Quitting
the Wrong Mentalities
Stop
procrastinating.
Avoiding the unpleasant parts of work doesn’t make them go away. Break the
seemingly unmanageable into manageable chunks, then sprinkle those
less-enjoyable aspects of a task into that other stuff that you really like.
Building up a huge hunk of the bad stuff to deal with all at once, after you’ve
completed the enjoyable stuff, is just going to leave a sour taste in your
mouth at the end of a project.
- Delaying gratification—“gratification” being whatever it is you’d rather do than the thing you’re procrastinating—has been shown to increase your productivity and enjoyment of the gratification itself. It can also lead to lower stress levels.
Beat negativity. Understand that the road to success
will not be unending, continual joy. There will be difficulties, setbacks, and
moments where you question your commitment. These will occur whether you’re on
the right path or the wrong path, so understand that while it might be hard
sometimes, you’ll need to make an effort to re-establish and embrace that
positivity you felt at the outset of your endeavor.
- Positive mental attitude (occasionally abbreviated as “PMA”) is crucial for entrepreneurs.
Don’t define
yourself by others’ success. You’ll lose sight of your own goals and
merits, and it can promote feelings of bitterness, jealousy, and inferiority.
Competition is healthy, but focusing too much on others can lead you to
internalize unhealthy attitudes.
- Along these same lines: praise your co-workers! When your colleagues, peers, or subordinates knock it out of the park, let them know. People and teams flourish this way.
Embrace failure. Failure always illuminates a truth
about the methods you used, or the particular goals you pursued; interpret
failure not as a badge of shame, but as a call for self-reflection. Sometimes
it’s only through facing the insurmountable, failing, and then struggling to
pull ourselves back together that we develop the tenacity we’ll need to
succeed.
- ”Failure,” as Henry Ford put it, “is simply the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently.”
- Failure isn’t always indicative of having the wrong idea—sometimes it’s simply the right idea, pursued ineffectively. Don’t scrap everything you’ve been trying all at once and or totally restructure. When working within a company or partnership, for example, it could be an issue of properly understanding each member’s accountability.
Focus on survival. The most important goal when beginning a new business, job,
or craft is simply to survive. Don’t set your sights too high or wide at the
outset, establishing unrealistic goals for your fledgling enterprise.
- You will never achieve that goal of, say, providing coffee to all of the homeless in the world through your new coffee shop, if you don’t focus on keeping that coffee shop in business and thriving first. Long-term goals are important, but shouldn’t come at the expense of sustainable short-term ones.
