This video is one among others in a series of videos that are geared to help you get
your life in shape by pulling yourself out of the rut.
Most of us have an inkling of the kind of potential we have and how, if we had better
habits, were less lazy or cared enough about our performance, we would succeed tremendously.
The first video in the series talked about distinguishing the good kind of lazy and the
bad kind.
Remember the story of Tony, the Lazy Mechanic?
Laziness had him procrastinating most of his duties, disappointing his family and friends,
and is possibly responsible for the bad back he keeps complaining about.
In today’s video, we are going to talk about how to stop being lazy, specifically if you
believe that you are not strategically lazy.
If you would like to understand the distinction between the two, please check out the previous
video on the Art of Being Lazy.
For now, let us find out, what you need to do in order to stop being a truly lazy person?
First, Stop Calling Yourself Lazy The reason you clicked on this video and found
yourself here is probably because you believe you are a lazy person.
This could be because your boss yells at you every day, calling you lazy; your spouse keeps
comparing you to the “apparently” successful neighbor you have, just to prove the point
that you are, indeed, lazy; or it could be your mind calling you lazy over and over because
you don’t seem as busy as everyone else around you.
The first step to stop being lazy is to purge this label from your life by, first, admitting
that you are lazy, and then understanding and believing that it is something that you
can get over with if you put in the correct measures.
For Tony, our lazy mechanic, to stop being lazy, he first needs to admit that his daily
habits and routines are concerning; in fact, he needs to admit that he is a lazy person
and that it is not doing him any favors.
At the same time, he needs to affirm to himself that it is not a permanent situation; it is
one that can be changed with just a little willpower and a few steps in the right direction.
The mind is a powerful tool, and what we believe we are is what we usually turn out to be.
If you keep listening to the people who call you lazy and then reinforce it in your mind
that you are, this is what you will portray to the world.
Change your mindset; tell yourself that you are not lazy, that the lanyard that you have
hung around yourself labeling you lazy is one that you have worn yourself; and can just
as easily remove it.
2.
Start with a Small Step One of the reasons most people become lazy
is being overwhelmed by the enormity of the tasks that they deem necessary to do or those
that they have been procrastinating over a period of time.
For example, as a student, you may have a myriad of assignments waiting to be done and
a test to study for in just a single weekend; after all, you are the master procrastinator.
Blocking out 7 hours during which you will crash the assignments may prove to be counterintuitive
and will likely draw you more into laziness.
So what do you do?
Simply start with a single task and work on it as if it is the only thing you have to
do.
Don’t worry about the bigger picture; just tell yourself that for 30 minutes, you are
going to sit down and write the outline of the term paper that is due.
Small steps are less overwhelming as compared to looking at tasks and goals as a whole.
They also serve as motivation to propel you forward to take even more steps.
You know what these small steps add up to?
One massive step into success.
Forgive the cliché, but it is true that the journey of a thousand miles begins with only
a single step.
3.
Eat the Frog Another easy-to-do way to stop being lazy
is by eating the frog, a phrase that was coined by Mark Twain.
In the previous video, we discussed how eating the frog was one way through which you can
be strategically lazy.
This is also another way you can stop being lazy.
By completing the tasks you dread doing first thing in the morning or ones that are likely
to consume a lot of time, you are less likely to be lazy as the tasks that follow will seem
less overwhelming.
3.
Develop Good Habits The mechanic Tony was labeled lazy because
of his bad habits; sitting down all day and doing nothing but watching TV and playing
video games, and neglecting his duties as a result.
You cannot rid yourself of a habit; habits are usually programmed into our brain which
is why long after quitting cigarettes, the impulses and the way one smokes hardly change.
However, new habits can be layered on top of older habits until they take control of
your life.
For instance, Tony could decide to develop one new habit that he deems good for him;
open up his shop an hour earlier.
Therefore, instead of getting there at 9am, he gets there at 8am, sit down on his desk
and have a cup of coffee while he goes through the shop’s accounts.
This one new habit could have a butterfly effect on how his days will go after that,
and possibly pave the way for over-layering of the older habits.
Therefore, one way to become less lazy is developing one good habit.
Trying to change all your old habits will prove unsuccessful.
Instead, work on one keystone habit, consistently.
You will be surprised at the end result.
4.
Get Others to Keep You Accountable Most of us appreciate praise and recognition
for things that we have worked hard for and excelled at.
This is because of the social conditioning of human beings; we do like to feel like we
are part of the crowd.
It is probably why you have never thought of walking in public naked; or if you have
thought about it, you never actualized it.
Why not?
Because you will probably get admitted into a mental hospital.
While constantly seeking approval from people might not be a good thing, it can be useful
in your journey to throwing off that coat of laziness.
You can do this by getting an accountability partner, someone you can be vulnerable with
and who will help you in your journey out of laziness.
This partner is someone with whom you share your goals and your progress, and also someone
who cheers you on when you have achieved a goal that you set out for yourself.
He or she is also offers constructive criticism and can show you how to make your habits work
for you better than they do.
They are also a source of motivation and encouragement should you get demoralized along the way.
5.
Take Out Your Distractions Have you ever put into perspective how much
time you spend looking down at your phone every day?
Or playing that video game you really like?
Or watching the reruns for a TV show whose season finale was 2 decades ago?
Okay, now, think about how much time you lose in transition from legitimate things you were
doing to distractions and back; looking up from an assignment you are typing because
your phone chimed; getting distracted from work in the office because you just heard
Steve tell Kyle that the trailer for Lion King is out; drawing attention away from your
girlfriend to get lost in a game that came out of the Store.
Distractions are other ways through which we become lazy.
When you are distracted when you should be getting work done, it becomes difficult to
get back to it.
In fact, if you are distracted by work that required full involvement, it may become even
more difficult to motivate yourself to start again.
Haven’t you ever said to hell with a major task and procrastinated, just to watch the
new episodes for a show you are following on Netflix?
What is the point here?
Get rid of your distractions; they are not doing you any favours and to be honest, chances
are you will enjoy them better in a time that you have set aside to indulge in them.
The next video in this series will be dealing with the issue of distractions; how do you
tackle these technological distractions that you aren’t seemingly in control of?
6.
Planning Benjamin Franklin gifted us with a quote that
is relevant to anyone who is looking to stop being lazy, “If you fail to plan, you are
planning to fail.”
Sometimes, laziness is borne out of an inability to know how to move forward while at other
times, it is borne of too much planning and no execution.
Using to-do lists and goal trackers are good ways to get rid of laziness if you are from
the former group of people who do not plan.
Planners tell you what to do and when to do it and the fun part comes at the end of the
day when you sit down and tick off the things in your lists.
If you are on the other end of the spectrum, the one where you do a lot of planning but
aren’t able to actualize any of them, I have three clichéd words for you; Just Do
It.
7.
Just Do It At the core of laziness is an inability to
get things started and moving.
As a student, you may be similar to my friend Marcy, whose walls and vision board used to
be full of lists of things she is supposed to do in order to get to where her vision
board says she should be.
However, most days, she would just chill out in bed, feel guilty for chilling out in bed,
then when she convinced herself to sit up, she would just do more planning.
After that she would feel exhilarated.
Finally!
A way to achieve her true potential.
Now that she has a plan for achieving her potential, she can go back to bed and wait
for tomorrow to actualize it.
If your laziness is borne of too much planning, stop planning.
Is there a website you need to check out in order to gain some specific information?
Do not write it in your to-do list.
Take out your gadget and go to the website right then.
Do you have assignments that need getting done?
Don’t plan how you will do them, use the time you would have planned to do the assignment
to get started on it.
You would be surprised at the results; because for one, there are results!
Thanks for watching us today.
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