Personal Development Archives

One Thing You Need To Absolutely Do Before Setting Your New Year Resolutions.

December 27, 2022 No Comments

It is almost end of the current year and a new year is in sight. You are probably taking some well deserved break as well as pondering about setting some new year resolutions. We all hope that a New Year will bring new luck and start things a fresh and set these new year resolutions and start announcing them to friends and family.

Wait a minute. Before we move to new year resolutions, did you think about what happened to the current years resolutions that you set almost an year ago. Are those resolutions still with you or did they meet their grave long ago?

If you are one of those who belong to the elite group people who have met the current years resolutions. Excellent work. Happy New Year and you probably don’t need this article (please read on anyway).

If you are one of those who forgot about those resolutions long ago or did not meet your resolutions. Please read on.

Before I go further, here are some infamous statistics:

About 23% of people give up on their new year resolutions within first week of the new year and staggering 64% give up within first month. And 91% of the people do not meet their resolution.

I was part of that infamous statistics too – until I started reflecting on why I am not meeting these resolutions. Reflection is a game changer.

Reflection helped me understand why I was unable to meet those resolutions and plan carefully before I set further resolutions.

What is a resolution anyway and why do you set it around New Years Day?

Resolution is a firm decision to do something. In a way, resolution is like setting a goal for yourself. People set new year resolutions more so because it is a new year (and nothing to do with the stage of their life) and for humans anything new is exciting and anything old is boring.

The fact is that the resolutions can be set at any time of the year. However, New year resolutions kind of become a cultural thing and people set them anyway irrespective of what stage of life they are at.

Why people fail to meet their new year resolutions?

1. “New” fizzles out: One main reason people can’t meet their new year resolutions is because resolutions are made out of emotion that arises due to excitement around new-ness. Once that new-ness fizzles out, your excitement fades out and you are back to your old ways. Resolutions work better when you are determined from inside and not when determined by excitement.

2. You have set wage goals and not specific goals – One of the reasons why we fail at any goal (and not particularly new year goals) is because we set them too broad. If you want to work out and lose 20 lbs is a wage goal. Instead I will work out 5 days a week for 30 minutes a day until end of June and lose 20 lbs is a specific goal. Which one do you think has higher chances of achieving?

3. You did not prioritise or did not account for the hurdles that you face in your usual routine – The resolutions are set around the holiday season where you have a lot of time for yourselves and you are relatively stress free. But, when the reality kicks in when you start going back to work or college or manage your kids – priorities. Chances are that you haven’t accounted for those when you are setting up your new year goals. Other way to put this is you did not prioritise your resolution.

4. You lacked accountability and discipline – Discipline is key. Few people are self motivated and very disciplined. They are accountable for themselves. But most of us may not be as disciplined and if there is no accountability, chances are that we will be off track very soon.

5. You did not track your resolutions – If you don’t track your resolutions, you don’t know how you are progressing and if you don’t know your progress, you get demotivated very soon.

Why Reflection matters?

Reflection will help you understand what you are lacking. Are you seriously serious about your resolutions or are you having resolutions for the sake of having the resolutions.

If you are really serious about your resolutions, then why did you fail? Is it because you lacked discipline? Or is it because you had unrealistic goals? Or is it because you did not prioritize? Or is it because you did not track them?

If you have reflected on why you failed with your prior years resolutions, you become aware of why you were not able to meet your goals. If you become aware of why you were not able to meet your goals, you can set more realistic resolutions and create systems (set specific goals, prioritize them, have an accountability partner and be disciplined and track them) to meet the resolutions.

Before you set the New Year’s Resolutions, please do yourself a favour and reflect on what happened to your prior resolutions.

Personal Development, Productivity

4 Simple Hacks To Get Your Distracted Day Back On Track

November 12, 2022 No Comments

Let us all be honest. No matter how much we like to stay on course, sometimes we cannot focus in today’s world of constant distractions.

We are either tempted because of notification chimes on our phone or because of an email pop up or someone else intruding our day unexpectedly. All these are just beginning of a distraction. One small distraction will lead to another and that to another and so on.

For example, If someone says something, you tend to browse to check for yourself and then you click on some thing that grabs your attraction and that leads to another click and it goes on and on. And just like that, half of the day of precious work time is gone and you only have about three or four hours left before you can turn your attention to your family or other daily chores.

While you cannot get your lost time back, you can at least try to stay productive for the remaining part of the day.

Here are few tricks to get your day back on track:

1. Turn off cell phone or keep it away: This is simple. When there is a problem, just remove the source of that problem. Our number one distraction within the last decade are our cell phones and its constant chimes. Statistics show that we browse our phone 96 times a day and that is every 10 minutes on an average. Even if you are someone who has turned off all the notifications, your hands habitually reach out to the cell phone. So, better remove it from your way of focusing.

2. Close all the browsers on the computer: Believe it or not, google and internet browsing wasn’t a distraction not so long ago. But, since we are so connected to internet, google and browsing, this is our another number one distraction along with the phone. I habitually tend to open a news site, sports site and a finance site even without my realization. I bet every one has their own favorite sites they tend to browse first thing in the morning or sometimes without realizing. Just close all the browsers. As long as it is within the sight, you get distracted. So, not only close the browsers and also unpin them from the taskbar to keep it completely out of sight.

3. Write a specific to do list: By specific to do list, I mean write a to do list with your tasks and allocate specific time for each task. This is something that will really help you focus and at least help you complete some amount of work. A specific to do list is something that you need to have every day anyway. Never the less, this kind of to do list will always help no matter what time of the day it is. Be realistic in your expectations here. Don’t try to cram everything here for the day. Move anything that is not important to the next day to do list.

4. Download the documents you need and disconnect the internet: This is If you cannot stay focused even after doing one and two above. Download the documents that you intend to work on to desktop or local drive that is accessible without internet. By doing this, even if you habitually try to open a browser unconsciously, you will come to a realization on why you have closed that in the first place and you will go back to what you are doing. If you have to attend any meetings, always go back and connect to the internet.

You can never get the wasted time back. We should at least try to make the best use of what is left.

Please let me now in comments if you use any other hacks to focus on work. Thanks in advance.

Growth, Personal Development

The 3 compelling reasons why i am not rushing for first 100 followers on Medium and you too should not.

November 5, 2022 No Comments

As I was preparing my first post on Medium (which I wrote on Regulatory Buddy) few weeks ago, I noticed that there is “first 100 followers” kind of movement going on in this space.

As a result, many writers in their articles suggested their fellow writers to follow them in return of the favor to get to 100 followers as soon as possible. Reason behind this frenzy is that one can start earning money from Medium content once you reach 100 followers. While this is a great incentive for writers, I believe in not rushing to get to first 100 followers just by following someone so that they can follow you back.

Having 100 True followers that love your writing is better than 100 followers who follow you for the sake of returning a favor.

Here are three reasons why I am not in a rush and you too should not:

Creators should create for “Love of the craft” and not for money: To some writers, writing is a hobby. To some other writers, it is their passion and it is career to some. What is common for all the writers is the “Love” of writing. I believe in beginning with that. Money, if it has to follow, will follow when time comes. This is true not only for “Medium” platform, but for any creative platform.
“Organic” following trumps “returning the favour” following: Is there ever an incidence where you read a book or watched a movie and loved it so much that you recommended it to someone else. This is exactly what happens with organic following. They are your “True” followers. They carry your message forward by sharing with others or by providing you feedback which will help you grow. They relate to you and treat you like one of their own. Organic following may be slow, but it will explode at some point if you are consistent and doing your craft well. People following you for the sake of following may not read every post of yours.
You would not earn the money you imagined: Let us be honest, we envision that we earn significant side income that will pay our bills, but the money that you are going to make immediately after you get 100 followers may not even buy you a cup of coffee. I understand that everyone has to begin somewhere, but why not be patient and let your following explode steadily vs Peak too quickly and then fizzle.

To tell the truth, I do not know much about monetization on Medium. I can only imagine that Medium wants writers to post more content frequently so that you get more followers quickly. More content you write, more visibility you have and more visibility means more reach. More reach could translate to more followers.

But that doesn’t mean that you have to rush to get followers for the sake of following.

WRITE FOR THE “LOVE” OF WRITING

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