What lies at the end of the road is a prize that money can’t buy and a legacy the world won’t forget.These views on work and life itself are quite practical in our daily lives.You have found your own calling if it’s something really familiar to you, you are very good at it, and other people recognize this in you.

Stage 6: Legacy

Opportunities to learn and grow are available, if we’re willing to look in the right places and humbly accept what we find.Discovering your calling is not an epiphany but a series of intentional decisions.

Action

Practice is significant in our journey because it can teach you what you are and are not meant to do.By practicing you will find what you want to do in life. If you failed at something, it means that you were not meant for that type of activity.

Stage 3: Practice

<ul><li class="ql-align-justify">There are three things that give life meaning: a project, a significant relationship and a redemptive view of suffering.</li><li class="ql-align-justify">If we want true satisfaction in life, we have to rise above the pettiness of our own desires and do what is required of us.</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Clarity comes with action.</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Discovering your calling is not a destination. It’s more about the trip, the adventure. About the trains, you choose to jump in or not.</li></ul>

Key Takeaways From The Book

We are blaming ourselves for not having already born with a clear calling in our minds.Is the calling just a natural fact that appears suddenly?You don’t ‘just know’ what your calling is. You must listen for clues along the way, discovering what your life can tell you. Awareness comes with practice.

Preparation Of Your Journey

Awareness is a sense that something more is possible. Our job is to realize that life is more than what beats the eye and there are clear hints along the path of discovering our true self.It is not an easy road, we have to be willing to step out of the box and see the bigger picture and start acting.

Stage 1: Awareness

A profession is seen as the result of different tries that we achieve after a long and strenuous practice. It can be considered a form of mastery.True mastery is about greatness, about doing something that pushes the limitations of what others think is possible or even sensible.

Stage 5: Profession

To find out which is your calling it takes time. Usually the entire time of your life.Your calling is not a job. It is your entire life.  We look at seven stages to finding your life’s work that serves as a model to us.

The Calling: 7 Stages

A deep dive into what work is and what is should be.

On his thirtieth birthday, Jeff Goins quit his job and began his pursuit of becoming a full-time writer. While certainly that was a milestone day, it was still less significant than the ones that lead to that memorable moment. The journey he took leading up to that daring decision involved twists, turns, and surprises he never expected. In the end, he found his life’s purpose, his calling; and in The Art of Work, he wants to share his journey with you and help you, too, discover your life’s work, along with the invaluable treasure that comes with doing so.As writer, keynote speaker, and award-winning blogger Jeff Goins explains, our search for discovering the task we were born to do begins with passion but does not end there. Only when our interests connect with the needs of the world do we begin living for a larger purpose. Those who experience this intersection experience something exceptional and enviable. Though it is rare, as Jeff discovered along the journey he shares in this one-of-a-kind book, such a life is attainable by anyone brave enough to try. Through personal experience, compelling case studies, and current research on the mysteries of motivation and talent, Jeff shows readers how to find the vocation they were meant for and what to expect during the long, arduous journey to discovering and pursuing it.

career

Career

personaldevelopment

Personal Development

mindfulness

Mindfulness

books

Books

A USA TODAY, WASHINGTON POST, AND PUBLISHER'S WEEKLY BESTSELLER!The path to your life's work is difficult and risky, even scary, which is why few finish the journey. This book will help you discover your life’s work to live a life that matters with passion and purpose. It’s about the task you were born to do, your true life’s work.Bestselling author and entrepreneur Jeff Goins explains how the search begins with passion but does not end there. Only when our interests connect with the needs of the world do we begin living for a larger purpose. Those who experience this intersection experience something exceptional and enviable.Though it is rare, such a life is attainable by anyone brave enough to try.Through personal experience, compelling case studies, and current research on the mysteries of motivation and talent, Jeff shows you how to find their vocation and what to expect along the way.In The Art of Work, you’ll learn:<ul><li>The seven stages of calling to discover your life’s work</li><li>How accidental apprenticeships differ from mentoring and why taking action is key</li><li>How believing The Myth of the Leap can prevent you from achieving your dreams</li><li>To live The Portfolio Life and how it can lead to your greatest satisfaction and best work</li></ul>Our hearts crave connection to a meaningful calling. The Art of Work illuminates the proven path for anyone who wants to embrace that calling and build a body of work they can be proud of.

Jeff Goins

The Art of Work

Taking a break from a problem for a time can lead to a breakthrough. But looking at your email or Facebook can make it harder to return to the task. If you need a break, it is best to take "smart" breaks. These are activities that are relaxing, not distracting. <ul><li>Briefly sit with your eyes closed.</li><li>Going for a ten-minute walk</li><li>Stretching or doing push-ups</li><li>Drinking a glass of water</li></ul>

Take "smart" breaks

A task can be perceived as effortful when we are really calculating opportunity costs. For attention-demanding tasks, the brain needs to focus on one thing and ignore the rest. Yet, it prefers lower-value activities. A way to discourage getting stuck on low-value activities is to reduce tempting alternatives.

Wean yourself off your phone

During complex tasks, staying sharp can be difficult. When you desperately need to focus, it can be tricky to stop a wandering mind. However, there are tools we can use to stay alert and power through.

How to maintain peak concentration

Your working memory corresponds closest to a mental bandwidth. It's the things that you're thinking about now. However, working memory is in contrast to long-term memory, which is everything you know and remember. Working memory is limited. One way to cope with limited working memory is to offload it on paper.

Minimize mental overhead

Difficult work can make you want to quit after a few minutes. However, the urge to give up is seldom constant. The desire to quit arrives at predictable moments. If you can identify those moments, and you can disable them. If you want to give up before you began, set a timer for twenty minutes and only allow yourself to quit when the time is up.

Find your quitting triggers

At times, you may get stuck. To get out of it, switch to a "meta" task, meaning shift to a more abstract layer of a problem such as figuring out why you're stuck. For example, if you are writing an essay and don't know what to write, switching to a meta task would mean writing about how you don't know what to write. This activity can help you articulate your difficulty that could lead to a solution.

Shift to the "meta" task

Do you find yourself scrolling feeds when you should be focusing? Here are ten tools to keep your mind sharp, even on the toughest tasks.

productivity

Productivity

health

Health

problemsolving

Problem Solving

timemanagement

Time Management

The 10 Best Tools to Stay Mentally Sharp at Work

Caroline Webb recommends a few hacks to have great days:<ol><li>Single-Tasking: focus on thing at once. Multi-tasking is a myth.</li><li>Planning Deliberate Downtime: Take care of yourself.</li><li>Resolving Tensions: The social problems are gonna take a toll on you.</li><li>Reboot your energy</li></ol>

The tools for having great days

If you disagree on something:<ul><li>Articulate the other person’s perspective as if you truly believe it.</li><li>Identify what you both agree on.</li><li>Isolate the real disagreement; explore how you could both be right.</li><li>Decide what you can do based on what you agree on. </li></ul>

Resolving Tensions by Finding Common Ground

"In all the empirical studies on psychological well-being, one thing emerges as a reliable foundation for happiness: the quality of our relationships."

People are often good but their circumstances can change how they come out.Get clear on the “true facts”: what you know for sure. Then assume that the other person has good intent, and imagine the circumstances that could be causing his or her behavior.

Assume “Good person, Bad Circumstances”

Daniel Kahneman, Nobel prize winner, explains how our mind has 2 modes:<ul><li>Your deliberate system is responsible for sophisticated functions such as reasoning, self-control, and forward-thinking. It excels in handling anything unfamiliar, complex, or abstract. But it has limited capacity and gets tired quickly. </li><li>Your automatic system lightens the load on your deliberate system by automating most of what you do and taking fast shortcuts that filter out “irrelevant” information and options. But it inevitably leaves you with blind spots. </li></ul>We need to be aware of both systems to make good decisions.

The Two-System Brain

There is no such thing as multi-tasking:<ul><li>Group together similar tasks (e.g., email, calls, and reading), so you’re not constantly switching from one mental mode to another. </li><li>Decide on the best time of day to tackle each batch of tasks. Create longer blocks of uninterrupted time for your most important work. </li><li>Minimize interruptions, to help you focus your attention on the task at hand. Which alerts can you switch off? Can you use an app to block access to certain websites? </li><li>Plan small rewards for good behavior. </li></ul>

Single-Tasking

"Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate."

Your brain’s deliberate system needs regular breaks to keep it fully functional. When tired, we are more likely to make poorer decisions.Allow your brain a chance to step back and consolidate the experience. Plan for breaks between “zones” in your day. Refresh your mind after every ninety minutes.

Planning Deliberate Downtime

You’re constantly moving along a discover-defend axis in your daily life, as your brain scans for threats to defend against and rewards to discover.<ul><li>In defensive mode, you become less smart and flexible, as your brain devotes some of its scarce mental energy to respond to a potential “threat”.</li><li>In discovery mode, you’re motivating yourself with rewards: a social sense of belonging or recognition; a personal sense of autonomy, competence, or purpose; or informational rewards that come from learning or experiencing new things</li></ul>When we are in the discover, we are more likely to have good days.

The Discover-Defend Axis

For a complete and happy day, you need to focus on your energy and reboot it when needed.Know thyself by identifying where the typical energy highs and lows occur. Plan for the triggers and events around the highs and lows.

Knowing How To Reboot Your Energy

You are not a mind trapped inside a body. You are a body and your mind is part of it. So if you want to change your mind, start with the body.<ul><li>The way you treat your body has a direct, immediate impact on your brain’s performance, affecting both its cognitive and emotional functions. </li><li>Your brain’s deliberate system performs far better when you’ve had enough sleep, some aerobic exercise, and a few moments of mindfulness. </li><li>Mimicking the physical actions associated with feeling happy, confident, and relaxed appears to tell your brain that you are in fact happy, confident, and relaxed.</li></ul>

The Mind-Body Loop

"The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing."

You can work towards having more productive and satisfying days. Caroline Webb believes it can be done by:<ol><li>Understanding how the brain works: the two-system brain, our discover-defence axis or mind-body loop.</li><li>Apply a series of practical advice</li></ol>

The secret behind having good days

In How to Have a Good Day, economist and former McKinsey partner Caroline Webb shows readers how to use recent findings from behavioral economics, psychology, and neuroscience to transform our approach to everyday working life. Advances in behavioral sciences are giving us an ever better understanding of how our brains work, why we make the choices we do, and what it takes for us to be at our best. But it has not always been easy to see how to apply these insights in the real world--until now. In How to Have a Good Day, Webb explains exactly how to apply this science to our daily tasks and routines. She translates three big scientific ideas into step-by-step guidance that shows us how to set better priorities, make our time go further, ace every interaction, be our smartest selves, strengthen our personal impact, be resilient to setbacks, and boost our energy and enjoyment. Through it all, Webb teaches us how to navigate the typical challenges of modern workplaces—from conflict with colleagues to dull meetings and overflowing inboxes—with skill and ease. Filled with stories of people who have used Webb’s insights to boost their job satisfaction and performance at work, How to Have a Good Day is the book so many people wanted when they finished Nudge, Blink and Thinking Fast and Slow and were looking for practical ways to apply this fascinating science to their own lives and careers. A remarkable and much-needed book, How to Have a Good Day gives us the tools we need to have a lifetime of good days.

In How to Have a Good Day, economist and former McKinsey partner Caroline Webb shows readers how to use recent findings from behavioral economics, psychology, and neuroscience to transform our approach to everyday working life.   Advances in behavioral sciences are giving us an ever better understanding of how our brains work, why we make the choices we do, and what it takes for us to be at our best. But it has not always been easy to see how to apply these insights in the real world--until now.   In How to Have a Good Day, Webb explains exactly how to apply this science to our daily tasks and routines. She translates three big scientific ideas into step-by-step guidance that shows us how to set better priorities, make our time go further, ace every interaction, be our smartest selves, strengthen our personal impact, be resilient to setbacks, and boost our energy and enjoyment. Through it all, Webb teaches us how to navigate the typical challenges of modern workplaces—from conflict with colleagues to dull meetings and overflowing inboxes—with skill and ease.   Filled with stories of people who have used Webb’s insights to boost their job satisfaction and performance at work, How to Have a Good Day is the book so many people wanted when they finished Nudge, Blink and Thinking Fast and Slow and were looking for practical ways to apply this fascinating science to their own lives and careers.   A remarkable and much-needed book, How to Have a Good Day gives us the tools we need to have a lifetime of good days.

Caroline Webb

How to Have a Good Day

Seneca wrote a lot of letters to Roman knight Lucilius. Through them, we get the sense that Lucilius struggled with many of the things we all struggle with: anxiety, distraction, fear, temptation, and self-discipline. It’s good that he had a friend like Seneca—someone who cared about him and told him the truth. One of Seneca’s best pieces of advice in those letters was actually pretty simple. “Each day,” he told Lucilius, you should “acquire something that will fortify you against poverty, against death, indeed against other misfortunes, as well.”

The Roman-era Stoic philosopher Seneca once joked that the one thing fools all have in common is that they are always getting ready to live but never actually do.That was 20 centuries ago. For tens of thousands of years, people have been procrastinating just like you do today: They put things off, delayed, made excuses, and wished their deadlines would disappear. And just as it does with you, this caused them anxiety, made them piss off their colleagues and families, and, worst of all, wasted time.

Fortunately, unlike our ancient counterparts, we have ages of wisdom to help us avoid the mental traps that lead us to procrastinate.Here are seven anti-procrastination tactics that are rooted in ancient philosophy and can be applied in the modern world.<ol><li>Action by action</li><li>Create a routine</li><li>Use a counterforce</li><li>Get one small win every day</li><li>Free yourself from the inessential</li><li>Face your important tasks head-on</li><li>Creat a sense of urgency</li></ol>

7 Tactics Of The Ancient World That Have Stood The Test Of Time

Without a disciplined schedule, procrastination inevitably moves in with all the chaos, complacency, and confusion: What was I going to do? What do I wear? What should I eat? What should I do first? What should I do after that? What sort of work should I do? Should I scramble to address this problem or rush to put out this fire?

Since habit is such a powerful influence, and we’re used to pursuing our impulses to gain and avoid outside our own choice, we should set a contrary habit against that, and where appearances are really slippery, use the counterforce of our training. — Epictetus, Discourses , 3.12.16

Use A Counterforce

Well-being is attained by little and little, and nevertheless is no little thing itself.—Zeno

Get One Small Win Every Day

Follow this advice today and every day. So much of what we think we must do — and what we end up doing — is not essential. Rip off the chains of obligation to these things. Then you’ll be able to better do what is essential and get a taste of the tranquillity that Aurelius was talking about.

From his stepfather Antoninus, Aurelius learned how to work long hours and “stay in the saddle.” He never shirked hard work or avoided his most unpleasant duties. He had a job to do and didn’t complain about it. “Never be overheard complaining,” he wrote, “not even to yourself.”

Stop letting yourself be distracted. That is not allowed. Instead, as if you were dying right now… Stop allowing your mind to be a slave, to be jerked about by selfish impulses, to kick against fate and the present, and to mistrust the future.—Marcus Aurelius

Create A Sense Of Urgency

The same goes for humans. When a bad habit reveals itself, counteract it with a commitment to a contrary virtue. Sometimes, when you find yourself procrastinating, it’s best not to dig in and fight it. Instead, get up and take a walk to clear your head. Try what artist <a href="https://ryanholiday.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=dcd3642d86121fbcaa9914228&id=c02ad43abe&e=47e85155f0">Austin Kleon </a>calls productive procrastination: “A kind of promiscuous working in which I procrastinate on one project by working on another, sometimes switching between two or more projects until all the projects are done.”

Don’t let your imagination be crushed by life as a whole… Stick with the situation at hand, and ask, “Why is this so unbearable? Why can’t I endure it?” You’ll be embarrassed to answer.—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations , 8.36

Action By Action

Yes, you can — if you do everything as if it were the last thing you were doing in your life, and stop being aimless, stop letting your emotions override what your mind tells you, stop being hypocritical, self-centered, irritable.—Marcus Aurelius

Face Your Important Tasks Head-on

In the sports world, University of Alabama coach <a href="https://ryanholiday.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=dcd3642d86121fbcaa9914228&id=e856728e5f&e=47e85155f0">Nick Saban </a> taught his players to ignore the big picture — important games, winning championships, the opponent’s enormous lead — and focus instead on doing the absolutely smallest things well. He would tell them, “Think about what you need to do in this drill, on this play, in this moment. That’s the process: Let’s think about what we can do today, the task at hand.”

Oppose established habits, use the counterforce of training to get traction and make progress, and channel the negative impulse into something, anything, positive.

<a href="https://ryanholiday.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=dcd3642d86121fbcaa9914228&id=3e0e5428e4&e=47e85155f0">Epictetus </a>once said that “every habit and capability is confirmed and grows in its corresponding actions, walking by walking, and running by running… therefore, if you want to do something, make a habit of it.” If you don’t want to do something, he said, make a habit of doing the opposite. For this reason, the Stoics were big on <a href="https://ryanholiday.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=dcd3642d86121fbcaa9914228&id=0cc8982e90&e=47e85155f0">habits and routines </a>. They believed that in a world where so much is out of our control, committing to a routine we do control is a way of establishing and reminding ourselves of our own power.

As wonderful as it would be if there were no such thing as death, we can use death as a tool: We can use it as a spur to move us forward. We can use it as a reminder of what’s truly important and use our time accordingly.

In many circumstances, we do not deal with our affairs in accordance with correct assumptions, but rather we follow thoughtless habit.—Musonius Rufus, Lectures and Fragments , 6.7

Create A Routine

The writer Haruki Murakami talks about why he follows the same routine every day. “The repetition itself becomes the important thing,” he says. “It’s a form of mesmerism. I mesmerize myself to reach a deeper state of mind.” Procrastination feeds on our uncertainty. Routine eliminates that uncertainty. We know what we do and when we do it.

Arnold Schwarzenegger is a filmmaker, entrepreneur, author, former governor, professional bodybuilder, and father of five. He’s also a fan of the Stoics. In <a href="https://ryanholiday.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=dcd3642d86121fbcaa9914228&id=e6c8537fe1&e=47e85155f0">a recent video </a>, he gave his best advice for staying strong during this pandemic: “Just as long as you do something every day, that is the important thing.” One thing a day adds up. One step at a time is all it takes. You just gotta get one small win. And the sooner you start, the better you’ll feel—and be.

It was Aurelius’ simple recipe for improvement and for happiness. And the fact that it came from such a busy man with so many obligations and responsibilities should not be forgotten. “If you seek tranquillity,” he said, “do less.” And then he follows the note to himself with some clarification: Not nothing—less. Do only what’s essential. “Which brings a double satisfaction,” he writes, “to do less, better.”

That’s torture. Seneca would call it a design problem. “Life without a design is erratic,” he wrote. “As soon as one is in place, principles become necessary. I think you’ll concede that nothing is more shameful than uncertain and wavering conduct, and beating a cowardly retreat. This will happen in all our affairs unless we remove the faults that seize and detain our spirits, preventing them from pushing forward and making an all-out effort.”

All the crises, distractions, and temptations we face today have their analogs in the past. So we should listen to the command that Aurelius gave himself on one of those days when he was struggling to stay focused: “Concentrate every minute like a Roman — like a man — on doing what’s in front of you with precise and genuine seriousness, tenderly, willingly, with justice.”

One gain per day. That’s it. This is the way to curbing our procrastinating tendencies: remembering that <a href="https://ryanholiday.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=dcd3642d86121fbcaa9914228&id=6248dee44d&e=47e85155f0">incremental, consistent, humble, persistent work </a>is the way to improvement. Your business, your book, your career, your body — you build them with little things, day after day.

It is essential for you to remember that the attention you give to any action should be in due proportion to its worth, for then you won’t tire and give up, if you aren’t busying yourself with lesser things beyond what should be allowed.—Marcus Aurelius

Free Yourself From The Inessential

When a dog is barking loudly because someone is at the door, the worst thing you can do is yell. To the dog, it’s like you’re barking, too. When a dog is running away, it’s not helpful to chase it — again, now it’s like you’re both running. A better option in both scenarios is to give the dog something else to do. Tell it to sit. Run in the other direction. Break the pattern. Interrupt the negative impulse.

Has procrastinating ever made your life less stressful and more efficient? I’m willing to bet the answer is no. This is why we must follow Aurelius’ lead and focus on the important tasks in front of us. If we can win that battle first, the rest of the day will be a breeze.

Procrastination can often be a product of overwhelm. We have so much on our to-do list that we don’t even know where to begin, so we don’t begin. Seneca liked to use the word “discursive.” When we have our attention pointed in so many different directions, we have it pointed nowhere. He compared it to the nomad: “Everywhere means nowhere.” The way forward is to <a href="https://ryanholiday.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=dcd3642d86121fbcaa9914228&id=c4cef2512c&e=47e85155f0">zero in on what’s most important </a>.

Putting off our responsibilities is easy. Complaining is easy. Both are as natural to us as breathing. But what good has either ever done for anyone in the long run? Sure, shaking your fist at the sky and venting your frustrations can feel liberating in the moment, but has it ever changed your circumstances for the better, solved your problems, or made you happier?

An adage of author and historian Cyril Northcote Parkinson was that “work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.” Today, we know that principle as Parkinson’s law. So, if you have two weeks to write a paper for school, it will take two weeks. If you block off all day Sunday to clean your house, it will take all day. If you give something unlimited time, it will take forever. When we’re pressed by a deadline, we don’t procrastinate.

We can use Parkinson’s law to our advantage. The Stoics did. <a href="https://ryanholiday.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=dcd3642d86121fbcaa9914228&id=ca67770c23&e=47e85155f0">Memento mori </a>— the reflection on mortality — was their reminder. Remember that you are mortal. Remember that you are always pressed by a deadline. Remember what Aurelius said: “You could leave life right now. Let that determine what you do and say and think.” It wasn’t to create panic, but priority, humility, urgency, appreciation.

With any goal, our imaginations often run wild envisioning all the things that can go wrong. While it <a href="https://ryanholiday.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=dcd3642d86121fbcaa9914228&id=645f7253d2&e=47e85155f0">can be productive </a>to think about the troubles that might lie ahead — the Stoics used an exercise called premeditatio malorum , or “premeditation of evils,” to prepare for potential adversity — imagining the worst usually just causes us to become paralyzed with fear. This is why <a href="https://ryanholiday.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=dcd3642d86121fbcaa9914228&id=ba27c1cfdc&e=47e85155f0">Marcus Aurelius’ </a>advice was to keep in mind that a life is built action by action. No author ever writes a book, he would say. Instead, they write one sentence and then another and then another.

The Roman-era Stoic philosopher Seneca once joked that the one thing fools all have in common is that they are always getting ready to live but never actually do. That was 20 centuries ago. For tens…

habits

Habits

How to Beat Procrastination Like a Stoic Philosopher

In Japanese, the word Kaizen translates to many things, but the main idea is simply “change.” To take advantage of the power of change, you need to <a href="https://fourminutebooks.com/mini-habits-summary/">start with your habits</a>. Which means you’ll have to look hard at the habits you already have.Your brain is always making habits as a way to save power on repeated behaviours. This preserves your mental energy for bigger, tougher tasks. But because it’s so automatic, you might form unwanted habits.

Kaizen Is Incremental Growth

Try setting your alarm just five minutes earlier and see if it makes a change to how rushed you feel getting out of the door. If this works, try extending this further by five-minute increments each week. Just having a bit more time to get your belongings together can have a huge impact.

Wake Up Just Five Minutes Earlier

Rather than sitting at your computer with a blank page in front of you, trying to magically be blessed with inspiration, try to do a small writing challenge each day instead. This can be the springboard for a bigger writing project and will get you in the habit of putting words down on the page. There are lots of podcasts and blogs dedicated to writing challenges.

Sticking To Your Hobby: A Writing Challenge

Change is infectious and when success is achieved in one area, you are encouraged to apply the same techniques to another area of your life. This is referred to as yokoten or ‘horizontal deployment’, i.e. copying what works in one area to see if it works in another.The philosophy of Kaizen is just as easy to apply to individual change as to change in a business; it is about setting long-term, medium-term and short-term goals, then thinking of small, incremental adjustments you can make to work towards these goals.

Yokoten: Horizontal Deployment

If you want to eat healthier, for instance, maybe you just add one vegetable to your plate each week to start. Once that habit has stuck, you can add more.Experts recommend this because it keeps you going in the normally difficult early stages. You’re also more likely to stick with your goal in the long-term when you follow this method, too!

The Eating Better Habit

Kaizen is a lifelong commitment to change, so there may be times when your motivation waivers or when you fall on hard times (unless you’re the luckiest person in the world). Nobody is perfect, and the idea isn’t to achieve complete perfection. It’s about approaching life as an exciting journey and opportunity for improvement.There will be inevitable stumbling blocks along the way, but there are some methods to keep in mind to make sure you continue with Kaizen.

Stumbling Blocks

Small changes like these aren’t usually easy to make because we don’t see the rewards immediately. In contrast, it’s easier to give in to a bad habit because they involve things that do reward us instantly. Kaizen fixes this problem by focusing on changing things in such a tiny way that your brain hardly notices. Ask yourself “What tiny steps can I take to move me closer to my goal?” Don’t discount things that seem ridiculously easy, either. They work!

Make The First Step Extremely Small

Kaizen is a Japanese philosophy centered around incremental growth, and it begins with evaluating your habits.The best way to reach your big goals is to start with such a small step that the difference is barely noticeable.Track your progress with your habits by reviewing them regularly.

The Three Key Takeaways From Kaizen

With many little strokes a large tree is felled

If your brain is still whirring, another idea is to get a piece of paper and write out a ‘brain dump’ of everything that is on your mind from that day. It doesn’t have to be anything coherent or fully formed – just write out everything that is troubling you. This can also be a really useful exercise if you wake up in the middle of the night and are unable to go back to sleep.

Do A Brain Dump

Start by interrogating your habits to make an inventory of your life. Get a piece of paper, divide it into the major sections of your life. Then, go through all areas of life and ask yourself if you’re doing all you can to be happy in that area. Dig deep to find out what you really seek. When you’re done with that, finish by writing down your biggest aspirations in each category.

Make An Inventory Of Life

Kaizen works best when you use a tracking system.Doing so helps you see the barely noticeable gradual changes. Your progress can then motivate you to keep going and show you additional areas where you can do better.Create your own journaling method to track your goals. Bullet journaling is one option that works really well for many people. You can also get a physical notebook and create your own by writing the days of the month and your goals and checking off which days you accomplish your goals.

Review Your Habits And Track Your Progress

Remembering the Kaizen approach and introducing a new activity into your routine with the least amount of disruption will mean you are more likely to stick to it. It can help to peg the activity to something you already do.Start knitting while you watch the evening news every day, or use the ten minutes waiting for your morning coffee to brew to write one hundred words of your novel. When you get home from work, dedicate ten minutes to practising the piano before you do anything else.

Sticking To Your Hobby: Start Off Small

The emphasis in Kaizen is always on doing things in small stages and treating the idea of change as an ongoing process rather than a quick-fix ‘to-do list’

First Kaizen step: if you’re having a tough time, keep a record of one small thing that you have achieved each day, then look back on this when things are feeling better and congratulate yourself on your resilience and for getting through.

Living The Kaizen Philosophy Everyday

Just six minutes of reading before bed has been shown to reduce stress levels by two-thirds and promote good sleep. Choose a couple of nights of the week where you read before bed rather than look at a screen and see if it makes a difference.

Read A Good Book

Part of practising self-compassion is not over-stretching yourself by doing things that you don’t want to do. Do you find that you are overwhelmed with trying to see everybody and fit everything in? Try to designate at least one or two nights per week for vegging out, doing your washing and cooking something healthy. Having more control over your own schedule and setting boundaries can feel wondrously liberating.

Learning To Say No: Setting Boundaries

Rather than trying to fit in your new activity when you have a small break from all of your other commitments, allocate some set time to your new hobby. Fill out the time in your calendar and set a reminder so that you definitely don’t plan anything else in its place.

Sticking To Your Hobby: Commit Spending Time

Kaizen is not one-size-fits-all; one person’s experience of it will be entirely different from another’s. The important thing is to listen to your mind and body, then create good habits that work for you and let go of the ones that aren’t doing you any favours.  The emphasis is on continuous improvement, so you should always be thinking about ways you can be tweaking your routine or simplifying your life. Staying mindful of your feelings and behaviours will mean that you will be more aware of when you need to take a step back or if you need a new challenge to get you out of a rut.

Bottom Line: Change For Good

Kaizen is useful for anybody wishing to change their routine. Rather than making any scary leaps into the dark, it is about stepping back and analysing your current habits, deciding what you could improve in your existing life, or thinking of new challenges you could start, then putting into place a plan to change in very small incremental stages. You will hardly even notice the difference to your routine.

Continuous Improvement

Focus your attention on improving just one room and see the effect it has on your mental state and how you feel about your home. It may spur you on to want to tackle more rooms in the house. And if you live with others, don’t take all of the burden on yourself; involve your partner, your children and your friends. A stress-free home will benefit them as much as you.

Your Home

Kaizen is Japanese for “change for the better” or “continuous improvement,” and the author explains this business philosophy that has expanded into the personal growth arena to give a clear pathway to reaching your goals through consistent incremental changes.

Reach your goals with Kaizen—the Japanese art of gentle self-improvement From Hygge to Ikigai, positive philosophies have taken the world by storm. Now, Kaizen—meaning “good change”—will help you transform your habits, without being too hard on yourself along the way. With Kaizen, even the boldest intention becomes a series of small, achievable steps. Each person’s approach will be different, which is why it’s so effective. First popularized by Toyota, Kaizen is already proven in the worlds of business and sports. Here, Sarah Harvey shows how to apply it to your health, relationships, money, career, hobbies, and home—and how to tailor it to your personality. Kaizen is the key to lasting change!

Reach your goals with Kaizen—the Japanese art of gentle self-improvement From Hygge to Ikigai, positive philosophies have taken the world by storm. Now, Kaizen—meaning “good change”—will help you transform your habits, without being too hard on yourself along the way. With Kaizen, even the boldest intention becomes a series of small, achievable steps. Each person’s approach will be different, which is why it’s so effective. First popularized by Toyota, Kaizen is already proven in the worlds of business and sports. Here, Sarah Harvey shows how to apply it to your health, relationships, money, career, hobbies, and home—and how to tailor it to your personality. Kaizen is the key to lasting change!

Sarah Harvey is an accomplished writer whose work has resonated with readers around the world. Sarah Harvey has published several books that explore a range of topics, from fiction to nonfiction, and has received critical acclaim for the ability to weave compelling narratives. Sarah Harvey's writing style is known for its depth and authenticity, and has earned quite a loyal following of readers.

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The Art of Work

The 10 Best Tools to Stay Mentally Sharp at Work

How to Have a Good Day

It's time to Read like a Pro.

How to Beat Procrastination Like a Stoic Philosopher

CURATED BY

It's time to
Read like a Pro.