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Kindle Notes & Highlights
by
Leo Babauta
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January 6 - January 9, 2024
Principle 1: By setting limitations, we must choose the essential. So in everything you do, learn to set limitations. Principle 2: By choosing the essential, we create great impact with minimal resources. Always choose the essential to maximize your time and energy.
1. Examine your task list. Take a look at everything on your list and ask yourself the following questions about each one: Will this have an impact that will last beyond this week or this month? How will it change my job, my career, my life? How will this further a long-term goal of mine? How important is that goal?
2. Start with your goals. If you start by identifying the things you really want to accomplish in the next year, you can plan your tasks so that you are doing things each day to further those goals along. Let’s say you have three long-term goals—each day, choose a task from your list that will move you closer to those goals.
Which areas of my life are overwhelming? What would I like to simplify? In addition to the tasks I need to accomplish in different areas, do I want to limit the number of possessions I have, what information I receive, or what responsibilities I have?
In everything you do, use these questions to guide you to choose the essential, especially if you have problems deciding. Once you get the hang of it, you won’t need these questions anymore—they’ll become automatic. 1. What are your values? Values are simply knowing what things are most important to you. Think about the things that really matter to you, the qualities you want to have, the principles you want to live your life by. Once you’ve identified these values, everything you do and choose should follow from those. 2. What are your goals? What do you want to achieve in life? How about
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Principle 4: Focus is your most important tool in becoming more effective.
Focus on a goal. Focus is the most important factor in determining whether you’ll achieve a goal or stick to creating a new habit. Not self-discipline, not rewards, not sheer willpower, not even motivation (though this is also an important ingredient). If you can maintain your focus on a goal or habit, you will more often than not achieve that goal or create that habit.
Instead, learn to focus on the positive. Think about how great you feel. Think about how other people have done this, and that you can too. Think about how good it will feel when you accomplish what you’re trying to do. Also, learn to see the positive in just about any situation. In my experience, this results in happiness, as you don’t focus on the difficult or negative parts of your life, but on the good things. Be thankful for what you’ve been given.
First thing in the morning, work on your Most Important Task. Don’t do anything else until this is done. Give yourself a short break, then start on your next Most Important Task. If you can get two to three of these done in the morning, the rest of the day is gravy.
When you eat, just eat. The best way to think about being present is this: Do just one thing at a time. When you are eating, don’t read or think about something else or iron your clothes (especially if you’re eating something that might splatter on the clothes). Just eat. Pay attention to what you’re eating. Really experience it—the taste, the texture. Do it slowly. Same thing with anything else: washing dishes, taking a shower, driving, working, playing. Don’t do multiple things at once—just do what you’re doing now, and nothing else.
You cannot fail, even if you stop doing it for a while. Doing it at all is success. Celebrate every little success.
Focus on one habit at a time, one month at a time, so that you’ll be able to focus all your energy on creating that one habit.
Set your 3 MITs (Most Important Tasks) each morning. Single-task. When you work on a task, don’t switch to other tasks. Process your in-box to empty. Check e-mail just twice a day. Exercise five to ten minutes a day. Work while disconnected, with no distractions. Follow a morning routine. Eat more fruits and veggies every day. Keep your desk decluttered. Say no to commitments and requests that aren’t on your Short List (see Chapter 13, Simple Commitments). Declutter your house for fifteen minutes a day. Stick to a five-sentence limit for e-mails.
It’s easy to set goals, but extremely difficult to achieve them if they’re goals worth achieving.
Choose a goal. Make a list of things you’d like to accomplish over the next few years. This list might have ten things on it, or maybe twenty. Now, you could try to tackle all those goals at once, or take on as many as possible. But that will dilute your effectiveness. Instead, choose just one, and focus completely on that goal until you can check it off the list.
Each day, choose a task to move you to completion. When you start your day, choose three Most Important Tasks (also known as MITs—more on this in later chapters) to complete that day. Whatever else you complete, if you complete these three MITs, you will have had a good day.
You’re not doing anything until you’re doing tasks.
The key to the MITs for me: At least one of the MITs should be related to one of my goals. While the other two can be work stuff (and usually are), one must be a goal action. This ensures that I am doing something to move my goals forward that day.
Another key: Do your MITs first thing in the morning, either at home or when you first get to work. If you put them off till later, you will get busy and run out of time to do them.
Focusing on fewer but more critical tasks is important, but to really simplify our tasks we must talk about the size of the tasks as well. We can focus on just one task today, but if it’s a huge and intimidating task, we can become overwhelmed and not actually do the task. Limiting our tasks doesn’t get anything done if those tasks are too big. Instead, break things down into small tasks that can be accomplished in an hour or less—even better would be twenty to thirty minutes, or even ten to fifteen minutes. The smaller, the better, because then we’re more likely to actually get them done.
Anytime you find yourself procrastinating on an important task, see if you can break it into something smaller. Then just get started. Don’t procrastinate, but just get started.
Small tasks are always better than large ones.
What do you do instead of keeping a schedule? Know your priorities (see the next section) and from moment to moment, decide what you should be doing based on your priorities, how much time you have available, and your energy level.
Consider having an “offline hour” each day when you regularly work while disconnected. Or even an “offline day” if you think you can do it.
Every urge will pass if you just wait a few minutes.
In order to get a handle on your commitments, you first have to take inventory, so you know what you have on your plate. Take an inventory of the commitments in your life right now.
How does this give my life value? How important is it to me? Is it in line with my life priorities and values? How would it affect my life if I dropped out? Does this further my life goals?
Look for the thing that gives you the least return for your invested time and effort. The thing that’s least in line with your life values and priorities and goals. Cut it out, at least for a couple of weeks, and see if you can get along without it.
Each time you cut a commitment, it may give you a feeling of guilt, because others want you to keep that commitment. But it’s also a huge relief, not having to keep that commitment each day or week or month. It frees up a lot of your time, and while others may be disappointed, you have to keep what’s important to you in mind, not what’s important to everyone else. If we committed to what everyone else wanted all the time, we would never have any time left for ourselves.
First, make a list of the things you truly want to do. The things you love to do. The things you want to spend your precious time doing. Shorten it to four to five things, if possible—this is your Short List, the things that are most important. Eliminate as much of the rest of the stuff as possible from your private life. Schedule your free time so that you’re doing the things on your Short List.
Now, slow down and enjoy every task. This is the most important tip in this chapter. Read it twice. Whatever you’re doing, whether it’s a work task or taking a shower or brushing your teeth or cooking dinner or driving to work, slow down. Try to enjoy whatever you’re doing. Try to pay attention, instead of thinking about other things. Be in the moment. This isn’t easy, as you will often forget. But find a way to remind yourself. Unless the task involves actual pain, there isn’t anything that can’t be enjoyable if you give it the proper attention.
Designate a home for everything, and be fanatic.
Thirty-day list. This is really a way to control the desires mentioned above. Make a list: Anytime you want to buy something (other than absolute necessities), put it on the list with the date you added it. Then, don’t allow yourself to buy the item until it’s been on the list for thirty days. By then, your desire for that item might have passed. It’s a great way to control that impulse to buy.
Pick a simple task to start with. Try to keep your attention on this task without switching. This could be something like eating, gardening, washing dishes, ironing, or cooking. Every time you switch your attention, take note of it. After you become more aware of your attention, learn to stop yourself when you begin to switch your attention. Practice this method throughout your day, no matter what you’re doing. If you’re showering, focus on your showering. If you’re eating, focus on your eating (see below for more). Stop yourself when your attention wanders.
be sure that whatever task you choose is something you can be passionate about.
Choose an important task. There’s work you love that’s easy and unimportant, and then there’s work you love that will make a long-term impact on your career and life. Choose the latter, as it will be a much better use of your time.
Lose weight. A growing number of studies confirm that just by eating more slowly, you’ll consume fewer calories—in fact, enough to lose twenty pounds a year without doing anything different or eating anything different. The reason is that it takes about twenty minutes for our brains to register that we’re full.
Real health and fitness come over a period of months and years. Lasting change is made gradually, in small increments, in a way that you can sustain for life.
Conventional wisdom says that diet is about 80 percent of weight loss, and to a large extent that’s true, because you can lose weight with a good diet and no exercise, but it’s really hard to lose weight on a bad diet with exercise. But we’re going to turn that on its head for two reasons: 1) We’re not just looking to lose weight, but to get fit and in good shape, and for that you need both exercise and diet; and 2) If you start out with exercise, the diet will eventually follow. It’s hard to exercise without at least wanting to eat right, so we’re going to start with exercise.
Treat these workout appointments as your most important appointments of the day. Don’t let anything get in the way of them.
Be sure to find foods you enjoy eating, or you’ll have a difficult time—this is very important.
Eat until you’re lightly full. Not stuffed. Stop before you’re really full, and wait ten minutes to see if you’re really still hungry.
Set short-term goals. Real, lasting change only happens over a long period of time—months and years. But it’s hard to stay motivated for something that long. Instead, set a short-term goal or two each month. Maybe set a goal each week if that helps. Some examples of short-term goals: Increase your workouts by five minutes each day this week. Lose a pound a week. Lose an inch off your waist.
1. How you feel after a workout. A good workout is an amazing feeling. Remember that feeling and let it motivate you before your next workout. 2. Time for you. While many people make time to take care of others (kids, spouse, other family, coworkers, boss), they don’t often make time to take care of themselves. Instead, make your “you” time a priority, and don’t miss that exercise appointment. 3. Calories burned. If you count calories (and it’s really one of the most effective ways to lose weight), you know that the more you exercise, the more calories you burn—and the bigger your calorie
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Fitting into new clothes. Want to look good in a smaller size? Work out! 12. Being attractive. That’s always a good motivator, as we all know. 13. Adrenaline rush. There is a rush when you exercise. Ride that rush to complete the workout. 14. Stress relief. Wound up after a long day at the office? Get out and work off that stress. It makes a world of difference. 15. Time for contemplation. The quiet time of exercise is perfect for thinking about anything going on in your life.
19. An exercise log/graph. For some reason, writing it down is extremely important. Do it for a week and you’ll see the power of the log. 20. Your before picture. You often don’t realize how far you’ve come. Take pictures. 21. A 5K race or triathlon. Just sign up for one and you’ll be motivated to train.
24. The scale. It’s not motivating to weigh yourself every day, as your weight fluctuates. But if you weigh yourself once a week, you’ll be motivated to have it keep going down, instead of up. Combine the scale with the measuring tape, and measure your waist. 25. Reaching a goal. Set a goal for weight, or your waist measurement, or a number of days to work out, or a number of miles to run this week. Setting and tracking a goal helps motivate you to complete that goal. Make it easily achievable.
28. Books. Buy fitness or healthy cookbooks as a reward. You’ll get a renewed sense of purpose. 29. Others commenting on how good you look. When someone notices the changes in your body, it feels good. And it makes you want to work out more. 30. An upcoming day at the beach, or a reunion. You can’t help but want to look good.
3. Examine your motivation. Know your reasons. Give them some thought…and write them down. If you have loved ones, and you are doing it for them, that is more powerful than just doing it for self-interest. Doing it for yourself is good too, but you should do it for something that you really want to happen, for really good reasons. 4. Really, really want it. This is essentially the same as the above tip, but I want to emphasize it: It’s not enough to think it would be cool to achieve something. It has to be something you’re passionate about, something you’re super excited about, something you
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Think about the benefits. Thinking about how hard something is is a big problem for most people. Waking early sounds so hard! Just thinking about it makes you tired. But instead of thinking about how hard something is, think about what you will get out of it. For example, instead of thinking about how hard it is to wake early, focus on how good you’ll feel when you’re done, and how your day will be so much better. The benefits of something will help energize you.
