This past week I did very well with all of my new habits, except one. I didn't write a blog post. I know this because I write an email to a friend of mine each Monday morning, outlining the status of the new habits I'm working to establish. It's an 'accountability' email, designed to keep me on track. 

     Last week I declared that I would write a blog post every week. I wrote one last week but I didn't this week (until now). So I asked myself, "why are my new daily habits coming along so well, but this weekly habit isn't?" And the answer is that I have linked my daily habits to other daily habits. 

     I have a new morning routine. I get up early (just before 6am) and I start my morning routine, following the same routine I went through the previous morning. In fact, I check back in my scribbler to see what I have to do next, and then I just follow that sequence. So when I added 'doing The Work of Byron Katie' to my morning routine, it happened 10 days in a row because it simply followed Feng Shui something (tidy/simplify/throw something out). 

     The problem is, I don't have a weekly routine yet. My new weekly habits are 'stand alone' and unlinked. This makes it more difficult to remember them / get them done. And so, this morning, I have linked writing my blog ... to my accountability email. 

     Today, I'm writing it just after my accountability email because I didn't like reporting that I hadn't written it. Next week, I will write my blog just before doing my accountability email so I can report that I have done it.

     So if you have something you'd like to institute as a new habit, link that habit to something else you already do, with the same desired frequency. This will make it much, much easier to establish and maintain.

   The intermittent nature of my blog posts is making pretty good fodder for the examination of what works and what doesn't here.

   Again, I've been remiss in posting something. However, over the past several months I have been very successful at introducing some other habits. In fact, I've been specifically focused on the creation of new habits, and with great results.

   It all started when we took a trip to San Diego in August to attend a real estate conference. The opening night speaker was by far the best presentation we saw. Shawn Achor is the author of The Happiness Advantage, and his basic message is that 'happiness is a choice.'

   As a result of listening to his talk, I decided to change some of my habits, starting with something he suggests called 'The Doubler'. The idea of The Doubler is to take a few minutes each day, ideally each morning, and write down the most meaningful experience you've had in the past 24 hours.

   It's called The Doubler because you effectively double the experience as a result of reliving or retelling the story.

   Now according to my new habit tracking records (judge me if you must), as of today I've done The Doubler exercise 54 days in a row, 94 out of last 96 days, or 97% since I started. I'm now confident that writing down my most meaningful experience each morning is pretty much a habit and, cough, I'm happy about that!

   The Doubler is one of about 10 new habits I'm working on and, yes, I have stats for all of them. I write down what I'm grateful for each morning, I prioritize my day in the morning, and I even "feng shui" something. To me that usually means 'chuck something out'.

   The result is a completely transformed workspace environment. However, the habit I'm most proud of is the 6am Club. I read about the 6am Club on the flight to and from San Diego, in a book called "How I raised myself from failure to success in selling" by Frank Bettger. It's one of those old, old classic sales books. How old? Well, the introduction is written by Dale Carnegie, and Carnegie writes that he met Bettger in 1917 ! To paraphrase, the author wrote "few men are successful who are not early risers." And so I'm getting up earlier. It's the habit change I'm most proud of (aside from quitting smoking almost 20 years ago). 

   As of this morning, my feet have hit the floor before 6am 29 days in a row, 34 out of the last 38 days, or 98% of the time since I started.

   You'll note it was rocky at first, but now I seem to have hit my stride. Being up that early has had all kinds of positive spinoff effects and often, by 9am in the morning, I've accomplished so much already that it's like entering the day with a 7-0 lead in soccer. I've won the day before many people have really started theirs. But then it's not about other people. It's about changing my habits. About choosing to be happy and successful.

   When left to my own devices, and when I rely on willpower alone, my goal achievement is spotty at best. But when I work to deliberately bring new habits into being, eventually the habits take over completely and I don't even have to think about them. So, if I can do this with so many things, why not a blog? For this week, anyway, I'm 1 for 1, or 100%.

NOTE: The 6am Club is not an actual club....but I invite you to join the club.

     I have just finished advising someone to work on building their blog. Gulp! I shared with them how easy it is to come up with blog topics. Gulp!

     I finished writing them about this incredible technique I learned about in a seminar last year and realized how remiss I've been in adding to my own blog. So here's the technique...

     You start by creating a list of 12 aspects of your business. If you're in business, this might include things like sales, marketing, experience, tips, secrets etc etc. If you're a realtor it might include things like working with buyers, working with sellers, downsizing tips, preparing for sale, the process, negotiating tactics etc. 

     Next you take each of those aspects and create four sub-categories. So sales might break down into pricing, guarantees, delivery, and after sale service. Preparing for a property for sale might break down into home exterior, de-cluttering, storage, deferred maintenance.

     You now have 48 blog topics. So next you take each one of the sub-categories and you turn it into a question. For example, "What is the relationship between price and value when buying X?" Or, "How far should you go when de-cluttering your home in preparation for sale?" Next, come up with 3 answers or points to cover for the question you're posing. For example, the issue of quality or durability comes up when looking at the price and quality of an item. The issue of family photos on the wall comes up when preparing a property for sale, and helping the buyer picture themselves in the house
rather than you and yours.

     Now you have 48 blog topics, each turned into a question, with three points to make in answering those questions. All that's needed now is for you to sit down at the computer and type for 5 minutes - non-stop. Think nothing about editing or crafting the piece. Just write answering the questions with whatever comes into your head, and covering the important points you've already laid out in advance. Bam! You have a rough draft of your blog topic. Edit. Perhaps find a useful picture to go with the article. And post.

     I have just finished advising myself to work on building MY blog.

"All the advice you ever gave (your partner) is for you to hear."  ~ Byron Katie

     In my humble opinion, the one and only reason I have done a blog post today is because of a magic software program. I just found out about it today and already I've accomplished more in a day, in a myriad of arenas, than I normally accomplish in two! I'm calling my new discovery "my life on one page!" Such is my enthusiasm for Workflowy.
    Workflowy is both an online productivity site and an iPad / iPhone Application. I've been working on it from my desktop today, establishing both an overview of my business and my life, as well as a detailed list of things to do.

     Not only that, I've created a simple outline for my next book, input a list of places I'd like to travel to, and simplified various processes for our real estate business by creating checklists. All in one, dynamic document!
    If that isn't enough, here I am resurrecting my blog which had been lost in a jungle of other tasks and responsibilities. It works.
    Most people have busy lives, so being able to establish what is essentially a dynamic one pager for EVERYTHING, is tantamount to magic. The program is incredibly simple, and intuitive. Further, there are a number of YouTube videos that can help with the basics. I watched 4 or 5 short tutorials this afternoon and that was all I needed.
    So do your life a favour and try out Workflowy. I'm as excited about it as I am about the documentary Searching for Sugarman. Both get a WOW! from me this week.

          Every day we set goals and create courses for ourselves, often automatically and unconsciously. Much of this goal setting and course designing has to do with relatively mundane issues. We pick up the phone and speak with a friend, making plans to meet later for coffee. Goal. We pick the coffee shop and in so doing establish the first element of course design. We think about where we’ll be prior to that coffee meeting and contrast destination to location. Course.

             For most of our young lives we’ve been following courses designed by ourselves and others. There was a course for our education through elementary school. The curriculum was predesigned. The levels were established along with standards of measurement. The same continued through high school and into university or college. But then?

          The vast majority of people have followed a pre-designed course for their education but when they leave school no such course exists for their careers. There is no course. No levels. No standards of measurement. No pre-established targets. As a result, we meander through our working life, doing the “job” but not managing the career.

           One way to be more successful is to pre-design the course you want to take. Know, in advance, where you want to go and contrast that with where you are now. This process establishes what Robert Fritz calls ‘structural tension’, a force which can then be used to propel us toward our desired end results. It’s the same tension that drives you when you have an appointment, and if you’re late that tension becomes even greater. Instead of unconsciously setting targets and contrasting those goals with where we are currently, we can do so deliberately.

         In working on my book ’18 Holes To Your Goals’ I noticed that all golfers successfully make it around the course, time and again, repeatedly, because the course has been predesigned for them. This course is broken down into a series of smaller, manageable goals that are easy to see. Golfers always know where they are in relation to their next target and take action accordingly. Such a model can work well in designing your desired career path.

          However, many people have a real aversion to setting goals and targets. So in my next Blog Post we’ll talk about why that might be the case.

                 I do understand the backlash against positive thinking. From a certain perspective, positive thinking looks like insincere tripe. And to the extent that you are trying to make yourself think or feel something that is NOT TRUE, it is tripe. However…

            When we “realistically” look at how bad everything is, what is the effect? I notice that when I am in a lousy state of mind, fully in touch with everything that’s bad and wrong, I tend to be tremendously unproductive. My focus shifts from doing what I have to do, to doing what I can to change how I feel, and my strategies for doing so aren’t all that great. They include watching TV, surfing YouTube, playing solitaire, and overeating.

         At the same time that realism is being touted, there is a corresponding bias against happiness and contentment. This arises as a result of the belief that if we were happy and content with things now, we wouldn’t want to change anything. Many people believe that happiness and contentment actually suck the life out of dreams and aspirations. In fact, nothing could be further from the truth.

        Happiness and contentment are productive states. I’ve noticed that when I’m happy and content I get things done and when I’m getting things done I’m happy and content. Sure, it’s possible that you are different. So I suggest you monitor your results. And to the extent that dissatisfaction and unhappiness sap your powers, revisit the positive thinking approach using the power of questions.

                Instead of asking yourself and proving everything that’s wrong, ask yourself what’s right. This is not about convincing yourself of something you don’t believe. That is an approach that makes positive thinking seem false and insincere. Instead, ask what is actually right in your world? Play with it. Make a list. And just check out the extent to which your state impacts your productivity and effectiveness.

               In my next blog post, I’ll talk about how much we follow courses that are already designed for us, and where we need to create them.

        What I like most about Facebook are the cool things other people post. Last week someone posted a TEDx video of a presentation done by author David Allen called “The Art of Stress-Free Productivity.” The title piqued my interest.

   You may recognize David Allen as being the author of the book ‘Getting Things Done’, and his first suggestion was to PARK things to get them off your mind. In other words, make a list of the things that are on your mind, so they’re off your mind – for now. He even went so far as to suggest “don’t keep anything in your head for the rest of your life!” He suggests you should “use your mind to get stuff off your mind.”

Allen points out that we need room and space to think. He calls it ‘psychic bandwidth’. He says that when we need to be creative we need to be able to spread out and make a mess – and that’s just not possible when we’re already living in a mess.

Cheri and I have used this in our own lives but unfortunately we’ve often done it as a last resort. In other words, when one of us is totally stressed out and overwhelmed, the other will ask “would you like me to help you make a list?”

A better approach would involve routinely making lists, and then further breaking down those lists into sub-lists. You could categorize these lists by topic, or you could categorize them by time frame, making sure there is also an ACTIVE LIST that you are working with on any given day.

In my most recent book, 18 Holes To Your Goals, I point out that a scorecard acts as a kind of ACTIVE WORK LIST. Start on Hole #1, then proceed to Hole #2, Hole #3 and so forth. This pre-structured plan makes golfers effective at getting from A to B repeatedly. Active lists are, in essence, the structure of one’s daily course. And if you have not-too-much-else to think about along the way, that would make for some stress-free productivity.

In my next blog post, I'll be writing about something that inspires me.