Archive for July, 2009

 

For the finale of my visualization experiment, my plan was to look at the various activities throughout this Life Experiment and show how they correlated with different levels of intensity for the experience.

The results were not as expected, and before I go into WHY that might me, I’ll lay them out here:

 

Teaching Brazilian Jiu Jitsu:

Overall instances: 13

Total points for intensity of experience: 104

Average intensity of experience: 8

Beach:

Overall instances: 7

Total points for intensity of experience: 56.5

Average intensity of experience: 8.07

Internship:

Overall instances: 7

Total points for intensity of experience: 56

Average intensity of experience: 8

Night Life:

Overall instances: 9

Total points for intensity of experience: 74

Average intensity of experience: 8.22

 

What seemed “off” about these results? Well, they’re all so damn similar! What is up with the 8s being all over the place? Two activities had an average experience intensity of 8. Strange…

Why is this? These activities are so very different, and to me there is a clear experienced difference in enjoyment, growth, etc… In my mind I would expect teaching Jiu Jitsu to exceed internship activity by a long shot. Here are some potential reasons why we see this alignment with 8s (none of these might be a factor or all might be a factor):

• I might have rated the activities in terms of that activity itself, and not in reference to some rough ideal of objective enjoyment and intensity. In other words, I might have measured my experience up to my expectations of that context. So, a day that was an “8″ in my internship was not in fact the same intensity of “8″ that I experienced teaching Jiu Jitsu or out dancing and meeting people.
• I am terrible at gauging my own experience and put down random numbers that related to how I thought I felt but in fact was not accurate. I don’t think this is the case but its possible.
• My experiences in any given context tend to be as enjoyable as the rest of my general life experience. In other words, I may believe that I enjoy some activities and contexts more than others in general, but in fact all my activities may relate to one baseline of enjoyment. Again I doubt this but its possible.

To be honest, I think that it was hard to be precisely accurate with these subjective measures of enjoyment in my life, but I believe that given the number of posts, I would have seen some kind of trend to differentiate the activities a bit.

I believe that this equilibrium was due to my measuring of experience next to expectations, and so my ratings were relevant to the context.

What DOES the data tell me?

Well, if nothing else it shows me that there seems to be some kind of consistent overall baseline to the enjoyment I experience in different contexts, wether these levels of enjoyment are specific to the context or in reference to a general baseline of life enjoyment.

Again this evidence is by no means conclusive, as I have stated before, but its able to be taken into some considerations, and opens up a bunch of other fun doors in self-understanding.

 

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For about the last week of my experiment, I wrote down what my mental / emotional experience was like during the activity itself. Based on these results, I came up with some trends that I expected… but the evidence is important in that it SO INGRAINS my ideas about what separates a peak experience from a “poor” one.

Analysis of experience within activity (peak or poor?):

From what I can tell, the difference between a “good” (pleasurable, socially un-stifled, purpose-driven) experience and a “poor” (unpleasant, socially stifled, seemingly purposeless) experience boils down to one thing:

Focus.

On my experiences of glory, the times when I felt my best and performed my best, I noticed the following about my focus:

• My awareness was generally merged with my activity
• My thoughts were focused on how awesome my present experience was, and all the great opportunities for fun and learning were all around me, and what kinds of results can come from them
• (Occasionally) How well other things are going in my life, things I appreciate or am excited about

Literally thats it.

When I was in these peak emotional states, my mind was very very limited in its conscious focus. It was focused on the best things in life, and usually was completely occupied with thoughts of the present.

Every now and again I’ll have an awesome experience but it will mainly be because my mind is focused on pleasurable anticipation or on appreciation for certain things or circumstances in my life – this is like “carry-over” positive state. 

Even in these times when my focus was not so much on the present, I was able to enjoy the present and bring a kind of ease, fun and spontaneity to the present because my I just felt good and that was communicated in all that I did.

On the other hand, during my experiences of “bleh,” my focus gravitated towards the following:

 

• My awareness and action were separated in my mind
• The ramifications of my current actions in terms of other people’s opinions
• Other areas of my life that I was concerned about or felt dissatisfied with

 

All of these focuses serve no purpose in my experience. Its not like I had any terrible soul-crushing experiences, but some of them just weren’t of the same great quality as others, and this “focus” factor played the greatest role in that – in my opinion.

When these thoughts swirled in my mind, I was not focused on how to have a better time, but on how to avoid a bad one. Thinking of a “bad” time is silliness, as it takes my mind away from what a “good” time is about – the glory to be had in the present, given the opportunities around me.

 

The Origins of Focus:

So where does focus come from? The obvious answer is “your mind, stupid!” 

I believe that conscious channeling of thought is a major determinant of our focus, but I think there are other deterministic (bit not unable to be overridden) factors at work. Here I’ll briefly run through some of the major aspects determining focus:

 

• Conscious direction of thought. In my opinion, this is the single most important factor, as it is more or less the only controllable factor. This involves where we will our minds to focus in any given experience.
• Previous associations. This has to do with the kind of focus that has been ingrained in our psyche in similar circumstances. For instance, if every time you speak publicly you associate it with pain and rejection, you mind will guide you strongly toward such areas of focus the next time you get on stage.
• External circumstance. As an optimist I’d like to say that this factor exhibits the least amount of control over our emotional state. I might even say that “external circumstance” is merely a fraction of our conscious direction of thought, since we are able o determine what about our circumstances we focus upon (and so are able to direct our experience). However, I will concede that there do seem to be times when our automatic evaluation of externals is so favorable that we are nudged strongly toward peak emotional state, while other times our automatic evaluation seems to be so “negative” that we are nudged strongly toward a less favorable state. It is certain that complete control over our state regardless of circumstance is not achievable.

 

 

The fact of the matter is that conscious free will is king, as it is what we are able to affect. If it is not king, then I will live as though it is anyway. We must live as though our will is free. (Thank you William James)

However, it might be useful to keep some of these other factors in mind. For instance, we might be careful of what kind of associations we habitually make because we understand that our minds will take us in that direction automatically once it is programmed.

 

Conlude:

Being extra conscious of my mental focus during experiences has further cemented the importance of focusing on positive outcomes. 

In fact, being more aware of my focus has seemed to generally have had a positive effect on my focus day to day because I’m used to monitoring it and gauging it.

This experiment will definitely bubble over into other posts and studies of focus and peak experience. 

 

 

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I spend much longer on this project than I had anticipated, but I think I drew a lot from it and I am pretty pumped to write up a finale about the entire process.

As a review, I made a point to visualize before major activities throughout my day. Sometimes this involved my internship, teaching grappling class, preparing a dinner, reading and writing personal development material, or anything else that occupied a block of time.

I gauged the activities with three figures: the number of minutes I visualized for, the intensity and “juice” of that visualization (0 to 10), and my rating of the overall experience of the event itself (0 to 10).

(X, Y – Z). X = minutes spent visualizing, Y = intensity of visualization, Z = intensity of experience.

The rating system was mostly to keep tabs on how I felt generally – its specific relevance and validity is looked at more closely at the bottom of this post.

Here’s a list of all that I recorded, including activities from July 8th to July 27th. In the actual writings I did, I included detail about each event, but the amount of typing I’d have to do in order to get that done would be astounding and carple tunnel-inducing. Enjoy:

1, 5 – 9 (Teaching a private lesson in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu)

2, 5 – 8.5 (Internship)

2, 5.5 – 4 (Writing a Time Management Presentation)

2, 4 – 7.5 (Internship)

0, 0 – 7.5 (Teaching Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Class)

3, 6 – 5 (Writing a Time Management Presentation)

0, 0 – 8.5 (Beach with Friends)

0, 0 – 10 (Friend’s House at Night)

1, 5 – 7.5 (Teaching Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Class)

1, 4 – 8.5 (Beach with Friends)

2, 8 – 7.5 (Weekly Review of my Files and Projects)

2, 5 – 8 (Internship)

0, 0 – 9 (Friend’s Party)

2, 8 – 7.5 (Writing a Time Management Presentation)

2, 5 – 8 (Teaching a Private Lesson in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu)

5, 7.5 – 9.5 (Teaching a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Class)

2, 5 – 7.5 (Internship)

1, 6 – 8.5 (University Seminar)

0, 0 – 8 (Writing a Time Management Seminar)

2, 7 – 9.5 (Internship)

2, 6 – 9 (Teaching a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Class)

0, 0 – 8 (Beach at Night)

10, 7 – 7 (Internship)

0, 0 – 7 (Gym)

1, 7.5 – 8.5 (Club in Newport)

1, 5 – 7.5 (Beach)

2, 6 – 7 (Writing)

2, 8.5 – 9 (Night in Providence)

0, 0 – 7 (Water Skiing)

1, 6 – 8 (Teaching a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Class)

0, 0 – 6.5 (Beach)

0, 0 – 5 (Picnic with Family)

1, 6 – 7.5 (Weekly Update on Files and Projects)

3, 8 – 8 (Business Consulting Meeting)

2, 7 – 7 (Business Meeting)

0, 0 – 7 (Teaching a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Class)

3, 7.5 – 9 (Club in Narragansett)

2, 6 – 8 (Internship)

1, 7 – 8.5 (University Seminar)

2, 7 – 9 (Toastmasters)

2, 5 – 7.5 (Teaching a Private Lesson in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu)

0, 0 – 8 (Writing a Time Management Presentation)

1, 5 – 8 (Teaching Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Class)

0, 0 – 6 (Business Meeting)

1, 5 – 8.5 (Sales Class)

3, 7 – 7.5 (Writing a Presentation on Time Management)

2, 5 – 8.5 (Teaching a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Class)

2, 7 – 6 (Club in Providence)

o, o – 9 (Reading “StrengthsFinder 2.0″)

1, 6 – 9 (Coaching for Time Management)

0, 0 – 7.5 (Meal with Mom)

1, 6 – 7.5 (Club in Narragansett)

1, 5 – 9.5 (Beach with Friends)

0, 0 – 8.5 (Carpentry with my Father)

2, 7 – 8 (House Parties)

2, 5 – 8 (Weekly Review of Files and Projects)

1, 7 – 8 (Running an In-House Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Tournament)

0, 0 – 6 (Hanging with Friends)

2, 8 – 7 (Friend’s House)

1, 6 – 7 (Business Consulting Class)

1, 6 – 8 (Visit Friend on the Beach)

0, 0 – 6.5 (Teaching a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Class)

 

Whoa thats a lot of stuff… 

Keep in mind that this doesn’t include all events that took a block of my time, but this is probably the majority of them – its everything I recorded.

The rankings themselves are rough and subjective, and many factors could have contributed to the scored of “intensity” for those various activities. 

Of course, it is very, very likely that one’s thoughts during an activity is the main determinant of one’s quality of experience.

The rankings may still be relevant in terms of referring to them to see basic trends.

 

The finale to this Life Experiment will be composed shortly. It contains personal insights from the experiment, trends in my own experience, and information recorded over the last week involving my mental focus during specific activities and how that might have contributed to the experience itself (I pose, after all, that the activity of one’s focus and thoughts during an activity is the main determinant factor in one’s quality of experience).

Don’t miss it.

 

As I stated in my first post, I have begun a Life Experiment involving a focus on positive outcomes. 

For well over a week I’ve taken time before the majority of my day’s major activities and focused on what I wanted to do, what I wanted to get done, and how I wanted to experience and move through the activity or event itself.

Some of the times I felt as though I was wasting my own time (part of my mind was saying “let me just DO things, come on!”), while other times I felt as though I had benefitted myself through the habit.

After a short while of practice and reflection, I think I’ve come to understand visualization and imagining positive outcomes a little bit better, and here’s the breakdown:

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Reticular Activator System:

Before getting into this project, I was already aware of positive visualization (imagining ideal scenes, imaging ideal outcomes, etc…) as a tool that would gear our mind towards that which we desired most.

The portion of the brain called the reticular activator system is generally thought to be the place in our minds that determines what we pay attention at any given time. If we focus on hair styles and think of nothing but styling hair, we will notice hair styles everywhere, we will pick up on details about the styles of hair that we see on anyone we meet or even everyone we see. That’s what we focus on, and so our reticular activator system shows us that information in as many ways as possible.

The idea is, if you focus on failure, your mind will only notice the millions of ways to fail and will not open your mind to methods of success. It will keep you trapped in behaviors and thoughts which bring about what you think about – failure. 

Hence, if you think success and your mind is geared towards what you actually want in your life, your filters will align to let you see all those factors which will lead to your success – it will bring you to manifest behaviors and notice new perspectives that will further your objectives.

That’s the premise.

 

The Value of Visualization:

During my personal experimentation, I noticed that positive visualization is useless unless it serves one of two functions:

• Enhances the experience you feel (brings about happiness or charisma or compassion, or whatever emotional resource you deem to be best)

For instance, sometimes my visualization was not very specific or even particularly sharp, but I only thought of positive outcomes while listening to some fun music. This might not give me a clue as to what I should actually do during the event or activity, but it would bring me into an energetic and outgoing emotional state, which I would experience along with my visualization of the event – and also with the event itself.

Essentially, this is about involving feeling into the visualization process. Wether that involves getting pumped about an outcome you really want, or moving around energetically, or listening to some good music tracks.

• Enhances your meaningful objectives (clarifies what needs to actually get done, brings you to follow through on actions towards your goals)

For instance, a few times I barely visualized at all but wrote down different tasks to accomplish in a certain context or during a certain activity. This by itself was able to structure my experience of the event and make it more enjoyable and more geared towards my purpose.

I find that a simple check involving the question “what is my purpose?” will often yield steps towards that purpose. I did this at meetings, before teaching Jiu Jitsu class, or before going to the beach – all to just make note of exactly why I was going there and what I could do there in terms of my highest aims. This might be talking to someone in private, or asking a specific question, or buying something at the store, or dropping something off to someone I thought I was going to see. 

The Habit of Success-Thinking:

Additional future value of positive visualization is the fact that it aids in developing the habit of thinking about positive outcomes.

If we are able to gear our minds towards imagining absolute success in terms of any activity or event, we are on the track of getting towards those desired outcomes. We will help to gear our senses, our emotions, and our intellect towards what is best for the achievement of our ideal future.

We are what we think. We bring what we think into the world in far more ways than we are consciously aware of. Imagine if that entire process worked FOR us!

However, visualization needn’t be done during a pause before an activity in the way I did during this activity. It can be done far ahead of the activity, and most importantly during the event or activity. For this reason, my experiment (which I will provide the result for in a different post) isn’t an accurate measure of how much I “positively visualized” about a particular situation.

This brings us too:

 

An Ever-Present Function:

So long as we alive, our mind filters information to some degree. Wether we are walking on the beach, working on the job, or going to a social event, we are almost always thinking – at least to a slight degree, but often to a very noticeable one. 

If these thoughts swirl around failure, it will be difficult for us to achieve success (and if we do achieve it, it will be harder to notice). 

For example:

You plan to attend a social event with the goal of having fun and sharing stories and adventures with new people.

Before even leaving your house you think of how awkward you will feel trying to have fun with new people. You think about how people might react to you, you think about how that might feel. Your mind flashes with mental pictures of you off in a corner by yourself. 

When you enter the party, you remind yourself that you are here to meet fun new people and have a blast with them, but you can’t seem to achieve that end.

We might not consider what happened here to be formal “visualization,” but nonetheless, the reticular activator system was responding constantly to your thoughts. 

Since the inner pictures and dialogue were about failure in the given situation, you would have worked against yourself in two separate ways:

 

1. You would have brought your mind to notice mostly the information that would be related to your thoughts – and since your thoughts were about social “failure,” your lenses of perception would be likely to let through just that information to bring you to social “failure.”
2. You would have associated socializing – or that social scene in particular – with “failure,” with “rejection,” with pain. Doing this continually will bring you to generally fear these experiences in those given context, hence permanently keeping you from the attainment of your ideals in that realm.

Now let us imagine you think and feel a bit differently:

You plan to attend a social event with the goal of having fun and sharing stories and adventures with new people.

Before you even walk into the event, your mind spins with excitement around who you will meet there and all the fun you’ll have. You see yourself walking around and talking to everyone, spreading the party out and having a blast.

When you’re at the party itself, you feelings and thoughts are 100% aligned with your objective to have fun and meet new exciting people. You’re living your ideals because your mind contains no thoughts that aren’t congruent to the ideals themselves.

We might not consider this to be formal “visualization,” either, but the fact of the matter is that our emotional state and perception lenses were completely on “success,” and so we found it effortlessly.

Here you are aligning our thoughts with our ideals and so living out our ideals as an extension of your mental activity (which in this case is an excited, charismatic expression). You are also coming to associate social scenarios with pleasure, since that is the emotion that swirls in your body as our mind swirls with pleasurable thoughts.

To conclude, I have decided to slightly alter my Life Experiment to adjust for the details of how I believe the reticular activator system to genuinely function.

In my opinion, the most important thing about “visualization” is its effect on our perceptual lenses – which in turn affect our intellect, thought, and action. The subtle stream of thought before, during, and after an activity is likely to be far more important a determiner of our experience than a few minutes of visualization beforehand.

Hence, in addition to recording the duration and intensity of my visualization before an activity, followed by a rundown of my experience of the activity itself – I will do something different.

For at least one activity a day, I will also record something about the state of my mind during the activity. I will write about my focus during the activity, the inner dialogue I experience, and how I take control (or don’t take control) of it.

This might be a challenging task, since I will intentionally getting in my own head – which might bring about negative consequences since the most positive “flow” states (from my experience and from evidence in my psychology research) involve a certain letting go of self-awareness, a certain out-of-your-head-ness. 

This experiment will be longer than expected, but I’m sure it will be worth it in terms of insight and experience. I’m excited to dive into the understanding of the reticular activator and gain a better understanding of how we can come to control our perception and our experience!

 

 

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We’ve all had times when we were completely compelled to dive into our productive work, and we’ve all had times when a part of us would do anything within reason to avoid it. I’m willing to bet that anyone reading this can think of at least 3 examples of both.

Understanding why this is implies an understanding of meaning, and of the factors that drive us to action.

 

On the job, striving for and creating compelling work usually implies:

• Having clarity in terms of what’s going on in the company and where it’s going (based off the company’s objectives and vision, as well as an understanding of what the company does to sustain itself)
• Knowing what it is you are doing, why you’re doing it, and what we are responsible for (involving our actionable plans, our reasons why we are doing the activity and its relevance to the company vision and core business, as well as what specifically we must accomplish and by when)

When we don’t know what’s going on in the company in the first place, if it often hard for us as workers to know that our actions are in alignment with that.

Consequently, we are not clear on why it is that we are doing what we are doing, and so we feel less compelled to completion.

Similarly, if we are not sure as to exactly what is expected of us, and what exactly we will do as an individual, we likely will not feel compelled to act.

If you’re boss runs into your office and quickly blurts out – “Hey, I need you to market our new whatchamacallit,” you’d probably want to ask him a few more questions before you followed his command.

Why? Because such a command is so vague as to be non-actionable. You need to know who you’re marketing to, you need to know how you should place the product. You need to know where this new thing fits into the company’s objectives in the first place.

Until you figure those things out (either from your boss directly, or by coming to a confident conclusion on your own), you will likely not feel driven to finish the project because you do not have what you need to confidently move it forward (meaning, actionable items, specifics as to what needs to be done, etc…)

I argue that the same can be said about our lives in general. In order to move forward in any life change, project or desired outcome, we need to have made determinations about our own highest objectives, our reasons for doing things in the first place, the specifics of the task involved, etc… It needs to make enough grand scene sense for us to be able to wrap our minds fully around it without feeling weird about it.

 

In life, feeling great while moving forward and making real progress on a desired outcome usually requires us to understand:

• Where we are in our entire life, and where we want to be (based off of our own ideals and purpose, as well as our values and what excites or compels us)
• What we need to do, why we’re doing it, and what we hold ourselves accountable for (involving our actionable plans, our reasons why as connected to our values, purpose, etc…, and a personal decision to bring about an outcome)

If you’ll notice, these criterion are more or less identical to those involved in getting productive work done on the job. 

These criterion apply far outside the realm of work (as ideas, or course they can be applied wherever and in whatever way you imagine, this is important to imagine). 

 

If you are putting an activity off, or if you feel down about something you are doing, be sure to have these criterion available. 

Recently I wrote about “Modeling a Fulfilling Life,” where I outline a process for understanding and recording a draft of important self understandings, visions, and objectives. It serves as a fine guide in this analysis of activities – which will help to streamline your priorities.

To refer to that article, click here.

 

Could it be said that some activity do not require these criterion? It could, yes, and I never intend to say out my opinions and thoughts as concrete laws of the gods. However, having these specific understandings under wraps helps us to look at an activity, process, or decision completely and not experience resistance.

It helps give us a sense of congruence in the idealistic and physical world, and aides in eliminating the kind of mental entropy that arises from not finding that congruence.

Thats worthwhile for me.

 

Recently I have modeled my own life and pursuits in an interesting format that I hadn’t ever thought of before.

I was listening to “Getting Things Done” on audio and I remember David Allen talking about “org charts.” I had no ideal what this meant, so I looked it up on Wikipedia (which – when combined with Google – can provide all the knowledge and wisdom any human will ever need).

Once I saw an “org chart” (short for “organizational chart”), I thought of its applications and how the hierarchical model would work in different contexts.

I thought about the purpose of my own life, and how the different facets of my life path naturally flowed from there. I then thought about the major pursuits I’m involved in, and the projects I am building currently. All of these aspects build off of each other.

I figured that an org chart might be a solid reference point where new activities and pursuits could be cross referenced, and where purpose could be reviewed, aligned with, or tweaked.

For me, this tool is nice to get a clear idea on structuring the way we make priorities – which basically boils down to:

• What do you value?
• What do you live for?
• What do you yearn to develop, create, experience?
• …What are you doing right now?

Thats what this is about on my end. That’s the kind of integrity and congruence that I believe to be immensely fulfilling.

I’ll run you through how I went about assembling an “org chart” for myself:

(Note: I am writing this as though its a kind of instructional, but of course its just the way I went about it. If you want to recreate an org chart like this for yourself I think you’ll find it useful, but this isn’t the best “method” or anything. To me, this chart is all about what works for me in terms of keeping my highest aims and priorities in line with what I’m doing with my life. If this idea resonates with you, roll with it. I’m not a Guru, I’m just a guy who doesn’t sleep because he reads and writes this stuff constantly.)

 

 

 

1) Highest Purpose

Come to a basic conclusion as to your highest reason for living, your purpose and most high objective.

Be warned, this will be a vague statement. Mine looks something like this “Maximal enjoyment, growth, and experience of richness for myself, with maximal benefit incurred to the world through me.“ I would like this to be my reasoning behind all action, my highest purpose. I aim to align myself with this purpose through my actions and choices.

You might want to emphasize your family or yourself, or you might want to de-emphasize yourself. Its really your own bag, here. 

Think about if you had one sentence that would be the base reason for everything you did. Write a bunch of them until one hits you in the chest. For now, use that one (you might tweak any of this stuff as soon as you feel the genuine pull to do so).

No matter what, make sure that your purpose is as boiled down as possible. In other words, do not mention your job unless your job has some form of immense, innate value in and of itself and serves no higher end. 

This statement will not be something very easily actionable – and by itself this broad statement of higher purpose will not provide you with any plans. However, it will be the basis for any planning you’ll ever make. Think about it, would you ever conscious plan out anything that wasn’t channeled towards your own highest purpose for living?

 

2) Core Pursuits

Determine the core pursuits and areas of focus that constitute the attainment of your highest purpose.

This involves understanding what actually achieves your highest objective. Again, these areas will also be relatively vague, but they will put some kind of form or context to the method in which you will attain and live through your higher purpose. 

For me, these areas include “Enriching Relationships,” “Innovation in Self Development,” and “Logistics / Health.”

For me, relationships of all kinds are the magnifiers of the human experience, and understanding how to manage, form, and cultivate relationships that are ideally enriching is a huge component in general fulfillment.

In terms of a purpose in work and creative endeavor, dedication to understanding and innovating in self development is something that will provide me with an outlet to produce presentations, understandings, and techniques to seriously better their own lives – while at the same time I will learn more about maximizing my own potential and living my life to the fullest on my terms.

The rest has to do with the factors that are required in the attainment of my other two branches off my highest purpose – anything that will help me experience more awesome mutual relationships / friendships / etc…, or anything that will aide in my continued, fulfilling innovation in the field of self development. This includes health, organization, and getting things done in general (which entails delegating tasks, 

You might have many more categories than I do, or you might have the same amount as I. I Would recommend that you group them in a manageable way. If you have kayaking, mountain climbing, water skiing, and snowboarding as 4 separate “core pursuits,” you might think about classifying  then together with “Health,” “Athletics,” or “Adventure.” Keep in mind that even these categories might fit well into other broader categories. 

 

3) Channels of Your Pursuits

Determine individual branches from your core pursuit that are central to you ideally maximizing them in terms of your highest purpose. 

A little wordy, huh? What I’m trying to get across is that each of these broach pursuits will have numerous branches to it, numerous sub-pursuits that are aligned with your highest purpose. If one of you’re core pursuits is Spiritual Development, then maybe your branches involve meditation, living the virtues of your faith, and studying spirituality.

For me, I can say that in terms of “Health / Logistics“, for example, I have three categories: “Health + Function” (includes all details on keeping myself physically and mentally sharp in order to live longer and experience more in terms of enjoyment and be able to contribute more), “Getting Things Done” (this isn’t a reference to the book GTD, it involves the broad category of moving projects and pursuits along with planned, organized grace so that I am able to do as much as I can in an optimally efficient way).

 

4) Ideals to Work Towards

Identify what ideal or set of ideals it is you want to be striving towards with your core pursuits – ensure that this relates to your highest purpose.

This is the base of the org chart diagram. If you look at my example org chart, you’ll see 3 large boxes on the bottom of the image correlating this the 3 core pursuits. I didn’t include text because it would be messy, but you get the point.

These boxes serve to be references to the ideals towards which your projects and pursuits aim. For instance, below the sub-pursuits of my “Logistics / Health” (in my actual diagram) I have a few bullet points that read:

• Increased efficiency and ability to delegate tasks and finish projects
• Spending as little time as possible on tasks that are not ideally enriching on my own terms
• Working towards holistic physical wellness

This is what the “Logistics / Health” category is about. I want to basically be as swift as possible in the processed and tasks that I will be heavily involved in, while looking to more and more channel my life towards the fulfilling experiences and activities that I most want to be enveloped in.

 

Adding Projects

Determine individual projects for your core pursuits, each of which will involve plans and next actions.

Here I’m going to cover the topic of “projects” in brief. If you really want to get into this, check out David Allen’s book “Getting Things Done.” Here goes:

It should be noted that “projects” are not on my sample diagram near the top of this post. I have a “project list” in a text file that I use for this purpose, the org chart itself is just a reference for me to keep myself reminded of and aligned with my purpose.

Once you’ve determined your highest purpose, as well as the branches that will be your pathway to that purpose, determine individual projects (long and short term) that will serve to maximize your efforts in those pursuits towards your purpose.

For instance, in my branch for “Innovation in Self Development,” I have individual projects for establishing a club for Self Development at my university, and a project for developing a presentation on productivity that I plan on giving to students at my school, and many more. Each of these projects relates directly to my ideals and purpose.

 

What its About

I find that if catch more people in the midst of most of their daily actions, you can ask them “Why are you doing this?” and they will not be able to provide any sort of informed response. In my opinion, being purpose-confused is no way to live our lives.

Like I’ve said before, this entire model – for me, anyways – is about being able to reference a system to make my decisions clean and in line with what I’m all about.

Again:

• What do you value?
• What do you live for?
• What do you yearn to develop, create, experience?
• …What are you doing right now?

Those 4 questions might be the most simple breakdown of what this whole idea of modeling is about for me in the first place. Once the purpose, pursuits, and projects are aligned they tend to promote compelling, meaningful action.

This look at self understanding, combined with plan / action / purpose understanding is described in more detail in my article “Principle of Universal Motivation.”

 

Extra tips for doing it yourself:

Q: How many core pursuits and sub-pursuits should I include here?

A: Whatever is manageable and functional for you. You might end up with only 2 core pursuits that you channel your life towards in order to achieve your highest purpose. You might also have 12 sub-pursuits under one core pursuit. Mine might have some categories that are vague, but thats because I like this model to be clean and workable.

Q: What if I want to use categories other than the 4 categories that you included here?

A: By all means, go for it. Highest Purpose, Core Pursuits, Sub-Pursuits, and Ideals are just what I found most useful – it wasn’t sent to me from the heavens on a stone slab. If you want to include your biggest projects into this mix – do it! If you’d rather look at contexts of your life (IE: home, work, etc…) and not pursuits – do it! Do whatever seems to work best in terms of organizing our purpose in a graphic form – or whatever serves as the best reference to keep you on point with your greatest goals and ideals.

 

In order to actually get the most out of this as a model, you will ideally analyze each segment by cross-referencing your ideals and your life. Are your day to day activities aligned with your highest purpose? 

How can you channel yourself more fully into the core pursuits that will enable you to live your purpose? How can you turn your subjective desire for something into a real, finish-able project?

You will likely find times when you would like to edit your model. Projects will always be changing and should be updated weekly at least – but even your highest purpose and core pursuits may need revision over time, and it will be your genuine creativity that will mold them into something you can follow.

Have fun.

 

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To be honest, I didn’t even think about how long this post would take or how long it would be. I didn’t even plan on having the kind of alliteration (P-oignant P-oint for P-roductivity) that showed up in the title. I had an idea, a general principal, and I want to just put it up:

 

In any context, achieve your pre-set, present objectives before going onto anything else. 

 

Thats the idea plain and simple. What does it mean in laymen’s terms? It means that if you have anything that you know is “on your list,” and is “highest priority,” then conquer that first. 

Another awesome way to put this is: Accomplish your “musts” like they are “musts.”

If something must get done while you’re at work that day, or before you leave for the gym, or while you’re online – then do those things absolutely first.

So, lets say you go to work with a little list of “musts.” Lets say that this includes:

• Talking to your boss about a new marketing strategy
• Send off 20 important emails to clients
• Set a concrete time for a meeting with the department, and
• Recycle your trash bin. 

These are the blatantly obvious things that you made a note to get done, your priority tasks that you’ll surely knock off for the day. Maybe you want to get it off your mind. Maybe they’re so easy and in your face you feel that its best to get them done now. Either way, they made to the top of your priority list.

..How would you FEEL if you got all of those tasks completed as soon as possible? 

• You see your boss – BAM you talk to him (assuming the timing is fine)
• You sit down on your computer – BAM you smoke those 20 emails
• You see your trash bin – BAM to recycle its contents
• You see the other heads of the department – BAM you find a time that works for all of them to meet

What would that FEEL like?

I’ll bet that if you honestly went through with that kind of rare diligence, you’d feel full of energy, confident, efficacious, productive, and even flat-out happy.

 

Give this exercise a test on your own terms – find a context to work with, and cover all the “musts” first – instead of doing what most of us (including myself) do, which is rationalize that we’ll get it done in a bit, and then end up rushing.

Maybe begin with an easy context, something like your morning routine. 

You might have as a “must” to brush your teeth, find a good outfit, eat breakfast, check your email, and do 10 minutes of yoga.

Instead of dilly-dallying at the breakfast table, or surfing the web – get all of your “musts” done swiftly and see that you don’t have to rush! 

The principal is beautiful, and it applies to any context that involves priorities (I can’t think of one that doesn’t). It has just as much to do with writing papers and working on creative projects as it does with meditation or spending time catching up with friends – its LIFE management by PRIORITIES, and this little tip is one tool towards that higher ideal.

 

 

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I continue to be amazed with the application of the ideas within “Getting Things Done.” Literally anything that I see as functional in my life I implement immediately, and I’m having a blast doing it. 

For a long time I have been diving in to ideas like “productivity” and “priorities” (including my first long philosophical treatise which dealt with these activities directly), but there’s a lot covered here that I haven’t seen anywhere else.

Here’s what I’ve been up to recently:

• Organized a workflow for my room and my car. Things are no longer randomly put in nice places, but placed in the most functionally efficient places possible, along with other related items. For instance, I have my reference files directly next to me by my desk, and I have a specific role for each drawer in my desk (writing utensils and office equipment, electronics, financial records, etc…
• I’ve begun reading “Keeping Work Simple.” This is another interesting book relating to uncluttered, stress-free work and productivity. Fascinating stuff. I’m currently digesting it in chunks (during discretionary time, such as lunch break at my internship) and taking notes on the poignant tips and tricks that I extract.
• I’ve begun consciously scheduling 60 to 90 minute blocks of time for important work. Its not a simple algorithm given my currently lifestyle, and it takes away more time from sleep (which as some of you know, I’ve been getting away from lately). However, these blocks of time are integral in genuinely becoming immersed in a project and producing the kind of quality work that comes from flow.
• I’ve organized the way I write in my daily planner. Used to be strait down chronologically with “maybe” actions in there with cemented issues. Now my calls are written on one side, with specific times listed next to those that require them. My “maybe” actions are fitted at the bottom, these are the actions I refer to when I find discretionary time. What’s written down chronologically are things that must be done. Different contexts are underlined to make things cleared (IE: At Jiu Jitsu Academy, At YMCA, At Internship, etc…).

There’s so much more to go into with this project and I’m eager to dive into it. One thing I’ve got to work on now is finding blocks of time to turn the phone off so that I can focus appropriately and not have intermittent distraction and random, fleeting topics cross my mind.

Much more to come, and in fact I’m sure this isn’t a complete list of the things I’ve updated.

 

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Recently I’ve been thinking about a new Life Experiment to engage in. I had a fantastic time with my productivity project, and I liked the fact that it involved constant management and recording – it forced me to put myself under a microscope.

About a week ago I wondered… “What would it be like if I took the time to envision an ideal outcome before engaging in anything?”

I realized that this would likely have a genuinely positive effect on my emotional state, my alignment to my desired ends, and my tangible results. Right then and there I knew it would be an experiment I’d have to go for.

 

The question remained, how do I make such a project manageable and measurable? 

I determined to do this in 2 ways:

 

• By recording the amount of time and experienced intensity of the visualization:

 

The amount of time will be recorded in minutes (IE: 1 minute, 2 minutes, 10 minutes), and the intensity of the visualization will be rated on a 1 – 10 scale in terms of the involvement and enjoyment invested in it (1 will imply very weak and fleeting engagement in actually visualizing without compelling feelings, 10 will imply an extremely joyous and enthusiastic experience of the imagined future). In this segment I will write a blurb about the visualization process itself.

• By recording the degree of enjoyment, fulfillment, or “flow” experienced in the activity itself:

The fulfillment, joy and “flow” involved in an activity will be measured on a 1 to 10 scale (1 being a very dismal experience, 10 being an optimal state of positive flow). Here I will write in detail about my experience of my tasks and activities. This information will only later be processed and used to understand the relation between visualization, enjoyment, and productivity.

 

I will aim to write these little reports on all the major activities that I take part in during the course of a day, which usually implies at least 3 things.

After 2 weeks of Focus on Positive Outcomes, I will write a massive final report on my experience with this life experiment, and how I have drawn from it.

 

I will be saving all of my reports over the next two weeks, after which I will process them all and post them up as new articles in the “Life Experiment” section.

Pumped, tomorrow is day 1! I’d better pack a notebook…

 

 

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I’ll just kill some time before we go out tonight.

 

I’ve got to find a good way to kill some time.

 

Nothing much, just killing time this weekend.

People tend to be interested in “getting through” extended periods of time in order to get to other, future periods of time. 

They might “get through” work so that they can come home. Or they might “kill time” watching TV until they head off to work. Some do both (oh, the horror!).

People “kill time” when they are stuck in a traffic jam, or in line at a bank. Some do so with friends, or while they are getting paid to be productive at work.

 

What this boils down to is disengaging yourself from your life. It involves holding so little value for the present moment that one wishes for time to be “fast forwarded.” 

This shocks me. WAIT a second… is this moment of your life not worth something? Would you really rather just get to the future? How short would your life be if you actually COULD fast forward it?

The fact of the matter is, we have to live our lives, there is no fast forward option. We must live every second of it some how or another, or we must perish. But:

 

Can it not be said that we can enjoy, learn from, gain from, and somehow find the richness in every millisecond of our lives?

 

This is the question I pose, this is the call I make to engaging fully in our lives.

 

So you’re stuck in a traffic jam…

•     Do you have some audio programs of great music with you?
•     Do you have some business calls to make?
•     Could you shoot out a group text to meet with your friends this week?
•     Could you look program your GPS to identify certain places as “Favorites?”
•     Can you at least roll down the window, breathe in, and appreciate this very second of your life?

You could make up your own list for nearly any situation you will ever face in your life.

 

Even in the face of emotional pain, living in this second could be seen to be part of the richness of life – something to learn from and experience to develop a stronger resolve, to instill a deeper desire to make the most of our own lives.

The “worthwhile-ness” is in the experience of the beholder. It is the meaning we find in this very moment that determines its value to us.

 

At any given moment you can find meaning, joy, growth, and/or benefit from a situation. When you find yourself eager to “fast forward,” or yearning to “get through” or “kill time,” ask yourself:

• What can I appreciate and enjoy in this situation? It could be a wonderful visual scene, a fun experience with others, an opportunity for problem solving, etc…
• What can I learn from this situation? It could be something new about someone you know, it could be how to deal with stressors and still take the best action, it could be studying a book on a topic of real interest to you.
• How will living this moment benefit my entire life? Maybe you will know not to make that same mistake again, maybe you’ll learn something important that you can refer to for the rest of your life, and just maybe you can drink in the situation and be grateful for your life.

When you understand your self-determined purpose for being alive, you can relate any situation in your life to your values and determine how to act in accordance with your deepest purpose. I consider this to be a main constituent of fulfillment and an invaluable step in being engaged with our lives adequately.

Savor this second, you only have so many of them.

 

 

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So the official Speed Reading Life Experiment is over.

Maybe not TOTALLY over, but I set a deadline by the end of June, and with that deadline was a goal to read 1000 word per minute with around 50% comprehension. 

 

Time to face the music. Over the last few months I’ve been speed reading regularly, but only up until very recently did I attempt reading 1000 words per minute for longer periods of time.

Just today I read 10,000 words (around 36 pages) in 10 minutes. My comprehension was probably about 20 – 25%. Some main points I missed, some I got, some details I read, some were skimmed completely to keep the speed up. 

 

It seems as though I’ll have to do these 10 min / 10,000 words experiments more to see decent comprehension for longer reads – but I think overall this experiment was fantastic. I had a great time moving faster and faster and developing the pacing and the honed focus to read and retain material at such a faster rate.

I’m glad I’ve cultivated the speed I have, just a little bit of effort over 2 months has definitely created massive changes in my ability to read quickly and effectively.

When I do some more speed reading or have an update, I’ll post it up here – but the official experiment is over now as a main focus of my development. On to something new…

 

 

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