Getting Started: Big Bang or Baby Steps?…

I am overwhelmed with stuff. Stuff on my desk, stuff on lots of flat surfaces at home, a pile-up of email in the inbox, bills, receipts, … Stuff, clutter everywhere. In my head as well: things to do, committments I……

[…] Looking back at our fresh starts & modest changes: Throughout this month, a wonderful quote from Walden has been turning over in my head: […]

I didn’t make resolutions, but I did implement some small, modest changes:

1. Dress Better. Wear khakis more often than jeans, and wear that nice sweater that I never wore much because it was “too nice.” Dress better at home… my wife deserves to see me looking good. Dress better even when I am alone. Why? Because it makes me feel better.

2. Put things away. When walking in the door at the end of the day, hang the coat up and put the laptop bag in the office rather than dumping everything on the nearest horizontal surface. It takes an extra 30 seconds, and the house looks better for it.

3. Do it now. Do those stupid little things that take barely more time to do than to add to my To Do list. Just do them and move on.

I have to stay conscious of all these things, but they are starting to take hold. There’s no trick I use, other than just being aware. I still start to shrug off the laptop when I cross the threshold. NO, go put it away you slob!

One of the minor resolutions I made after the new year pertains to how I update my own site.

Because I still only have a dial up connection in my apartment and can’t get a wireless signal to save my life, I used to fret every time I had something to post to my blog. After the new year, I began keeping a simple text file on my desktop with the name “Reviews to be Posted” as well as a folder with picture files I may want to use on the site (organized in order that they will be posted). Now, instead of struggling with the decaying telephonics in my apartment every time I have something to review, I simply edit the txt file. When I am in a place where I can skitch a wireless connection (or in the rare event that I get a stable dial up connection), I simply cut/paste the entries. All of this sure beats running down the street to the coffee shop every time I want to update the site.

I’ve learned to go with the flow of every day life and use the advantages of technology when I can instead of madly seeking them out. This saves me time, but also saves me a few bucks every month by not paying for a high speed internet connection in the apartment where I only spend a few conscious hours out of every day.

I have so many friends who have needlessly become dependent on their always-on internet connection. They freak out when something isn’t right. I’ve learned to take it easy and tackle the content as it comes and the publishing as it is convenient. Instead of waiting until an available connection is near to write my blog posts, I oil the squeaky door when it makes a sound and walk through it only when I need to.

I’ve started the new year with a new habit per week in my planned move towards more healthy living. I’m blogging my efforts if you’re interested. It’s not been 100% successful yet, but the beauty of the small step approach is you don’t get overwhelmed, and it’s easy to make small tweaks, rather than give up altogether.

I have three goals for this year: Be Healthy, Be Greek & Be a Writer. Each Monday I write down (in my moleskine weekly planner) a small, meaningful goal for each one. I highlight each one as they’re completed during the week.

These goals are small, but they’re challenging. They get me moving and the fact that I’m writing them down shows me that I’m actually making progress.

I’ve never kept track of my goals this way, and it never seemed like I was accomplishing much - I couldn’t see any results or remember what I’ve done. Now I can clearly see that I’ve been moving in the right direction.

With regards to the Fresh Starts & Modest Changes: I’ve cleaned out my email box of 5 years worth of crap - I didn’t use the “DMZ” folder. I used the Trash. It’s so freeing to check my inbox & see only the messages I’ve received that day. We’ve also cancelled our Satellite subscription. TV became the biggest time-waster & contributed nothing to our lives. Netflix replaced it & now we have control.

My modest change, something I’ve been trying to be consistent in doing every day, is that every time I notice something has gotten too big for me to keep a hold on, for better or for worse, I ditch all of it. Well, I keep the things that are presently in my mind. For instance, a folder full of email. I don’t get much email, I max out at about 20 per day, but I like to just leave it wallowing in my inbox. So what I’ll do is filter out every email from someone on my contact list, go through them quick, shooting off replies, and then just dump the rest. Delete them like they didn’t exist. It’d be nice if gmail had a “bounce” button, so people would know that I never read their email, but whatever.

Perhaps not the most elegant way of dealing with overload, but it helps me relieve stress. I was reading 6 different books, 1 for school, 1 for a book club I’m in and 4 for personal pleasure. Yesterday I said “this is too many books” and I picked my favorite, one that I was reading for personal pleasure, alerted the book club that I wouldn’t be doing a review this month, bookmarked the spark notes for my AP lit book, and now I’m down to one great novel that I can devote more time to completing by, oh, mid february, and still get that one important thing finished.

2005 was a year of changes both modest and personally staggering (2004 more so, at least we’re moving in the right direction). As New Year’s wound around, I made time to reflect and found that my goals haven’t really changed much. Still working on getting at least 3 bouts of exercise each week; added the goal of eating 3 big green salads. Still reading at least 1 book for fun each month, and still trying to test 3 new recipes each month. Not much to declutter now, so I’m trying to meditate a couple of times a week, thanks to Merlin’s advocacy.

Other modest changes that aren’t really tied to concrete goals: Being choosier about how I spend my time. My mantra in 2006 is “don’t force it”. I believe the steady application of these two principles will bring the bigger challenges down to their level.

I made only one resolution—to make a serious effort to change my eating and exercise habits, because I wasn’t happy with the toll my choices were taking on my body.

So far, so good. My husband and I have both made significant changes in what, how, and when we eat, and I’ve been exercising six days a week. I’m feeling better already, and so is he. I even managed to survive the search champs bacchanalia without overindulging in sweets and other refined carbs.

I’m still not entirely sure what pushed us to the point where we were ready to oil that hinge, but it seems to have happened, and I’m grateful for it.

I’ve enjoyed the podcasts and reflected on my commute tonight on my January. After selling my design business last year, I embarked upon a year of self-awareness. I resolved to go to work only when I needed to but it didn’t quite work out even in a loose permanent role. I recently switched from perm to that of digital strategy/people consultant, which commenced in November. At the turn of the year I resolved to do three things: go to work when I need to, otherwise do it at home or elsewhere that suited my flow. I also resolved to learn guitar - my dad’s teaching me and I’m making progress, playing along to my own Garageband backing tracks. Today I also went to a yoga class before work. Great. Little things, but potentially life-changing.

I hung up a chin-up bar in my room…I’m just starting by hanging there, and slowly moving up the amount of time that I do “L” arm hangs until I can do pull ups. I also decided that I would not watch tv while I was doing my work during the day, because it just takes twice as long. I have saved a LOT of time this month, and really enjoyed listening to music over tv anyways!!

The idea of modest changes really resonated with me. One thing I resolved to do, believe it or not, was to rest more. I was working pretty intensely 5-7 days a week and it was exhausting! Now I try to rest at least three days week. Result? More energy in the workouts.

Also, I’ve been posting my workouts to my blog (check it out if you want), which only my girlfriend seems to read. She always asks me, “Where’s your workout?” So besides the motivation of recording exercise, the fact that someone else is paying attention really makes me want to work out consistently and harder.

I wanted to focus on the regularly scheduled programming -

1. Keep the dishes washed
2. Keep the laundry from not overflowing
3. Visit the gym as much as humanly possible
4. Bring a lunch to work every day
5. Weekly review on a weekly basis

These are the little things I worried about entirely too much before and used them as excuses for not doing something else. How can I replace a bathroom if the laundry isn’t done?

The result is a much cleaner house, less damning clutter and I think I get more done off my next actions now.

“…new clothes can be seen as a fancy uniform that won’t produce in its wearer the skills, mind, or experience for their intended vocation…”

Of course, you can also see it the other way round - by putting on that flash new suit, you want to become worthy of wearing it - whatever that means to you.

It’s a grading technique sometimes used in the martial art I practice - rather than saying that the person has mastered all the things necessary for the grade being awarded, they are seen to be well on their way to achieving that, and the grade is awarded, as an incentive to get there. I certainly remember feeling “Wow! I don’t really deserve this - I don’t know X or Y, and I really have to work on Z…”. And, of course, in saying “I have to do…” you make a small commitment to yourself to live up to what you think that grade should be.

My small change was along those same lines - I decided to make an effort to aim at my next grading. I’m now training at a new club, with an excellent instructor, training twice more a week, and have started the process of finding out where I need to be to achieve my next grading. Also managed to get a couple of friends involved in the same club…so I’ve got an interest in watching them grade (is that vicarious grading? :)

As a rule, I generally do not make New Year’s resolutions. I just don’t see how a promise made to myself on one particular day should be any more important than a promise made to myself on any other day. However, I did undertake on one modest change in January that will probably have big implications:

I stopped fooling myself about being content with my working life the way it is and decided to ressurect the career path I had set aside a few years ago when I needed the money and a job in that career path wasn’t available.

The change in mindset alone was startling. Suddenly I’ve found time and energy for things like my portfolio which had been collecting dust for over a year. I’m networking again, and actually getting people asking me to send in a resume instead of finding the most polite way of brushing me off. And yes, alot of the home office clutter is gone. It’s hard to work at a desk when you can’t find the keyboard.

I’ve started to change several areas of my life since the turn of the new year (decreased weight, increased downtime, increased efficiency and accountability), but there are two areas that REALLY have resulted in changes in my life. Let me share them with you.

1. Avoid the “Ugh, not now” response. I have spent a long time letting 2-minute items pile up because I couldn’t bear to face them. Those “ugh” items always cast a pallor over my day, and always reminded me of what I hadn’t accomplished. My action list for the day now is full of high-level career and/or current project items that now get my undivided energy and attention. That’s a change that makes me, my co-workers, and my bosses happy! Win-win.

2. If you don’t care where you start, or don’t even care if you EVER start, then ask someone who DOES care. My wife always has a running list of priority items in her head. I know what they are - I trip over them every day during my travels around the house. So if I have the time to address a mini-project, I ask her “What do you want done?”. If you don’t care about the priority of current projects, then ask some other stakeholder. They will give you the direction you are seeking.

Modest changes really hit home with me. As the father of two little kids and a very busy lifestyle, I wanted to slow down a bit, get better organized both at home and at work and so far have been able to accomplish a great deal focused on changing modestly.

One modest change is that I work on the fifth floor of a building and decided to take the stairs every time instead of the elevator. Sometimes I cannot find the time to go to the gym and so far this is a great modest form of exercise. This also relates to an article that I read that compared athletic fitness to health fitness.

Another modest change I have made is in the organization of my garage. I take a corner of the garage and work on that rather than trying to tackle the entire thing at once and walking away frustrated. As a result, I am nearing the end of a very organized garage.

My focus at work is to continue implementing the organizational ideas that exist on this daily stop for me called 43 Folders.

balling socks. this is one modest change i have made that really has an impact. because, when you begin to ball socks, you also begin to fold your laundry. and when you do that, you can put it away. and when it is put away, in its respective drawers (kids, etc) you do not spend frantic weekday mornings searching in the laundry room for the matching sock before daycare/work.

it’s amazing how much time, energy and stress balling socks can alleviate.

that’s it in a nutshell for me. balling socks.

thanks merlin, especially for the Lamott passage. I now have “Put the Puppy Back on the Paper” on my board too. When I was in graduate school, I used “How to Write Your Dissertation in Fifteen Minutes a Day.” Utterly the same principles at work. That mother got me through. (and now I am all PhD-ified, and stressing over laundry)

One less latte? You’re a crazy man!

I started with your suggested modest changes and then life overtook me as it had been threatening to do for months. I went out and bought GTD (called How to Get Things Done in Australia) and spent a weekend implementing it at home. That was last week. All this week I’ve been doing the same at the office and I’m feeling very good about it all so far.

S.

I started keeping track of what I get done. I write a list for each day, in my notebook.

It’s motivational no matter what— either I love the long list or I wish the short list was longer.

It’s also really useful for adjusting how big my next actions should be, because I see how I chunk things together each day.

Plus I just like to measure things, even in a really qualitative way.

My January small change was to meditate every day, even if it was only for 5 minutes. By the 31st (today) I meditate everyday for at least 20 minutes a day. I now wonder why I always thought that I never had the time. It’s strange how my entire schedule just kind of morphed around this one habit.

My February goal is “Eat Healthier”. I’ve been spending the last week trying to figure out what that even means, but I think I’m getting a handle on it. I’m a big fan of grabbing potato chips and shoving them in my mouth everytime I walk by the cabinet and eating a lot of “empty” calories in general. The rule now is to stop buying this stuff to begin with and eat more nuts and whole grains.

Hopefully my pregnant wife won’t mind not having snack foods in the house. Either that or I should just get some self control.