Do you feel energized, focused and committed?
Think about your typical workday. How often do you wake up in the morning, excited to get to work? How much time do you spend fighting traffic to get to the office? Do you run from meeting to meeting, with no time in between, as emails pile up unanswered in your inbox?
When was the last time you left your desk at midday and took an hour for lunch with a friend? How much energy do you have left for your loved ones when you leave the office at the end of the day? Do immediate demands overwhelm your capacity to do more productive thinking?
How do you really feel? Are you loosing connection with yourself, your colleagues? Are you clear on who you are and what your goals and purpose at work are?
Is your candle burning out?
Candle lit bamboo-and-paper lanterns were commonly used in ancient Japan for brightening the evening darkness. And as is the courteous ritual, a friend, one evening, offered just such a lantern to a blind man to carry home with him.
“I do not need a lantern,” the blind man remarked. “Darkness or light is all the same to me.”
“I know you do not need a lantern to find your way,” his friend replied, “but if you don’t have one, someone else may run into you. So please take it nonetheless.”
Taking the lantern in hand, the blind man started off and before too long he walked squarely into a fellow traveler.
“Look out where you are going!” the blind man barked at the stranger. “Can’t you see this lantern?”
“Your candle has burned out, brother,” replied the stranger.
How to get energized, focused and committed?
Change you habits on email & meetings:
1. Deal practically with the massive amounts of Emails. First, don’t look at it every minute; look at it every hour or two. Second, try to discipline yourself to read only the subject matter in order to discard 50% to 80% of your emails right away. We all get so much spam. Third, practice what I call “OHIO” — Only Handle It Once, immediately deciding what to do with each email. Concentrate on the emails that are important and answer them right away. And don’t put them into some sort of storage system, because by the time you’re ready to finally tackle them, you’ll spend another half an hour trying to find them.
2. Take a mindful approach to Meetings: First, you ought to have the materials and agenda sent out in advance. Second, the person who’s presenting the issues should speak for a short amount of time, 10 or 15 minutes, and not consume the whole meeting. Third, you need to have a real discussion and debate. Fourth, you should end the meeting with clear to-do’s — what are the next steps, who’s going to follow through on them, what are the time frames? And fifth, you should end the meeting at the very latest in 90 minutes, and try for 60 minutes.
Adopt the 3 success habits:
- CONNECT with yourself, get clear on who you are and where you are right now, and what got you here (Point A)
- Get CLARITY on where you want to go and why, in very clear detail (Point B)
- COMMIT to the process of self-development that will take you from Point A to B.
