Respecting the end of the week. It's tempting to carry our work into the weekend especially when we don't have a clear cutoff day and time for the end of the week. But if we work over the weekend, there is no beginning of the week either. Instead of pushing yourself for
Do the hard thing first. There are tasks that require emotional labour and we have a tendency to procrastinate on them and to focus on the other stuff. But when we do that, we make it even harder to execute them and the stress starts compounding. The alternative is to focus on one task that&
One by one. Greg Mckeown talks about the absurdity of the word priorities in his book Essentialism. Priority is a singular word without a plural form. More often than not, our effectiveness gets reduced because we cannot identify our singular priority. We end up putting in a lot of effort in different directions
The expectation of good. Whenever we work on any creative project, whether it is a book, a blog, a song, an enterprise, or anything else, the thing that stops us the most is the expectation of making it good. We start believing that starting it would make sense only when we can ensure that
Not breaking the streak. When we start building a habit, eventually a day comes when we feel a strong tendency to skip. The resistance or laziness or whatever we call it is at a peak and we keep delaying until it's too late. Somehow, our mind convinces us that it would be
Make an ordered list. The brain is not equipped to sort the things on our minds. The more stuff we carry in our heads, the more we become stressed as our brain continuously tries to make sense of the unorganised list of things we are carrying around in our minds. It makes sense to
A space for everything. Work from home is an oxymoron. The mere fact that it is home should suffice to say that you can't work from there. When our personal and professional lives overlap, it creates confusion and trouble. The best way to compartmentalise work and personal, especially if you are an
Use a timer. A timer can help us get done with more stuff than we think. It can make possibly arduous tasks come within reach. A workout with a timer of 20 minutes is much more likely to be done. Since you know it's going to end in 20 minutes, you
Adjusting to new. When we build our habits, we become used to the tools that we use. Changing the tools causes a bit of readjustment both physically and mentally. This readjustment is a big reason why we are hesitant to upgrade our tools. But as technology evolves and it helps serve our audience
2 kinds of why! One is where we want to act with intent. Hence, we are imploring what our action is for. This is a why worth exploring. The other is a form of procrastination. Instead of acting, we wait for the right reasons, we look for purpose and passion. There is no answer
A framework for income generation. Start with customer traction: find a smallest viable audience that desperately needs a problem solved. Empathise with the audience, understand their challenges and create a product that solves their problem. Show up with generosity and intent. Create tension and trust to help the audience take action. Make it easy for
Fear accompanies action. When we take action to move forward, fear asks us to wait. It tries to delay and maintain the status quo for as long as possible. If we wait too long, the fear takes over and we feel paralysed. Any action involves a trade-off and has the potential of loss.
Forward motion. It’s not always linear, it’s not always predictable. Many times, we need to go through loops in order to get moving. But it is imperative to move forward. If we stand still for too long, we become stagnant. A question that can help with forward motion is “What’
The nature of fear. The nature of fear is to deter us from following our path. It delays, distracts and disorients us. The irony is that the path that fear presents has no case at all. All it says is that this has worked in the past, so simply keep doing that only. When
What before how. Determining the “what” is much more important than rushing into the “how”. The busy and urgent culture forces us to rush into the how, into doing things whether they lead to forward motion or not. Working on a clear vision and direction, and identifying the key action steps that take
Generosity as a skill. We all have the capability of making things better. And the more we make things better, the more capability will build to do it. There is no limit to the amount of impact you can create when you act with generosity. When you bring change with intent for the people
Getting out of the slump. The creative process is cyclical and getting into a slump is a natural part of it. The thing that makes it worse is the guilt associated with the slump. In order to get out of the slump, it is important to be kind to oneself and start afresh. Analysing the
Understanding change. Change is hard. The status quo grows on us the longer we stay there. Change involves unpredictability. It requires us to be patient and agile when things don’t go the way we expect them to. The key to change is intent. When change is done with intent, we can
What needs to be done? There are times when we feel lost, when we are unable to see a direction, when everything feels stuck. At these times, it becomes difficult to find clarity and get answers. What can help is to focus on one action at a time, one day at a time. Sometimes, a
One thing at a time. There is almost nothing that can’t be resolved by giving it our undivided attention. Sometimes, we may end up realising that we can’t do anything about the thing in question, but even in that case, we can move forward. Overwhelm occurs when we try to solve too many
Intent matters. When you do things with intent, you ask the tough questions. You know longer go with the flow or choose the convenient path. Intentional action is rare and valuable. It is from intent that new, innovative things shape up and take form. Intent usually starts from an individual but then
Finding your voice again. It is difficult to find our voice when we are at the receiving end of stimuli. It could be conversations with friends or instant messages or videos on streaming services or social media. When our brain is handling stimuli, its focus goes mainly to responding to those stimuli. And then
Separating work and personal life. A big part of the challenge of working as an independent creative is to create boundaries between work and life in as many areas as possible: physical space, time, attire, people, finances among others. The more clear the boundaries between work and personal life, the more effective we become as
The emotional labour of taking a decision. When we take a decision, we cut out the alternatives and choose a path. This requires emotional labour. The process of thinking about the alternatives and looking at the pros and cons can act as an illusion of forward motion. At some point, we have to make a trade-off, we
Few marketing questions. Who’s it for? What’s it for? What change do you seek to make? What promise are you making? Why would they trust you? Why would they talk about you? HT to Seth Godin for bringing these questions to focus. — If you liked reading this, consider subscribing. If you
