It’s easy for one person to gain an advantage but to ensure that everyone involved has a win requires a great deal of awareness, self control, and the ability to enjoy delayed gratification.

Examples of win-win situations include setting up a babysitting rotation with your friends, providing emotional support for a close friend or partner going through a tough time, or maybe taking on an extra workload so that your partner can quit their job and start their dream business.

Why You Should Only Create Win-Win Situations

When your actions have a direct influence on the outcomes for you and others around you, it is important to be always striving to create win-win situations.

You deserve more than a loss

If you are willing to accept a losing option, one where you are put to a disadvantage, then what does that say about you? What image of self respect does that convey to the rest of the world? How could you expect others to treat you well, and offer you advantageous opportunities when you don’t even do that for yourself?

By accepting a losing situation in your life you are essentially saying “I am not worthy of positive outcomes and I do not deserve to have good things in my life” and once you start thinking this way, your brain will try to find proof that it is true and other people will automatically align with this view of you.

Your life will become a perpetual series of lose-win (or worse, lose-lose) situations because that is all that your mind will be capable of seeing. Worse still is that you will only attract other people into your life that will also fulfill this arrangement. That means, in all aspects of your life, you will naturally find people that want to take advantage of you or people that want to feel sorry for themselves by creating destructive lose-lose situations.

Neither of them is a positive influence and neither of them bring any happiness to your life.

And your happiness is the most important part of your life. It is the key factor underlying your confidence, your relationships, and your success in life. Therefore, making someone else happy at your own expense is counter-intuitive. It may yield a superficial short-term burst of positive energy but the long-term effects are disastrously negative for your happiness.

Others deserve more than a loss

The same applies for allowing losing situations to occur for other people. If you like to take advantage of other people, or maybe just do not care about their outcomes, then what does this say about you? What sort of relationships will you create in your life?

The attitude of willingness to allow (and worse, purposefully create) losing situations for other people is rife with problems. Firstly, you create vicious cycle where you establish a connection with someone new and you coexist in a negative win-lose environment for a small period of time. But it is not sustainable in the long-term and your friendship/relationship/acquaintanceship will end, often badly, and you move on to the next person.

Which leads to the second problem with being win-lose oriented – you only attract negative people, emotions, and energy into your life. The action of taking advantage of other people (intentionally or not) never attracts a positive and happy person that can bring improvements to your life. These people are busy interacting with other positive and happy people, leaving you jump from one negative situation to the next trying to take your advantage.

The “wins” that you get from a win-lose situations are not good for you or your life because they are laced with the previously mentioned negativity. They are not real wins in terms of you progressing your life towards happiness. They do not provide long-term fulfilment, establish positive relationships, or lead to successful outcomes.

It is actually quite common for the win-lose oriented person to look back on their life with many regrets, simply because they filled their life with negative wins rather than positive ones. They are unlikely to establish close friendships and even less likely to have successful long-term romantic relationships.

Win-Win is the only positive choice

To avoid such negativity in your life it is imperative that you always aim to create win-win situations.

The win-win attitude is like a barrier that prevents negative people from entering your life. With this mindset you will only attract like-minded (win-win) people who will have a positive influence on your life. No self-hating lose-lose people, no self-wallowing lose-win people, and definitely no self-obsessed win-lose people.

Your life will become filled with positive people, emotions, and energy. You will be rewarded with fantastic opportunities, wonderful experiences, successful business ventures, and great long-term relationships. You will achieve far more than you could ever have imagined just by always working towards win-win situations.

Win-win is the only real choice for a happy and positive life.

Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net

The Secret To Great Relationships: Improve Yourself

Relationships play an important part in our lives but they are tricky to get right. According to most popular relationship guidance the keys to successful relationships are said to be things like good communication, being honest about your feelings, being affectionate often, showing gratitude, and so on. But I feel these items are missing the point. Don't get me wrong, they are great ways to maintain a strong relationship but they are merely subsets, or derivatives, of a more important relationship requirement: that each person in the relationship is living their own individual lives to their full potential. How we live our life as an individual defines how we live our life as part of a relationship. If we are not true to ourselves, not living our lives to our full individual potential, then how could we fully commit ourselves to building a successful and wonderful relationship? It's not possible. The effort that each person brings into a relationship is directly related to the effort they put in to themselves as an individual.

A wise woman (my mum) once said...

If you are not living to your whole individual potential, then you can never be the full half of a relationship

People that are willing to accept underachieving, mediocrity, or are just happy to be "above average" will get that exact same level of quality in their relationships. Why? Because they will think that to contribute (and receive) "above average" is all they need for their relationships.

Relationships require sacrifices

Being in a relationship requires effort. A lot of effort actually. Ignoring all the nice thing about relationships (romance, passion, etc) relationships are really just the union of two people (unless you're a polygamist) that can function as a single unit to work towards common goals. That sounds a bit cold but stay with me, I'm making a point here. :P

Relationships provide us with many benefits including pooling resources (e.g. money, house, cars), sharing experiences (e.g. travel, new activities), and bringing happiness through emotional connection. But all this requires a concerted effort because sometimes the decisions made as a functioning couple may actually be in opposition to the desires of one of the individuals. This is what most relationship experts call making a sacrifice.

Sacrifices are very important in a relationship. Being part of a relationships requires an individual to consider the needs and thoughts of the other person, and sometimes even place those ahead of their own. That is, there are times when an individual must make a sacrifice for the sake of improving/helping the relationship or the other person.

But, and here's the catch, a person who is not fully living their own life as an individual will be less likely to choose to make a sacrifice. A person that feels like they are "missing out" in their life, that they have not achieved everything they want, or that their life has been wasted, is not someone who will willingly make a sacrifice.

It is only when you are truly happy being alone that you can become selfless and dedicate yourself fully to someone else.

Live your own life

What exactly does "living your own life" mean and why is it so important? Put simply, every second of our lives is spent with ourselves, living in our own minds. We cannot take a break from it, we cannot go live someone else's life, and we cannot simply shut it off if we don't like what is happening. It's our life and we have to live it 24/7.

No relationship that we start will ever come close to this level of time in our lives. Even if we managed to spend every single second with our partner we will still not ever be as fully immersed in the relationship frame of mind in comparison to the individual frame of mind. Our brains are wired to think as an individual and it is only through a conscious decision that we move into the relationship frame of thinking, but even so it is still our individual mind that was activated first and had to make that choice.

As such the attitude we take to our life as an individual is what shapes everything else around us. The way we choose to live, think, and behave as an individual pervades our entire life. As previously mentioned, every second of our life we are living as an individual, therefore every second of our life is determined by how we treat ourselves as an individual. If we do not respect ourselves, or cannot be honest with ourselves, then it is impossible to expect anything else from our life. This includes our work, our family and our relationships.

If you are not fully living your life to your maximum potential then you can never fully contribute to a relationship.

An Example (using Maths!)

Most health relationships function with a roughly 50:50 split of contribution between the two people involved. Let's consider an example relationship with a fictitious couple where the two people have a pretty decent life - they both work in respected professions, both have good incomes, maybe they have some children, a few close friends, they've ticked a few things of their bucket lists, and they are relatively content with their life. But contentment is not necessarily happiness is it?

Looking a bit deeper it is obvious that both are not operating to their full individual capacity. For whatever reasons they are coasting through life, content with being "above average". For this example we'll say that they are both only functioning to 50% of their true individual capability.

Doing the simple math, it becomes obvious that the maximum each person can contribute to the relationship is 25% (50% effort x 50% contribution = 25%) and when combined that only comes to a grand total of 50% effort for their entire relationship. That means their happy little life together will only ever reach half of it's maximum potential. Their relationship may be good now, but it has the potential to be so much better if they just put a bit more effort into their own individual happiness.

This example might seem overly simple but it was done that way for a reason. Because it is actually this simple! If each person is only bothering to achieve 50% compared to their actual ability then they will put the same (or less) effort into their relationships, and the result will always be a relationship that is just good instead of being the wonderful and exciting adventure that it should be.

How to fix it

The answer should have struck you by now, but I'll spell it out just in case. If you are not living your life to your full potential, not chasing your dreams, and not being 100% honest to yourself then you are sabotaging your life and ruining your relationships.

If this sounds like you then you need to start making some positive changes in your life. Find what excites you in life, be honest at all times, try new things, and never give up on your dreams. Do not settle for "above average". Do not lower your standards to accept what is nearby and common, but rather set your goals higher and see what steps up to meet those lofty heights.

Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net

5 Reasons Why Sucking Up Is Stupid

The message for today is simple: Never be a suck-up. Ever.

I am sure we have all known a suck-up or two (like the guy in the cheesy picture above). These are the people that run around trying to make themselves look and feel good by getting approval from their peers, and particularly from their mangers. They might even try to call it "networking" or "making connections" but most of the time these actions are just sucking up in disguise. They are especially prevalent in the workplace where individuals mistakenly think that being a suck up (brown-noser, ass-kisser, whatever you want to call it) will propel them further and faster up the chain.

Sadly for the suckups this kind of thinking is completely wrong. Sucking up does not get you anywhere good, and it actually has a very negative impact on your career and on your life in general. In fact, the more you suckup the more detrimental it is to your life. Here are five good reasons why sucking up is stupid.

5 Reasons Why Sucking Up Is Stupid

#1 Sucking up makes you look insincere...

..because you are!

No matter how good you are at sucking up, everyone else around you will notice it. And when people notice sucking up they immediately label that person as insincere and fake. Even those you are sucking up to will think this.

Sucking up sends a very clear message about yourself:

My own ideas, thoughts, and actions are worthless and I will blindly say and do whatever I need to to get approval from others.

People will get this message loud and clear and they will see all of your actions as insincere, even if you do manage to 'grow a pair' and actually decide to have your own opinion.

#2 Nobody trusts a suck up

Consider the situation from the perspective of a manager working with a suck up subordinate. If that person is constantly acting as a "yes man" and always trying to be on the manager's side would that manager feel like they are able to trust them? Would the manager be comfortable leaving them to handle an emergency? Would that manager have confidence that the suck up would be a strong leader without the manager around?

No-sucking-way! (sorry, that was bad)

Nobody trusts a suck-up because they spend too much of their time and energy trying to impress others, rather than just getting stuck into the work and being productive.

#3 A manager that encourages sucking up is not a good manager

Sadly there are some managers who enjoy having people suck up to them and sometimes they even encourage it. But have a think about the kind of manager that would do this.

A manager who is swayed by sucking up is not a good manager. They obviously lack confidence in their ability to lead, and thus receive a small burst of positive reinforcement whenever a suck up comes along. So what do they do? They encourage the sucking up! After all we all like to feel good about ourselves don't we?

The suckup might see this as a wonderful opportunity but it is actually very limiting. A poor manager that feels like they need ass-kissers will also feel like they need to sabotage their career progression in order to always keep them one step below. They will use the suck-up to make themselves look (and feel) good but never allow them to grow to their potential.

A manager without confidence will forever be a negative and reactive manager. They will feel like they are fighting against everyone else to make themselves look good, and when it comes to the crunch time, the suck-up will not be well looked after.

The irony of all this is that a manager that encourages sucking up, or is not skilled enough to even spot it, is not a good manager to work with in the first place. Instead of wasting your time with these people, move on and find a good manager that will help you grow.

#4 A good manager is all about honesty

A good manager values integrity and honesty above all other traits. They respect the opinions of those around them and are open to, and willing to listen to, new ideas and even feedback on their own performance. This is the difference between being a manager and being a leader.

A good leader knows that their role is about guiding and supporting the team below them. A good leader knows that the people below them are the experts and the leader is there to ensure they get the best possible environment to thrive and develop their skills. And it is this thinking that means a good leader does not like sucking up.

These good leaders want a team of smart individuals that work cohesively as a team. A suckup breaks this team dynamic by attempting to make everything all about themselves - something a good leader will not stand for.

The result is that the suck-up does not last in a team with a good leaders. They will move on to another position where they hope that their brown-nosing skills will be more respected. As I've already described, the only manager that will respect such behavior is a bad manager and the suck-up ends up doing more harm than good to their career. Especially when they could have stayed and grown so much under the guidance of the good leader.

#5 People don't make friends with a suck-up

The final reason for not to be a suckup is that suckups do not make many friends. We spend a lot of our lives at work so it makes sense that we form close connections and friendships with our colleagues. But no-one wants to be friends with a suck-up.

Sure a suck-up might make many "connections" in the sense that they know a lot of people in the business world, but rarely will they develop close friendships. The suck-up is more likely to have 500+ connections on LinkedIn but less than a handful of true friends in real life.

Friendship is a massively important part of our lives. Having great friends brings so much happiness and positivity to our lives. When you have truly close friends they become like a second family that you can share your life with. I know I am blessed with an amazing bunch of friends and funnily enough I met most of them in at work.

Sucking up does not get you anywhere in life. It results in nothing but negative outcomes, both in professional and personal contexts. It is time to stop sucking up and start being honest in your life. 

Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net

How to be Impressive

I was at a social event recently that was filled with what I would consider to be highly intelligent people, and I was amazed to see a slightly disturbing pattern emerge. What I saw was that many of these well educated people were so hung up on impressing others that they had forgotten how to just be social and have a good time. It was as if life had become one big competition to these people and that in the brief two hour window in which they met it was a "measuring contest" as to who had been more successful and impressive in their lives so far. Pretty sad huh? But the real sadness was that none of them were really all that impressive. Sure they were all university educated and well employed in successful and respected companies, but they were not actually impressive. Why? Because it was obvious that they were too caught up in making their lives sound impressive rather than just actually being impressive.

And so it struck me - people who spend their time worrying about impressing others end up living the least impressive lives.

Impress Yourself, Not Others

If you are trying to impress others then you're doing it wrong.

What other people think of you does not matter at the best times, and particularly so when thinking about how impressive your life is. In order to be a person who impresses others you actually need to stop caring about impressing others.

People that expend their mental energy trying to impress others are projecting thoughts, ideas, and examples from their life that they think are impressive. The biggest flaw with this thinking is that everyone does not think the same. What is impressive for one person may be dull and boring for another.

If a 20 year old man told you how he was excited because he had walked to shops earlier that day you might not be too impressed. In fact you might think that he was a little lazy (or crazy). But what if that man had been in a wheelchair for the majority of his life? What if he had been told that he would never walk again? Would you be impressed now?

Of course you would! And that is a perfect example of why the measurement of your life has nothing to do with others. To that fictional man the act of walking is impressive and that is all that matters. The fact that most other people can do that easily is not the point. His actions are only judged from the perspective of his own reality.

And the same rules apply in your life. Your opinions of your life are what matter most. No one else in this world has the exact same knowledge and experience as you. That means that no one else is positioned as well as you to make a judgment on your life. Only you can determine if your life is impressive.

Stop trying to impress others and start trying to impress yourself.

How to be Impressive

Taking everything I've said into consideration it should be obvious that you do not become impressive simply by trying to be so. You become impressive by living a happy and purposeful life.

And here is how to do just that...

Follow your passion

If there is one thing that is universally impressive it is when someone breaks away from the traditional pursuits of our society to chase their dream. Stories of people quitting their mundane jobs to do what excites and motivates them are naturally inspiring. We love to hear these stories because they remind us that it is actually possible to live our dreams.

Compare the difference in the following scenario. Imagine meeting some new people at a party and the conversation takes the standard "what do you do?" path. The first person is a hard-working office drone in some well known accounting/law/consulting firm, earning a decent living. The second person is barely getting by but is running their own business, writing a novel, and training to become a WWF wrestler. It's pretty obvious which person is more interesting and which person's story would be more inspiring isn't it?

So don't base your life around what you believe others will think is impressive. That "successful" office job is actually not that impressive when compared to the endless possibilities that are available if you only decided to follow your dreams instead. :)

Be humble and never brag

Nobody likes a bragger. If you go into a conversation with aim of bragging and trying to sound impressive then the chances are that you'll just annoy everyone.

What people respond to better is someone who is quietly confident and does not need to talk about themselves or be validated by others. This personality trait is very impressive.

Consider me as an example. I believe what I have achieved in life so far is impressive, at least from my perspective. I'm respected and highly sought after in my career, I am the founder of a software development company, I write articles that touch over 4,000 unique visitors a month, and I actively participate and advise in multiple private equity projects.

But I don't start off telling that to anyone when I first meet them. I generally tell them a very small subset, just glossing over the details, and only if they show enough interest do I go into detail. Don't get me wrong, there is a time and place for self-promotion but that time is rarely in purely social situations.

If you do impressive things in your life then you should give others the chance to discover this for themselves. They will respect you much more if you are humble about your achievements.

Be positive

It is amazing how contagious and inspiring a positive attitude can be. If you exhibit a happy and positive attitude towards everything in life then people will find it very hard not to be impressed. Even the most negatively minded person will feel the impact of a positive attitude. Just make sure you're not doing the in-your-face-happy-clappy-my-attitude-is-better-than-yours positive attitude. Nobody likes that.

But seriously, your attitude defines everything in your life, and if you are projecting a strong and positive attitude then you will attract like-minded people.

Imagine the situation where two people are doing the same job and one describes it as "just a boring job that pays the bills" and another describes it as "an amazing job working with great people and getting to learn lots of new skills and processes". Which person would gain your attention?

If you have a positive attitude, even if the face of negativity, then you will always come across as an impressive individual.

Do not worry about what others think

This is the final ingredient to being impressive - stop worrying about what others think.

If you are following all the above steps AND you simply do not care about what others think of you then I guarantee that people will be impressed by you.

When you operate in this mode you give off an aura of passion, motivation, productivity, happiness, and success, which are all highly impressive traits.

That's it. That's how to be impressive. So what are you waiting for? Get out there and start being impressive today!

21 Motivating and Inspiring Quotes About Happiness

For something different I decided that today I would do a post of my favourite happiness quotes. Some of these are not the traditional happiness quotes you'll see in frequent usage but I like them because they are quirky and funny. Just like me.  

Each morning when I open my eyes I say to myself: I, not events, have the power to make me happy or unhappy today. I can choose which it shall be. Yesterday is dead, tomorrow hasn't arrived yet. I have just one day, today, and I'm going to be happy in it. Groucho Marx

When I was in grade school, they told me to write down what I wanted to be when I grew up. I wrote down happy. They told me I didn't understand the assignment, I told them they didn't understand life. Unknown

A positive attitude may not solve all your problems, but it will annoy enough people to make it worth the effort. Herm Albright

Most people are about as happy as they make up their minds to be. Abraham Lincoln

It isn't what you have, or who you are, or where you are, or what you are doing that makes you happy or unhappy. It is what you think about. Dale Carnegie

When one door of happiness closes, another opens, but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one that has been opened for us. Helen Keller

Plenty of people miss their share of happiness, not because they never found it, but because they didn't stop to enjoy it. William Feather

Happiness is the art of never holding in your mind the memory of any unpleasant thing that has passed. Unknown

Happiness is like a kiss. You must share it to enjoy it. Bernard Melzer

Happiness cannot be traveled to, owned, earned, worn or consumed. Happiness is the spiritual experience of living every minute with love, grace, and gratitude. Denis Waitley

To be happy, we must not be too concerned with others. Albert Camus

True happiness consists not in the multitude of friends, but in their worth and choice. Ben Johnson

Most people would rather be certain they’re miserable, than risk being happy. Dr. Robert Anthony

It is not by accident that the happiest people are those who make a conscious effort to live useful lives. Their happiness, of course, is not a shallow exhilaration where life is one continuous intoxicating party. Rather, their happiness is a deep sense of inner peace that comes when they believe their lives have meaning and that they are making a difference for good in the world. Ernest A. Fitzgerald

It is only possible to live happily ever after on a day to day basis. Margaret Bonnano

A happy person is not a person in a certain set of circumstances, but rather a person with a certain set of attitudes. Hugh Downs

There is only one way to happiness and that is to cease worrying about things which are beyond the power of our will. Epictetus

I have now reigned about 50 years in victory or peace, beloved by my subjects, dreaded by my enemies, and respected by my allies. Riches and honors, power and pleasure, have waited on my call, nor does any earthly blessing appear to have been wanting to my felicity. In this situation, I have diligently numbered the days of pure and genuine happiness which have fallen to my lot. They amount to fourteen. Abd Er-Rahman III of Spain

Success is not the key to happiness. Happiness is the key to success. If you love what you are doing, you will be successful. Albert Schweitzer

He who sings frightens away his ills. Miguel de Cervantes

By making a conscious decision about our everyday attitude we can define the happiness in our lives. We can define the quality of the life we live just by choosing to have a better attitude. Happiness occurs by choice not by accident. Zac Sky (that's me!)

I couldn't resist being a little cheeky and sneaking one of my own quotes in. :)