Focus seems to be something we are all seeking. Yet, it often seems so elusive.
Growing up and watching cartoons, there was an iconic plot line that included the main character (like Fred Flintstone) having a ‘devil’ on one shoulder and an ‘angel’ on the other.
The two sub characters of Fred’s mind would proceed to argue their choice of action, trying to convince poor Fred that their perspective and suggested action was best. Fred would become dizzy and confused amidst the arguing, not sure what to do.
At times, I’m guessing we all feel like this today. The voice of our better self, our inner ‘angel’ suggests we focus on X, only to be immediately drowned out by our inner ‘devil’ who compellingly argues that we direct our attention to one of the many meaningless, but fleetingly pleasurable distractions we have access to.
Living this way can be exhausting.
We would all love to get rid of that taunting voice. The unfortunate reality is that there is no way to fully remove it. It is part of our human nature and will be there for our entire lifetime.
So, we need a better way.
The Power of Habit
The better way is to create better habits. Sounds straightforward enough, right? I’m sure you have even tried this more than a few times.
All of us have found how devilish hard it is to create new healthy habits. That devilish voice of our emotional brain is very good at voting against the new habit, with a 1,000 well-crafted arguments that tend to win out in the end. But ultimately, we lose out - since the healthy, productive or success-oriented habit was what we wanted most.
That’s why most of us need a program or some form of support. Oh, wouldn’t it be nice if we could make the change we wanted to without the support. Read a blog post, make a change. Read a book, make a change. It would make for a great Hollywood story, one where we as the ‘hero’ have a moment of clarity, realize what we need to do and forever changes our ways. Which you know by now almost never happens!
That’s where the Nature of Work 8-week program comes in. Steve Rio and Yasmeen Sadain are good friends of mine and we have a shared passion figuring out how to help people be more effective in their work and life. We believe that, while people may have many good intentions and goals, they struggled to operationalize that on their own.
My Personal Experience
This past Fall I had the privilege of being in the pilot cohort for the Nature of Work program.
As someone who already takes people through multi-week resilience, focus and well-being programs, I came into the program more to experience it than expecting to get a lot new out of it.
The reality turned out that it wonderfully reinforced key concepts I lean on in my training. And far more importantly, it changed my behaviour in positive ways!
In only a few weeks, I knocked another 30 minutes off of my screen time each day, evolved my morning routine for greater focus, better planned my week/day, stuck to my daily focus blocks to get more done in less time, and powerfully changed my evening routine.
The result? My overall end of day rating for the day went from an average 3.5/5 to 4.5/5! That is how you have better days! This is huge for a guy who already knew most of this stuff!
The power was in the cohort model and the inspired accountability it created. Habit is the key. But even I was under-leveraging the power of being with a group of like-minded individuals and being challenged by the goals of a program.
How About You?
Here’s a great question to ponder. If I asked you “what’s the one thing you know, that if you did (or stopped doing) on regular basis, it would make a huge difference in your productivity - what would that be?” All of us know what that one thing is. Well, what if you changed that!?
What would you do with an extra hour/day? Or increased productivity? Or better, deeper sleep?
This is something that is totally achievable for each of us – but rarely on our own. It is the power of the cohort model that gives you the accountability you need.
Join Us as Part of the Next Nature of Work CPA Cohort
As a Certified Nature of Work facilitator, I’m inviting you to be part of the pilot CPA cohort, starting May 3, 2021.
This cohort is exclusively for CPAs, so you can go through the program with peers facing similar challenges.
If you are looking to shift your focus off of the things that are not in your control and put it firmly on the things you can control, there is no better place to start than with a cohort of like-minded individuals all working towards your individual and shared success.
Please connect with me at scott@mindfulwisdom.ca to find out more.