An essential intent, on the other hand, is both inspirational and concrete, both meaningful and measurable. Done right, an essential intent is one decision that settles one thousand later decisions.
Being vague is not the same as being graceful, and delaying the eventual “no” will only make it that much harder – and the recipient that much more resentful.
My experience has taught me this about how people and organizations improve: the best place to look is for small changes we could make in the things we do often. There is power in steadiness and repetition.
Boundaries are a little like the walls of a sandcastle. The second we let one fall over, the rest of them come crashing down.
Why are adults so much more vulnerable to the sunk-cost bias than young children? The answer, he believes, is a lifetime of exposure to the “Don’t waste” rule, so that by the time we are adults we are trained to avoid appearing wasteful, even to ourselves.8 “Abandoning a project that you’ve invested a lot in feels like you’ve wasted everything, and waste is something we’re told to avoid,” Arkes said.9.
The tendency to continue doing something simply because we have always done it is sometimes called the “status quo bias.
Without clarity and purpose, pursuing something because it is good is not good enough to make a high level of contribution. As.
By applying tougher criteria we can tap into our brain’s sophisticated search engine.8 If we search for “a good opportunity,” then we will find scores of pages for us to think about and work through. Instead, we can conduct an advanced search and ask three questions: “What do I feel deeply inspired by?” and “What am I particularly talented at?” and “What meets a significant need in the world?” Naturally there won’t be as many pages to view, but this is the point of the exercise. We aren.
Of course, the point is not to say no to all requests. The point is to say no to the nonessentials so we can say yes to the things that really matter.
Fewer things done better,” “Communicating the right information to the right people at the right time,” and “Speed and quality of decision making.” Indeed, this is what it means to lead essentially.
Once the mental work shifts to the basal ganglia, mental space is freed up to concentrate on something new. This allows us to autopilot the execution of one essential activity while simultaneously actively engaging in another, without sacrificing our level of focus or contribution.
Clear intent leads to alignment; vague direction produces misalignment every time.
Research has shown that of all forms of human motivation the most effective one is progress. Why? Because a small, concrete win creates momentum and affirms our faith in our further success.
The best asset we have for making a contribution to the world is ourselves. If we underinvest in ourselves, and by that I mean our minds, our bodies, and our spirits, we damage the very tool we need to make our highest contribution. One of the most common ways people – especially ambitious, successful people – damage this asset is through a lack of sleep.
Routine is one of the most powerful tools for removing obstacles. Without routine, the pull of nonessential distractions will overpower us. But if we create a routine that enshrines the essentials, we will begin to execute them on autopilot.
Jim Collins, the author of the business classic Good to Great, was once told by Peter Drucker that he could either build a great company or build great ideas but not both. Jim chose ideas. As a result of this trade-off there are still only three full-time employees in his company, yet his ideas have reached tens of millions of people through his writing.8.
With this new singleness of purpose, he eliminated everything else from his life. He called the process “reducing himself to zero.
Our options may be things, but a choice – a choice is an action. It is not just something we have but something we do. This experience brought me to the liberating realization that while we may not always have control over our options, we always have control over how we choose among them. Have.
Box CEO Aaron Levie has a similar criterion for hiring. He simply asks if the person is someone he’d want to work with every day. “One of the ways we think about this is,” he says, “could this person have been one of the founding members of the team?” If the answer is yes, he knows he’s found someone who will fit right in.2.
As you continue to clear out the closet of your life, you will experience a reordering of what really matters. Life will become less about efficiently crossing off what was on your to-do list or rushing through everything on your schedule and more about changing what you put on there in the first place.