You do not have to be good. You do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting. You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine. Meanwhile the world goes on. Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain are moving across the landscapes, over the prairies and the deep trees, the mountains and the rivers.Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air, are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely, the world offers itself to your imagination, calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting-- over and over announcing your place in the family of things.
Years ago when Seinfeld was a new television show, Jerry Seinfeld was still a touring comic. At the time, I was hanging around clubs doing open mic nights and trying to learn the ropes. One night I was in the club where Seinfeld was working, and before he went on stage, I saw my chance. I had to ask Seinfeld if he had any tips for a young comic. What he told me was something that would benefit me a lifetime...
He said the way to be a better comic was to create better jokes and the way to create better jokes was to write every day. But his advice was better than that. He had a gem of a leverage technique he used on himself and you can use it to motivate yourself—even when you don't feel like it.
He revealed a unique calendar system he uses to pressure himself to write. Here's how it works.
He told me to get a big wall calendar that has a whole year on one page and hang it on a prominent wall. The next step was to get a big red magic marker. He said for each day that I do my task of writing; I get to put a big red X over that day. "After a few days you'll have a chain. Just keep at it and the chain will grow longer every day. You'll like seeing that chain, especially when you get a few weeks under your belt. Your only job next is to not break the chain."
"Don't break the chain," he said again for emphasis.
Over the years I've used his technique in many different areas. I've used it for exercise, to learn programming, to learn network administration, to build successful websites and build successful businesses.
It works because it isn't the one-shot pushes that get us where we want to go, it is the consistent daily action that builds extraordinary outcomes. You may have heard "inch by inch anything's a cinch." Inch by inch does work if you can move an inch every day.
Daily action builds habits. It gives you practice and will make you an expert in a short time. If you don't break the chain, you'll start to spot opportunities you otherwise wouldn't. Small improvements accumulate into large improvements rapidly because daily action provides "compounding interest."
Skipping one day makes it easier to skip the next.
I've often said I'd rather have someone who will take action—even if small—every day as opposed to someone who swings hard once or twice a week. Seinfeld understands that daily action yields greater benefits than sitting down and trying to knock out 1000 jokes in one day.
Think for a moment about what action would make the most profound impact on your life if you worked it every day. That is the action I recommend you put on your Seinfeld calendar. Start today and earn your big red X. And from here on out...
Don't break the chain!
Brad Isaac a lead software programmer. You can read his motivational strategies every day on his goal setting blog, Achieve-IT!
I’m just back from Adelaide, where I spent a few days with my Dad. I lucked out. I got a great family. My parents always shared their opinions, but never assumed I would adopt them, never told me what to do. It was my passport to a journey of positive risk taking. My safety net was the myriad family voices, soft and strong, meshed and whispering ‘You can do it, you can do it, there’s no failure only learning. You can do it’
My Dad has always been rather cautious, a deep thoughtful man who considers every aspect of a problem before making a decision. He is shy, observant and very wise. He is softly spoken and doesn’t like conflict. When I was thirteen he saw in me the same shyness, soft spoken withdrawing nature, and he asked me to do something for him, something he just didn’t have in him but if he could change anything about himself , this was the thing he would have changed. He asked me to find my voice, to speak for him. He asked me to enter a speaking competition and wrote my first speech for me. Having signed me up and given me his version of the speech, he set me free. He put me out in the woolshed paddock to practice, having me project my voice above the sound of bleating sheep. I scared the heck out of him. I tore up his speech and found my own words, my own voice.
Last weekend, at 84 and the oldest surviving sibling of 9, my Dad spoke at his sisters 80th birthday. He is still so softly spoken that the party was stilled to silence to hear him. He said how he would rather have catered the party than have to speak. But speak he did, taking the risk surrounded by family and modelling what he dreamed for me 40 years ago.
Breakfasting here this morning I am infused with gratitude. I lucked out.
