Make it Easy!

Leo Babauta shares a quote that really got me thinking last week. He said “make it so easy you can’t say no.”

I recently started my own consulting business and noticed that it is really different being a self-employed person vs. an employee for someone else. Being self-employed is tough work.

I said right there and then that I needed some change in my life.

I thought about what I wanted to accomplish with my business but also what I wanted to accomplish personally. I set three things to do each day that I wanted to get done to improve my life. One of those was prioritize the work I would do each day.

I have a nasty habit of committing to doing different things and then not writing those things down. Oftentimes those things don’t get done, or if they do, they are much later than originally anticipated.

So I committed to use workflowy.com, a favorite website of mine, to record what I said I will do and then to prioritize information I put in there for the day.

How does this relate to Leo Babauta’s quote? I made the process easy for me. I put all my information in one location that I can access anywhere. With workflowy, I am able to record information, move it to my daily work section and mark it as complete when done.

Another thing I did last week was to commit to improving my physical fitness.

Anyone that knows me can tell you I am a tall and big guy. I am six feet six inches tall and weigh over 300 pounds.

Exercising is a tough thing for me.

Mentally, I find it hard to get my gym clothes on, go to the gym, and then to exercise for 30 minutes to an hour. I think I’d rather go to the dentist and have a root canal.

So I thought “what is something I can do that is so easy and so minimal that I cannot fail.”

I came up with doing one push-up a day.

Why did I choose one push-up?

I’ve always heard that a good all-around exercise is a push-up. Plus I am terrible at doing push-ups. I usually take the easy way out and do modified push-ups. I figured if I could get down on the ground and do one push-up, then it would be so easy that I couldn’t say no.

Well that first day I went out and did one push-up. That’s it, just one push-up. I recorded the exercise in my book, I gave myself an invisible high five and congratulated myself on the accomplishment.

The next day, I did one push-up again. But then I did two more. I thought that was great. I did more than I planned to.

The day after that, I did five push-ups. You see a pattern here, don’t you? I made the goal so easy, that I am exceeding the goal and feeling great about it.

How can you take Mr. Babauta’s advice and apply it to your work?

If you find yourself delaying something that needs to get done or simply want to improve your life in a certain area, create a goal, task, or step that is so easy, that it would be ridiculous to not get it done.

Then go do it. Congratulate yourself on doing it.

The next day, do it again.  You may find yourself doing a bit more each day.  After a period of time, it will become a habit. Maybe a habit you look forward to doing each day.

You will see amazing results from using this approach.

I’d love to hear about your experiences and the successes you encounter.