Sometimes people tend to think that they need to perform many actions to succeed. It's preferable to focus your energy on a limited number of activities because you can't do everything due to constraints of time, money and other resources. I poured water from a giant pitcher into seven glasses until it emptied. I showed different pouring possibilities, pouring equally and pouring unequally where one glass received more water than the others. I also demonstrated a situation where not enough water remained for one of the drinks.This demonstration helped me emphasize the important message of prioritization — how every executive should choose how much energy to dedicate to each critical assignment.Pour water into the glasses that matter most to you. Focusing on the most crucial tasks is one of the core habits of highly effective people. Cheers to a new, better year.

Simple Secret for High Performance

Self Improvement

Simple demonstrations can lead employees to better time-management and feelings of self-worth.

My published ideas

Twenty years ago, just before a speech I was invited to deliver for a major U.S. company, I discovered that one of the people I had learned from so much, <a dir="ltr" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zig_Ziglar" rel="nofollow noopener">Zig Ziglar </a>, had given a speech there, and I sought his advice, asking two key questions:

1.   What was the best thing you did in your speech for that company?

2.   What mistakes should I avoid making, especially in front of this audience?

Ziglar told me that the best thing he did was using humor. I asked him, "Is it vital that they laugh during the speech?" And he replied, "Only if you want them to invite you again."

In retrospect, I realized that he gave me one of the most essential pieces of advice I have ever received because, until that moment, I've had never dedicated an intentional effort to creating planned humorous moments.

The second thing Ziglar told me was, "Gil, find creative ways to demonstrate your messages. People learn, enjoy and remember much better when you demonstrate your messages."

A week after the conversation, I sat at my work desk, poured a glass of <a data-ga-action="/topic/water" data-ga-category="autotag-linking" data-ga-label="ai-metadata" dir="ltr" href="https://www.entrepreneur.com/topic/water">water </a>and stared at the air. "What kind of demonstration can I perform to deliver the message of focusing on a limited number of activities?"

Sometimes people tend to think that they need to perform many actions to succeed. My goal was to deliver a message that it's preferable to focus your energy on a limited number of activities because you can't do everything due to constraints of time, money and other resources.

I watched as a glass of water slowly emptied, and then I felt like Archimedes discovering the laws of floatation. Only instead of running naked in the streets and shouting, "Eureka!" I whispered, "Water glasses."

For my speech, I went up to the stage with seven water glasses and demonstrated how I poured water from a giant pitcher into the seven glasses until it emptied. I showed different pouring possibilities, pouring equally and pouring unequally where one glass received more water than the others. I also demonstrated a situation where not enough water remained for one of the drinks.

This demonstration helped me emphasize the important message of prioritization — how every executive should choose how much energy to dedicate to each critical assignment.

That's one of the most important things you should focus on while planning the next year. Less is more. Focus. Would you like to share that concept with your team?

Here is what I did with a small group of managers as part of a workshop for managing personal effectiveness. I did it a couple of times over Zoom too: Each participant received a medium-sized water pitcher and several glasses of his/her choosing. The participants had to plan their goals for the next year and choose as many glasses as they desired. They attached every glass a sticker with the name of the goal. At the end of the workshop, they all poured water into their drinks, according to the attached goals' importance.

This exercise stimulates a combination of mental <a data-ga-action="/topic/learning" data-ga-category="autotag-linking" data-ga-label="ai-metadata" dir="ltr" href="https://www.entrepreneur.com/topic/learning">learning </a>channels of the participants: the visual medium, the kinesthetic channel and the auditory, and it creates a humorous atmosphere ("Whoops, be careful, you spilled some!"). All of this leads to the creation of magical and unforgettable moments, which, in turn, leads to improved performance.

The idea of water glasses served me well when I consulted a client who told me, "You know, Gil, without anything related to what we did today, the thing I desire the most is to find a loved one and have kids. How can it be that I'm so successful in my professional life, but can't make it in my personal life?"

I realized that on the one hand, she wants to find a romantic partner, but on the other hand, she doesn't allocate enough to building a relationship. In this case, I used a demonstration that included two water glasses. One glass represented "working," and the other one represented "personal." I proved to her how she dedicated all her time and energy to working and not finding a romantic partner.

The choice was, of course, in her hands, and for the next two months, every time she drank a glass of water or any other drink, it was impossible for her to forget the message.

Today, she is a happy CEO and a mother to two lovely boys. Perhaps when they grow up a little and seek out their mom's advice about career, school, sports, hobbies, family, community volunteering and other essential activities, she might even show them how to balance between the more essential glasses and the least critical glasses.

Pour water into the glasses that matter most to you. Focusing on the most crucial tasks is one of the core habits of highly effective people. Cheers to a new, better year.

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1 Simple Secret for High Performance in 2021

Bite-size practice of core skills is something we do all our lives. We may master a foundation skill, then return to re-learn it when our work evolves to a different place. Core skills never change, but our application of them may shift as our skill level progresses. We commit to improving those core skills by intentional practice. The good news is that it’s fully possible to improve our abilities in rapid strides. The bad news, though, is that mastery – in design or any other skill – is linked to deliberate practice. No one (yet) has come up with a method to instantly transform someone into a great designer. Mastery is a structure built brick by brick. Fortunately, we are not talking about practicing and mastering a long list of core skills – five or six are usually sufficient.

Practice

Maynard lived next door. When he wasn’t spinning wrenches at the local Ford garage, he was out in his driveway, hunched over a neighbor’s car. As a kid I spent…

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Go with the flow. Sweet curves can flow from your compass into your work with a bit of practice.

M aynard lived next door. When he wasn’t spinning wrenches at the local Ford garage, he was out in his driveway, hunched over a neighbor’s car.

As a kid I spent hours leaning over a fender, watching him perform what seemed like magic. I thought he could fix anything and peppered him with questions, but his answers always ended with the same admonition: “It takes practice.” That’s not an answer I wanted to hear then and, to be honest, it’s not what I like hearing today. Who wants to practice? Can’t we just skip it and get to the fun stuff?

There are two schools of thought about becoming a master at an art or craft. Both involve practice.

One notion, affirmed by centuries of traditional apprenticeships, says that mastery is less dependent on talent than just putting in the time. Writer Malcolm Gladwell claims it takes around 10,000 hours of practice to reveal the potential hidden in an average person pursuing excellence in a specific area. This would come as no surprise to our ancestors who trained in traditional apprenticeships, beginning at around 13 years old, for five or six years before progressing to journeyman status.

The other approach holds that we make huge strides toward mastery by breaking core skills into bite-sized pieces that can be practiced deliberately over time. Entrepreneur Jim Rohn, no stranger to the concept of success, once wrote, “Success is nothing more than a few simple disciplines, practiced every day.”

But it’s not just about putting in the time, it’s about focusing on specific lessons. In fact, we gain nothing and may even go backward by putting in large chunks of time on the wrong things while ignoring fundamental core skills.

I imagine you have seen, as I have, woodworkers with very high technical ability gained through many years of effort, yet who lack simple design fundamentals that would showcase their ability. Without a solid base of core design skills, no amount of precise workmanship will make up for that deficit.

This bite-size practice of core skills is something we do all our lives. We may master a foundation skill, such as proportions, then return to re-learn it when our work evolves to a different place.

Core skills never change, but our application of them may shift as our skill level progresses. For example, we return to the core skill of understanding proportions again and again as we explore working at different scales or experiment with curves or organic forms. The assumption is that if we want to always get better, our core skills such as drawing will also need to get better. Thus we commit to improving those core skills by intentional practice.

The good news is that it’s fully possible to improve our abilities in rapid strides. The bad news, though, is that mastery – in design or any other skill – is linked to deliberate practice. No one (yet) has come up with a method to instantly transform someone into a great designer. Mastery is a structure built brick by brick.

Shape up. Understanding the simple shapes that inhabit a design is a key skill.

Fortunately, we are not talking about practicing and mastering a long list of core skills – five or six are usually sufficient. For woodworking in general, examples of core skills might be sharpening, stock preparation or joinery. Do you see how each of these can be broken down into small, easily practiced pieces?

If we treat design as an area of mastery, there are six core skills to focus our attention on: proportions, lines and simple shapes, drawing, space, curves and forms. Longtime readers of this column will note my tendency to revisit these skills.

What follows is a summary of each core skill, broken down into bite-sized bits.

Proportions are the patterns we use to tell a story and give the eye footholds within a design. They include whole-number harmonic proportions, and how these patterns relate to the human form, nature and architecture. Proportions are woven into each and every core skill and, for that reason, are critical to all other skills that follow.

Space out. Add perspective and depth to your imagination through the exploration of space.

Lines and simple shapes include points, lines and simple shapes that can be generated with a straightedge and compass using simple geometry. They are the structure underlying any design and the building blocks of spatial organization.

Drawing is a visualization skill that can help flesh out a design. It includes quick freehand concept drawing, proportional field studies (drawing examples from real life or masterworks at a museum), simple geometric plan and elevation (façade) drawings and isometric drawings.

Space is the ability to visualize shapes in three dimensions. It is one of the most challenging skills to develop.

Curves refers to the ability to execute designs with sweet, natural curves.

Forms involves the combination of simple shapes, lines, solids and curves into pleasing compositions.

That fair curve. We all want to make alluring curves.

Be deliberate about practice – set aside a regular time to focus on one aspect of a core skill. Practice is a short period of time meant to address a weakness – and that’s it. It’s separate from executing a project; you won’t produce a finished product, but you need to make it part of your routine. If you have the luxury of a full day in the shop, give yourself 20 minutes to practice an area in which you wish to see improvement. If time is limited, it’s still wise (perhaps more so) to schedule a regular practice session.

One practice habit that I never outgrow is visiting a museum or historic furniture collection for a period of field drawing.

Whether it’s a high-style 18th-century masterpiece, a Greene and Greene architectural detail or a nice regional piece, just sketch something that catches your eye. Field studies really amp up your observation skills and can reveal details and secrets you might never notice in a photo.

Field trip. A field study lets you look right over the masters’ shoulders and see the work through their eyes.

You can use your pencil in an outstretched arm to pick off proportions using the method I covered in the February 2012 issue of Popular Woodworking Magazine (#195) to get a lifelike proportional sketch. Just be sure to ask permission before sitting down to render your drawing (but I’ve yet to have a museum refuse me, especially when they understand that I see their collection as an inspirational resource).

I’ve summarized several of these core design skills with a single sentence, but don’t let that fool you. Each of these areas contains depths that you can explore for a lifetime!

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Mastery Through Repetition

For many people, the most harshly judgemental responses are the most natural. Indeed, we may even take pride in being hard on ourselves as a sign of our ambition and resolution to be our best possible self. But <a href="https://self-compassion.org/the-research/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">a wealth of research shows that self-criticism often backfires – badly </a>.Instead of chastising ourselves, we should practice self-compassion: greater forgiveness of our mistakes, and a deliberate effort to take care of ourselves throughout times of disappointment or embarrassment.

Self- Compassion

Talking about being kind to yourself may sound like something from a nursery classroom. But even cynics should care about self-compassion – especially if they want to be resilient.

Think back to the last time you failed or made an important mistake. Do you still blush with shame, and scold yourself for having been so stupid or selfish? Do you tend to feel alone in that failure, as if you were the only person to have erred? Or do you accept that error is a part of being human, and try to talk to yourself with care and tenderness?

For many people, the most harshly judgemental responses are the most natural. Indeed, we may even take pride in being hard on ourselves as a sign of our ambition and resolution to be our best possible self. But <a dir="ltr" href="https://self-compassion.org/the-research/">a wealth of research shows that self-criticism often backfires – badly </a>. Besides increasing our unhappiness and stress levels, it can increase <a dir="ltr" href="https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20201222-the-four-keys-that-could-unlock-procrastination">procrastination </a>, and makes us even less able to achieve our goals in the future.

Instead of chastising ourselves, we should practice self-compassion: greater forgiveness of our mistakes, and a deliberate effort to take care of ourselves throughout times of disappointment or embarrassment. “Most of us have a good friend in our lives, who is kind of unconditionally supportive,” says Kristin Neff, an associate professor of educational psychology at the University of Texas at Austin, who has pioneered this research. “Self-compassion is learning to be that same warm, supportive friend to yourself.”

If you are a cynic, you may initially baulk at the idea. As the British comedian Ruby Wax wrote in her <a dir="ltr" href="http://www.rubywax.net/frazzled.html">book on mindfulness </a>: “When I hear of people being kind to themselves, I picture the types who light scented candles in their bathrooms and sink into a tub of Himalayan foetal yak milk.” Yet the scientific evidence suggests it can increase our emotional resilience and improve our health, wellbeing and productivity. Importantly, it also helps us to learn from the mistakes that caused our upset in the first place.

We all make errors, but self-compassion can help us forgive ourselves and take better care during disappointment and embarrassment (Credit: Alamy)

Relying on self-compassion, not self-esteem

Neff’s research was inspired by a personal crisis. In the late 90s, she was going through a painful divorce. “It was very messy, and I felt a lot of shame about some bad decisions I had made.” Looking for a way to cope with the stress, she signed up for meditation classes at a local Buddhist centre. The practice of mindfulness did indeed bring some relief, but it was their teachings about compassion – particularly, the need to direct that kindness toward ourselves – that brought the greatest comfort. “It just made an immediate difference,” she says.

Superficially, self-compassion may sound similar to the concept of 'self-esteem', which concerns how much we value ourselves, and whether we see ourselves positively. Questionnaires to measure self-esteem ask participants to rate statements such as, “I feel that I’m a person of worth, at least on an equal plane with others”.

Unfortunately, this often comes with a sense of competition, and it can easily result in a <a dir="ltr" href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/15298860902815451">kind of fragile narcissism that crumbles under potential failure </a>. “Self-esteem is contingent on success and people liking you, so it is not very stable – you could have it on a good day but lose it on a bad day,” says Neff. Many people with <a dir="ltr" href="http://www.emotionalcompetency.com/papers/baumeistersmartboden1996%5b1%5d.pdf">high self-esteem even resort to aggression and bullying </a>when their confidence is under threat.

A wealth of research shows that self-criticism often backfires – badly

Cultivating self-compassion, Neff realised, might help you avoid those traps, so that you can pick yourself up when you feel hurt, embarrassed or ashamed – without taking down others along the way. So, she decided to design a psychological scale to measure the trait, in which participants had to rate a series of statements on a scale of 1 (almost never) to 5 (almost always), such as:

<ul><li>I try to be loving toward myself when I’m feeling emotional pain </li><li>I try to see my failings as part of the human condition </li><li>When something painful happens, I try to take a balanced view of the situation </li> </ul>

<ul><li>I’m disapproving and judgmental about my own flaws and inadequacies </li><li>When I think about my inadequacies it tends to make me feel more separate and cut off from the rest of the world </li><li>When I’m feeling down, I tend to obsess and fixate on everything that’s wrong </li> </ul>

The more you agree with the first set of statements, and the less you agree with the second set of statements, the higher your self-compassion.

Neff’s first studies examined how <a dir="ltr" href="https://doi.org/10.1080/15298860309027">self-compassion related to people’s overall mental health and wellbeing </a>. Questioning hundreds of undergraduate students, she found the trait was negatively correlated with reports of depression and anxiety, and positively correlated with general life satisfaction. Importantly, this study also confirmed that self-compassion was distinct from measures of self-esteem. In other words, you could have someone with a general sense of superiority, who <a dir="ltr" href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0092656606000353">nevertheless finds it very difficult to forgive themselves for perceived failures </a>– a far from ideal combination.

Many think of 'self-compassion' as lighting candles, meditating or other notions of 'self-care', but self-compassion runs deeper – and even cynics should care (Credit: Alamy)

Blossoming field

Later research confirmed these discoveries in more diverse samples, from <a dir="ltr" href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/15298860902979307">high-school students </a>to <a dir="ltr" href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12671-019-01221-8">US veterans at risk of suicide </a>, all of which showed that self-compassion increases psychological resilience. Indeed, self-compassion has now become a blossoming field of research, attracting interest from many other researchers.

Some of the most intriguing results concern people’s physical health, with a recent study showing that people with <a dir="ltr" href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27121978/">high self-compassion are less likely to report a range of different ailments </a>– such as back pain, headache, nausea and respiratory problems. One explanation could be a <a dir="ltr" href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/15298868.2018.1436587?journalCode=psai20">muted stress response </a>, with previous studies revealing that self-compassion <a dir="ltr" href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24239953/">reduces the inflammation that normally comes with mental anguish, and which can damage our tissues </a>in the long term. But the health benefits may also be due to behavioural differences, with evidence that people with higher self-compassion take better care of their bodies through diet and exercise.

People who have higher levels of self-compassion are generally more proactive – Sara Dunne

“People who have higher levels of self-compassion are generally more proactive,” says Sara Dunne, a psychologist who studied the link between self-compassion and healthy behaviours at the University of Derby, UK. She compares it to the advice of a well-meaning parent. “They would tell you that you need to go to bed, get up early and then tackle your problems,” she says. Similarly, someone with high self-compassion knows that they can treat themselves kindly – without overly judgemental criticism – while also recognising what is best for them in the long-term.

This is an important point, says Neff, since some early critics of her work had wondered whether self-compassion would simply lead to lazy behaviour and low willpower. In their view, we need self-criticism to motivate us to make importance changes in our lives. As evidence against this idea, she points to research from 2012, which had <a dir="ltr" href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0146167212445599">found that people with high self-compassion show greater motivation to correct their errors </a>. They tended to work harder after failing an important test, for instance, and were more determined to make up for a perceived moral transgression, such as betraying a friend’s trust. Self-compassion, it seems, can create a sense of safety that allows us to confront our weaknesses and make positive changes in our lives, rather than becoming overly self-defensive or wallowing in a sense of hopelessness.

After making mistakes, many jump to highly self-critical responses, but research shows that cutting yourself a little slack can be the key to resilience (Credit: Alamy)

Rapid interventions

If you would like to gain some of these benefits, there is now abundant evidence – from Neff’s research group and many others – that <a dir="ltr" href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27664071/">self-compassion can be trained </a>. Popular interventions include “loving-kindness meditation”, which guides you to focus on feelings of forgiveness and warmth to yourself and others.

In <a dir="ltr" href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30824257/">one recent trial </a>, Tobias Krieger and colleagues at the University of Bern in Switzerland designed an online course to teach this exercise alongside more theoretical lessons about the causes of self-criticism and its consequences. After seven sessions, they found significant increases in the participants’ self-compassion scores, along with reduced stress, anxiety and depressive feelings. “We measured a lot of outcomes,” says Krieger, “and they all went in the expected direction.”

There are also written interventions, such as composing a letter from the perspective of a loving friend, that can provide a significant boost, says Neff. For most people, the habit of self-criticism does not seem to be so deeply ingrained that it is beyond repair. (Neff’s website includes <a dir="ltr" href="https://self-compassion.org/category/exercises/#exercises">more detailed guidelines on the ways to put this and the loving-kindness meditation into practice </a>.)

Neff says that she has seen an increased interest in these techniques during the pandemic. For many of us, the struggles of isolation, remote working and caring for the people we love have provided the perfect breeding ground for self-criticism and doubt. While we cannot eliminate those stresses, we can at least change the ways we view ourselves, giving us the resilience to face the challenges head on.

More than ever, we need to stop seeing self-compassion and self-care as a sign of weakness, says Neff. “The research is really overwhelming at this point, showing that when life gets tough, you want to be self-compassionate. It's going to make you stronger.”

David Robson is the is author of  <a dir="ltr" href="http://www.davidrobson.me/the-intelligence-trap">The Intelligence Trap: Revolutionise Your Thinking and Make Wiser Decisions </a>(Hodder &amp; Stoughton/WW Norton). He is <a dir="ltr" href="http://www.twitter.com/d_a_robson">@d_a_robson </a>on Twitter.

.css-d7z4j9{font-family:'Source Sans Pro',sans-serif;font-size:2rem;line-height:2.5rem;letter-spacing:-0.125%;font-weight:700;}Simple Secret for High Performance

1 Simple Secret for High Performance in 2021

Practice

Mastery Through Repetition

Self- Compassion

Why self-compassion – not self-esteem – leads to success

Simple Secret for High Performance