I read a Nerd Fitness article and there is good stuff. There are two words to improve the life. The last time you stopped a book at the half? The last time you walked away during a movie? The last time you stopped a video game before you beat it?
« Finish what you start ! », that what my parents tell me and I think it is the same thing for you. The good news is parents don’t have rights all the time. In fact, there is a lot of reason why we need to stop something we haven’t finished.
Here two words that allow us to stop things we don’t like to do: Stop and No, thanks.
Must finish
A human being like progress. We like to check empty boxes and say: « It’s done ! ».
I’m sure, if you began a book, movie or tv show several days ago, you will do everything to finish it. You want to finish it even if you don’t like it, just to say: « it’s done ».
Remember, our lives on this earth are limited, so, we need to spend the maximum of time to do things that make us happy. Say: « I need to finish it » is not applicable.
This phenomenon is: « I already began or I already paid, now I must finish ! ». It’s called « Sunk Cost Fallacy » and there is a good explanation in LifeHack .
Think of all the things you began and after you realized that it is not interesting but you continue to the end like tv shows, books, projects, restaurant’s meal, a crappy relationship or your career (watch this TED’s video ).
It’s OK to stop to do crappy things in your life to do things that make you happy. It’s not because you began that you must finish.
We know guts are necessary to have long term success, but spend time and energy to do things with stubbornness and obstinacy isn’t the recipe for success.
We do things in our lives because we simply began to do them one time. Stop everything is useless, but stop things we don’t like to do can allow us to use this time and this energy to improve things we like to do.
Say No, it’s cool
Did you watch Jim Carrey’s movie « Yes Man »? Do you do like Jim Carrey? Do you do things out of obligation or because you’re afraid to miss anything incredible? The truth is your life is a piece of shit if you say « yes » to everything.
Say « No » to opportunities, trips and requests look terrifying. When you say « No », you ask yourself if you miss something great. But this allows you to focus on important things like taking care of yourself, take care of your health and spend time with people who are important for you.
Eric Barker talks about it in his blog :
« No » creates focus.
Warren Buffett once said: « The difference between successful people and very successful people is that very successful people say « no » to almost everything ».
And that’s what gives them the time to accomplish so much.
Everything is said. We should stop to say « yes » out of obligation. How many nights you went and it was sucked?
« No, thanks » allow you to avoid to do not interesting things to focus to spend time with family/best friends, improve a skill or an exercise or to learn to cook a healthy meal.
No, thanks
Everyone complains to don’t have enough time in a day, but we don’t take time to select what is important and what is not important.
Here is a manual to is from today :
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Stop something – Stop a book, a movie, a project that doesn’t interest you anymore
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Say « No » to something – Say « No » to something that you do usually out of obligation and spend your time to do something important or something that makes you happy.
In my case :
- Stop something – I unsubscribed me from several YouTube channels. Now, I have only YouTube channels that teach me something. I subscribed to 18 YouTube channels and it’s perfect
- Say « No » to something – I say « No » to a party (reunion) with old students of the primary school. I have enough with parties where everybody repeat the same memories. However, a old friend put me a word on my door, blablablabla but no. Instead, I recover and I’m learning human anatomy to learn deeply about how muscles work during training. Serioulsy, it’s cool.
What did you stop and said « No, thanks », this week ?
-Steph