Finish What You Start by Peter Hollins.
A short guide to help you finish that goal.
My writing community, Smart Writers Community picked this book as the book we are to read for January and February.
I was in between Believe Bigger by Marshawn Evans, The World Needs You by Dr Samuel Ekumndyao and one of Gary Chapman’s books.
January was quite busy but I promised to push myself and get it settled and here we are. Finishing strong!
I have recently discovered that I love writing bite-sized summaries of self-help and motivation books.
Would I continue? Maybe. It’s good to make changes. Who knows what else would catch my fancy and help lives?
Finishing what you start is making your intentions a reality.
To help out, reward yourself for doing a task e.g. write two chapters of a book/article/ assignment/code/project and you will get a (insert your reward).
For me, it’s a cup of Parfait.
Following through is related to focus, self-discipline, action and persistence but it is not synonymous to any of them.
We don’t follow through for 2 main reasons:
- Inhabiting tactics. 2. Psychogical roadblocks.
Inhabiting tactics are schemes we use to sabotage and misuse our time and effort. These are setting bad goals, procrastination, indulging in temptation and distractions and poor time management.
For Psychological roadblocks; the fear of judgement, rejection and failure also slow us down. However, we had already failed the moment we decided not to try. Don’t let your perfectionism stop you from following through. Take courage and continue with a habit/goal.
Following through will help you build better relationships with yourself, your spouse, children, family and friends.
2. Staying Hungry
You need to find a true source of motivation, and create a balance between your dream, the positives and the negatives. That way, the negatives would be acceptable obstacles in the pursuit of your goal.
There are external motivators which are sources outside yourself that drive you to action. They are about avoiding negative consequences. Self-bribery is the only positive external motivation.
An accountability partner helps you to commit to something. The same as an accountability group and it can be more effective as having multiple people on your case makes you want to excel and not shame yourself.
Losing money is another motivator. Not wanting to waste money on buying a course or having a Coach and not being faithful. Giving someone money to hold on to until you finish a task is another option.
Self-bribery can help drive you to complete a goal. Imagine how you will use your reward would keep you going.
Internal motivators are often better sources of motivation as they are about what you want.
‘Internal motivators are the carrot, while external motivators are the stick’.
Here are some questions to ask yourself to determine how you will benefit then let them motivate you.
a. What are you getting out of this?
b. How will your life change of benefits?
c. How will your family benefit?
d. What impact will you have on others?
e. What positive emotions will you get?
f. How will your actions lead to your long-term and short-term goals?
Write the answers to these questions and review them periodically to improve your status quo.
‘Everything in life is an opportunity cost which means that everything you do will call for something from you’.
If the opportunity cost is too expensive for you, you will not follow through so your motivation must be stronger and mean more to you than what you will sacrifice.
Another way is to make the sacrifices smaller, e.g giving up social media to write a book, been an author must outweigh wanting to use social media or reduce the time you spend on social media and use it to write the book/article/course/code etc
Keep your motivations in sight. See them and hear them often. Use images, sound, textures and scents. Remember to change them up to avoid getting too used to them.
3. Create a manifesto.
Let's create rules that will help us achieve our goals. This would help you make your decisions automatically. they will hold you accountable and guide you.
He gave an example of always completing two tasks in our to-do goal every day.
Rule 1
Ask yourself why you want to give up: Laziness or Fear?
Rule 2
Focus on a maximum of 3 things a day. Learn to difference between important and urgent things.
Important things must be done first. Also, learn the difference between useless motions and actual actions. Do actions that will help you complete your goal.
Look at your to-do list, and determine the steps you need to complete them starting with the most important one.
Don’t multitask.
Rule 3
Write your rules and post them in a visible area. Also, learn to stop, check and evaluate how you are progressing with your goal.
‘Give yourself five daily limitations and five daily requirements. Make clear statements about what you cannot do and what you must do.’
Rule 4
Reaffirm your intentions by reminding yourself what they are and why you want to achieve them.
‘When you find yourself deliberating between quitting and following through, check the answers you have written to these questions’
Rule 5
If you feel like giving in to an urge ask yourself how you will feel in 10 minutes, 10 hours and 10 days from now.
At 10 minutes you might feel good with a bit of shame loading. After 10 hours, you might feel shame and regret. In 10 days, you might be consumed by regret when you realise the negative consequences of your decision to your long-term goals.
If it is not negative, then go ahead with what you want to do.
Remember to be honest with yourself and not use excuses to rationalize things.
Rule 6
Wait 10 minutes. If you want to do something harmful, negative or determinantal to your goal, force yourself to wait 10 minutes. If you still want it, wait another 10 minutes.
It helps to build discipline and improve decision-making.
The same with beneficial things. If you want to stop beneficial things wait or continue 10 minutes. It will help build your balance.
4. Follow-Through Mindsets.
A mindset is an act way of visualizing and approaching situations and problems.
Follow-through is 100% mental. You must be ready to deal with discomfort and make sacrifices. You must embrace scary situations.
Mindset 1:It’s Worthwhile.
Hard work is a prerequisite. You must believe that hard work will to improvement. Hard work wouldn’t overcome everything but it’s an essential component that can not be skipped.
You must believe in yourself and your abilities and trust in your opportunities.
‘You are as good as everyone else.’
You must believe what you are doing is valuable and relevant to your goals.
Mindset 2: Comfort with Discomfort
Your journey wouldn't be comfortable. You need to minimise the negative consequences of uncomfortable situations by getting immunized to the sense of discomfort.
Do new things outside your comfort zone. Learn new skills, talk to new people, practise new actions you are bad at, and expose yourself to new situations and things.
The more often you get discomforted doing things, the more you get comfortable with discomfort.
‘Discomfort is merely your fear instinct at play and does not actually hurt, so getting comfortable with it is a good idea’
Mindset 3: Allow Learning
You get to learn about what it takes to finish something and what you are made of it you follow through.
Giving up is an automatic failure so finish whatever goal you have set for yourself. It is only when you finish you can see how you did and evaluate your performance.
You get to learn what doesn’t work and avoid the issue in the future. Ask yourself, ‘What can I learn from this?’
Mindset 4: De-Stress
Learn to introduce stress-reducing habits into your life. spend 30 minutes doing relaxing activities i.e reading a book, listening to music, exercising, cuddling, meditating, taking a walk etc
If you don’t, you will project that bais unconsciously the next time you want to follow through and finish something.
5. The Science of Smashing Procrastination.
You need to plan for your future self. avoid the urge to want a reward now. You can move future long-term rewards into the present more effectively.
‘Temptation bundling is a way to blend both future and present self needs by making future rewards more immediate.’
An example would be working out while watching TV.
Make a list with two columns, on one side your guilty pleasures and on the other things you need to do for your future self.
You can break them into smaller bits and you can start with the easiest tasks. The more you move with an easy task, you will break inactivity and gain momentum.
6. No Distraction Zone
Distractions break down our self-discipline and it happens in the background without us noticing. The worst ones are the mindless ones that we don’t even realize we are doing.
The default effect is making an option the default which will
increase the likelihood of it being chosen as making decisions requires effort and we always take the part with less effort.
For phone apps, put a timer on them so you don’t overuse them. If you like picking up your phone often, keep it far from you.
For things you don’t want to do, keep them out of sight. Don't buy items you know are bad for you. Schedule alarms to remind you to do things.
Instead of multitasking, single-tasking. Which is working only on your current task. It is purposefully and intentionally tuning out everything else.
It might take a while to adapt and it requires you to make conscious decisions against your instincts.
Batch your tasks. Pack similar tasks together and complete them all at once. Batch checking emails, batch making calls, batch your distractions. do it all at once within a time frame so you are no longer tempted to go back.
Have a do-not-do list: things you can’t do anything about at present because of external circumstances, things that don’t add value to your current projects, tasks that are current and ongoing but will not benefit from
additional work or attention paid to them.
Have 40% of whatever you need (information/inventory/) then move on with the action that would get you on the road. Don’t wait until you have 100% or 80% information before acting.
Allow yourself to relax and rest- without your phone. Meditate instead.
7. Deadly Pitfalls
False hope syndrome is overestimating the changes you can make when you set unrealistic expectations for what you can do and the speed, number, and ease of the changes you plan to make to your
life.
‘Don’t shoot too high, but don’t shoot too low; otherwise, you’ll grow bored and unengaged.’
Overthinking makes you think you are working but you are not. When you overthink, you freeze your ability to make decisions. Instead, emphasize action. Get the information you need but don’t obsess over it.
Worrying steals your control and composure, and makes you focus on issues that are both real and imaginary.
‘But the truth is, worrying causes you to suffer twice — once during the worrying and again if the dreaded event actually occurs. And if it doesn’t occur, you’ve just suffered for no reason at all.’
Not knowing yourself is another mistake to avoid. figure out how to work best and create the most beneficial environments for yourself. Everyone works differently. Find what works best for you and use them to your advantage.
Also, find out why you are failing, it would help you minimise mistakes and work smarter.
8. Daily Systems for Success
‘A system is a set of actions that you consistently perform every day in order
to streamline your success and reach your goals.’
You should have a system that tasks become routine and you don’t have to think about them anymore.
‘The key to a system is to work on progress and consistency in your life, as opposed to working on goals.’
Systems are not limited like goals as they apply to everything you do. They help you achieve your goals, and protect you from failure even when you don’t meet a goal, it helps to get to a better place instead as you are progressing.
Keep track of your progress, and tick off your task once done. Celebrate every little win. It will help boost your morale. Reward yourself for meeting and completing your ultimate goal.
Set a routine for your work, it helps to know when to do what. Check your planner for your to-do list at the start of the day. It helps you to see your goals and follow through. Remember, you should minimise distractions and focus on one task till you are done.
Tax yourself; ‘Train yourself to view bad behavior as something that is too expensive to engage in. For example, raise the costs of unproductive behavior by forcing yourself to climb five flights of stairs to smoke or eat chocolate or browse your phone.’
To have a great system, first, gather all the information. Assign responsibility; specify how much work you want to get done, set a realistic deadline for your goals, plan what to do after a project and how you will move along to the next task, gather physical resources, and identify obstacles.
‘Daily systems streamline work and cut down on the amount of willpower
you require to plug on in life. They make actions systematic and therefore
they encourage progress. You can avoid failure in your life by using
systems to implement efficiency and forward progress.’
For getting this summary done, I am rewarding myself with Parfait, well deserved don't you think?
So, which tip are you going to put into action henceforth?
