POSTPONE SOMETHING

(ACTION 3: PERSONALITY DEVELOPMENT SERIES)

INTRODUCTION:

We are now talking about the 3^rd action in the series of Personality Development.  Once you set your goals and start creating a focus on your goals, you may face several challenges. Creating focus may not seem too easy. You are willing to concentrate your energies on your goals, but, somehow your mental status keeps you adrift from your goals.

This happens because you have already developed a habit of spending your time on certain activities. Now, all of a sudden it is not possible for you to take away that time and put it somewhere else even if it is for your goals. In fact, you are comfortable with those activities and your mind will resist any change as change will require extra efforts and determination.

Well! If you can learn to postpone some of your activities for delayed gratification, you can create a strong focus and achieve success. Let us see how you can develop the art of postponing something and achieve massive success.

HABITS THAT WERE STOPPING ME:

MY HABITS:

Let me give you my own example. Sometime back, when I was in a job and working for an average of 12 hours a day, I decided to become fit and healthy. Running was the exercise that I selected for this purpose. With a few months of practice, I was able to run for about 15 km. For this, I needed time, and I used to do this on the ground in the evening after returning from my job. At the same time, I had finished my PG Diploma in Financial Management and I developed a habit of reading, Economic Times, every day. Also, I loved to read good literature in Hindi as well as English. I was going with all these activities simultaneously and was not left with enough time even for a good sleep.

THE CHANGE:

At this stage of my life, I met some successful entrepreneurs and decided to take their help and guidance to be like them. I decided about some new goals and they asked me to focus on activities related to the action plan suggested by them. But I was really short of time. It was then that my coach suggested me to temporarily reduce my time for running from 2 hours to half an hour and save one and a half hour. Also, save one and a half hours from reading newspapers and literature. I followed his advice and saved 3 hours a day to develop my entrepreneurship skills. And, this helped me to reach my ambitious goals as per the plan.

DO YOU HAVE ANY UNPRODUCTIVE HABIT?

• If you can learn to postpone some of your current activities that are not related to goals; you can achieve greater things in life. Therefore think seriously about your current habits that are stopping you from achieving bigger goals in your life. Learn to postpone something temporarily for achieving a meaningful goal.
• Identify your habits. In which activities you are spending your time? Prepare a list. Then think seriously about those activities where you are spending your time but these are not relevant to your goals. Take time from these activities and use the same for making your goals come true.
• Quite often, people say no to an opportunity, just because they think that they are too busy. Friends! Don’t say NO to an opportunity just by default. Analyze whether any bigger success is hiding within this opportunity? If yes, then think wisely about rescheduling or even temporarily stopping your current activities.
• Once a bigger opportunity was knocking my door. But I was putting almost 15 hours in my job and had no time. At that time I decided to grab the opportunity and therefore my mind started working in another direction. Ultimately, I could wisely devise a method to take away a few hours from the job and invest it in achieving my goal. I think there always are possibilities and one must learn to explore it.
• Sometimes your activities are not directed towards any goal but you just love to do it. For example my activity of reading newspapers or literature. For someone, it may be watching a favorite show on television. If you become really passionate about your goal, you can easily postpone these unproductive habits.

IMPORTANT SUGGESTIONS:

Friends! I am giving some suggestions about activities which can be temporarily postponed to achieve some worthwhile goals:

1. Spending time on television. One of my friends told me once that those who are behind the screen earn when we watch them. But we on the other side spend our time and money and don’t get anything in return.
2. Social media viz. Facebook, Instagram, Whatsapp or LinkedIn can be of great importance in our life if we are using them productively for the growth of our start-up or business. But these can be equally damaging if we are just spending time without consideration of returns, especially in financial form.
3. Discussions about politics, religion, history, cricket, movies, etc. People have their own opinions and you can’t change them by discussion. Then why waste your precious time in these activities?
4. Don’t be a sort of helicopter parent to your children. Let them grow at their God-given speed. Some people spend their whole life in over helping their children to grow. This takes them away from their other important goals.
5. The time spent in week-end parties, family outings, traveling to enjoy holidays, etc. can be well utilized for activities related to your goals. Once you reach your goals, you may enjoy these activities in a much better way.
6. Identify your habits if these are coming in the way of your goals. For example, habits of procrastination, gossiping, talking ill about others, being inflexible or adamant, poor dietary habits, neglecting family, and neglecting your own health, etc. Learn to postpone such habits or behavior at-least temporarily till you achieve your goals.

TAKEAWAY:

Friends! Success does not embrace you by default. It would never happen that when you are shopping in a mall, your loving success suddenly comes to you and then stays for-ever in your life. Success is a planned event.

I understand that you are extremely busy. But, if you are not thoughtful, you can say NO to an opportunity that has a greater potential to impact your life positively. Therefore, instead of saying NO to an opportunity, learn to postpone some of your non-productive activities. This can ultimately bring an abundance of joy and happiness in your life.

Dr. Lokesh N Rai

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