Do you do the things you say you're going to?
When I received the package from my last company part of that was some services with an outplacement firm, I only took advantage of a few of their services, but I did take an assessment. This assessment essentially told me a lot of things that I already knew and to keep an eye out for potential problem situations with excessive bureaucracy and detail and I’ve been keeping that in mind ever since. One of the things that this assessment did was recommend a couple books to read.
Last Wednesday I picked up one of these books, First Things First, by Stephen Covey. I didn’t set the book aside like I would normally do but I started reading it. I’m still slowly plodding through it, reading during my lunch time when I get a chance. I’ve found the book interesting in that it makes you focus on the important things in life, the principles that surround our lives. I haven’t made any drastic changes as a result of the book but I have started thinking about it (it’s a start).
I did read an interesting section about improving your self integrity by making promises to yourself and actually keeping them. I’ve always found that I make promises or say I’m going to do something only to get distracted and find some reason to not complete it. I’ve always been somewhat conscious of this but it hasn’t really ever come up and I’ve always written it off as if it’s something important I’ll apply myself. While I’m certain that’s true the book suggested building up your self integrity by making small promises to yourself and then actually following through. For the next couple weeks I’m going to try this and see if I can notice any results, hopefully I will but even if I don’t this will be an interesting exercise. Small promises, daily, weekly, things that are achievable.
Tonight I’m going to clean the cat litter, before going to sleep I will empty out the stinky pile of cat shit and replace it with clean litter. Simple? Yes. But I want to start small and accomplish the things I say I’m going to do without falling back to procrastination for no good reason.
Last Wednesday I picked up one of these books, First Things First, by Stephen Covey. I didn’t set the book aside like I would normally do but I started reading it. I’m still slowly plodding through it, reading during my lunch time when I get a chance. I’ve found the book interesting in that it makes you focus on the important things in life, the principles that surround our lives. I haven’t made any drastic changes as a result of the book but I have started thinking about it (it’s a start).
I did read an interesting section about improving your self integrity by making promises to yourself and actually keeping them. I’ve always found that I make promises or say I’m going to do something only to get distracted and find some reason to not complete it. I’ve always been somewhat conscious of this but it hasn’t really ever come up and I’ve always written it off as if it’s something important I’ll apply myself. While I’m certain that’s true the book suggested building up your self integrity by making small promises to yourself and then actually following through. For the next couple weeks I’m going to try this and see if I can notice any results, hopefully I will but even if I don’t this will be an interesting exercise. Small promises, daily, weekly, things that are achievable.
Tonight I’m going to clean the cat litter, before going to sleep I will empty out the stinky pile of cat shit and replace it with clean litter. Simple? Yes. But I want to start small and accomplish the things I say I’m going to do without falling back to procrastination for no good reason.
Labels: Books, self improvement
posted by Matt at 1:39 PM
