I don’t read a lot of poetry.
I mean, I loved Shel Silverstein as a kid, but haven’t read much else in the past thirty years.
This is why stumbling across a poem from David Gate last week was such a delightful-and-poignant surprise:
If you know the name of your team’s starters
but not your kid’s teacher or doctor
the issue isn’t capacity
If you can keep a grill clean
but not a toilet or a shower
the issue isn’t ability
If you can work a pressure washer
but not a washing machine or pressure cooker
the issue isn’t experience
If you can plan out golf every weekend
but not a family vacation
the issue isn’t complexity
The issue is what you care about
and who you don’t.
Gate’s poem is obviously directed at a broad audience, but we can make it applicable to our particular situation to see how we deal with motivation, attention, and priorities.
It reminded me of two of my favorite fictional characters:
“It’s not who I am underneath, but what I do that defines me.” -Bruce Wayne, Batman Begins
“It’s not that I’m lazy, it’s that I just don’t care.” -Peter Gibbons in Office Space
I am a disaster, held together with spit and duct tape, and I spend every day helping my fellow disasters (that’s you!) live a tiny bit better. And over the past 15 years, I’ve seen similar patterns arise in the self-limiting beliefs in the people who are trying to better themselves.
We have spent decades crafting stories about what we can’t do…even though we have very specific evidence to the contrary:
- We say we always fail at building new habits …but have a 317-day streak on Duolingo.
- We say we are “lazy and lack motivation”…but we’re a guild leader in World of Warcraft, coordinating weekly raids and community nights.
- We say we can’t find the time or focus to read a book …but can spend hours each night doomscrolling through social media with the focus of a Zen master.
I realize these aren’t apples-to-apples comparisons, but they are examples in which we apply broad strokes to our identity to avoid an uncomfortable reality:
We probably have the skill. We certainly have the knowledge. We definitely have the ability.
It comes down to where we decide to direct that skill, knowledge, and ability.
By definition, we prioritize the things we give our attention to. As author Ramit Sethi says, “Show me somebody’s calendar, and I’ll show you their priorities.” It’s not the things we say that are our priorities, but rather the things we actually do that reveal our priorities.
To create lasting change, we must do the uncomfortable work of looking at our days and our behavior, and nonjudgmentally acknowledging where our time, energy, and effort is going.
And then we can get to work trying to align our aspirational priorities (eating better, getting more sleep, exercising more regularly) with our actual priorities (how we are currently spending our time).
Here’s what I do personally: I tell myself that I’m not allowed to say “I don’t have time to X,” I have to instead say “X isn’t a priority right now.” I can then evaluate whether or not I’m living up to my expectations and why I’m not prioritizing X.
Once we’ve developed this awareness, we can then apply our “Big Why.”
The “Big Why” is the reason we must constantly remind ourselves of, to help us keep our brains focused on the thing that we actually want to prioritize instead of the shiny object over there.
Examples include: being a good role model for our kids, because we want to start dating again, because we’re training to fight The Mountain, etc.
When we have a darn good reason for wanting to change, we can use it as motivation to stay focused on the adjustments to our environment and behavior that will actually stick:
- Putting our workouts in our calendar with reminders, and laying out our gym clothes the night before.
- Setting a “go to bed” alarm and locking ourselves out of social media apps after 10pm.
- Bringing a book with us when we get our oil changed rather than scrolling through Instagram.
Remember: it’s not what we say are our priorities, but what we do that reveals our priorities.
This week’s question, which I’m also asking myself:
What are your supposed “priorities” and how are you actually spending your time?
How can you employ your BIG WHY to help narrow that focus to the stuff you actually want to do?
-Steve
