Growth Zone To WIN
We grow outside our comfort zone. The stretch beyond what we find easy and comfortable is where we learn new skills. The challenge is that anything worth having usually requires effort. That is hard.
I remember learning to look at my options and “choose my hard”. The logic being that life is full of hardships that we must face. We must face them now or later. It is hard to do what's necessary to buy a house now, but it is also hard renting for your whole life with no control over the rent increases that are imposed upon you. It is hard exercising and getting healthy, but it is also hard to be older and not have a healthy body that moves well and allows you to enjoy a quality of life. Choosing the easy option gives instant gratification, but often the long-term consequences of “easy” might not be what you want.
So can you make the hard easy, or at least more desirable? Yes. A compelling future vision can make the current sacrifice exciting knowing you are a bit closer to the goal. Breaking a task into small, easy steps makes it easier to achieve. The easier you make it to do anything, the more likely you are to do it. The initial effort of planning can present a hurdle - it's worth clearing. Breaking the next step into the smallest, easiest parts that you can helps to create forward momentum.
Has your internal dialogue ever paralyzed you by wondering what the next step is or how to do it. I know I have been stuck at this point. We live in an era of information and, sometimes the next step is asking/typing the current question you have. With consistent effort, you can find and/or look up pretty much anything. There are people who want to help. You can reach out to them. I often like to think about my best self and ask myself the question, ‘What would my better or future self do in this situation?’ Sometimes it is literally being humble enough to text a friend to ask for help or a recommendation. If you want to win in your life, you need to be clear on your priorities so you can make daily choices that move you forward.
Lou Holtz, the famous football coach for the Notre Dame football team, had a lovely acronym for WIN: ‘What’s important now?’. It's simple and powerful. Focusing both on what's important and what your next step is can be life-changing. Lou Holtz got his players to ask themselves this question 35 times a day. I'm not suggesting that you do that, but I recommend you make a practice of doing this at least three times a day, at mealtimes, for example. It's helpful to do it as if you were having a discussion with your ideal image of who you want to be.
This does require effort. It is a learnt skill and helps to create the discipline of guarding the gates of your mind and deliberately directing your thoughts. Your brain can be exercised and trained. Like any training, you need to build up to fitness level. It also helps to make sure that you are in the right frame of mind when you are putting yourself through these exercises. I find the acronym HALTS useful. I use it as a quick check with myself to see if I am Hungry, Angry, Lonely, Tired or Stressed. If so, stop and address those areas of need before tackling higher order thinking.
Set yourself up to succeed and win. An easy place to start is your environment. Where do you live, work, rest, study? Set these areas up to serve you. Start with small actions to direct your thoughts and check the quality of your thinking: Post-it notes in areas you look at daily like the bathroom mirror, an alarm on your phone, a friend that you check in with. These can all help develop the mental muscle to think in ways that work for your good and your growth.
