5 Simple Steps to Living a Better Life
Mediocrity is the trap separating you from the people you spend your lunch break reading about.
Mediocrity is the HPV of office life.
It’s an invisible and infectious killer of greatness. People are vulnerable to it. Companies, especially large ones, all carry some form of it. Its symptoms include running out-dated processes, attending time-sucking meetings, and playing mindless freemium video games.
I battle mediocrity at work and in my life every day. After 12 years of working in an office I’ve wasted an ungodly amount of time and I’m on a mission to do something about it.
Which brings me to Carmen Medina.
Carmen Medina is an author and retired CIA Senior Federal Executive who really has it out for mediocrity. You can listen to her recent lecture at SXSW titled “The Mediocrity Trap” for free.
I strongly suggest you give it a listen for a deeper dive into eliminating mediocrity from your work and life.
Here are five actions from Medina’s presentation you should start doing right now.
Invest Your Time
“You shouldn’t be KILLING time. You should be INVESTING time.” — Carmen Medina
Medina reminds us we get about 50 years as adults to pursue what brings us joy. That could be starting a business, traveling the world, or making a healthy home for your family.
Fifty years sounds like a lot. It isn’t; especially when you consider we sleep eight hours a night. And Nielsen reports U.S. adults spent on average 11 hours a day watching or listening to radio, television or digital media.
In order to accomplish your goals, stop killing time on bullshit activities.
You know what they are.
Binging Netflix. Playing 14 hours of Fortnite. Drinking all night Friday and doing nothing on Saturday. Whatever it is, stop.
Invest your time instead.
Read nonfiction.
Learn something on the internet instead of wasting time on it.
Take a road trip somewhere you’ve never been.
Go for a walk and plot out what the next year of your life could look like. Write it down.
You don’t need to eliminate life’s little joys.
Just keep them little. Schedule an hour to play video games. Use it as a reward for making progress on an important project. Watch two episodes of BoJack Horseman in one sitting instead of two seasons.
Most importantly: Put. Down. Your. Phone. Install the Moment app to track your phone usage. It’ll show you how many times a day you pick up your phone and how much time you waste infinitely scrolling memes on social media.
Strong Ideas, Loosely Held
Medina says “Most decisions are one night stands.” Let’s face it, the majority of our seemingly-brilliant ideas don’t survive outside the vacuum of our mind. A bold new idea defines our way forward Tuesday night and then it’s as dead as a second grader’s goldfish by Wednesday afternoon.
That’s okay. Give yourself the freedom to change your mind. Do it often. Holding on to bad ideas because their yours or you’ve invested in them is a mistake.
“Most people hate changing their mind. . .The best hedge fund managers love changing their mind. Since they are hedge fund managers, they will flip their mind and reverse the trade.” — Marc Andreessen, NetScape Founder
Let People Know They’re Doing Something Right
Most of us are used to only receiving feedback when we’ve done something wrong. An expectation hasn’t been met. Or we cross a line. It’s just as important to give and receive feedback when you’re doing things right. It’s as easy as telling a coworker “Hey, Becky. You did a great job on that presentation. Your enthusiasm really energized the room. Keep it up!” People are more likely to keep doing something if you notice and point it out to them.
This works outside the office, too.
Informing a spouse that you appreciate him doing the dishes unprompted, or her asking you detailed questions about your passion of yours will ensure they do that again in the future. Humans are feedback machines. We’re built to take in loads of information and look for patterns. Unfortunately, we’re hardwired to find negative patterns. It’s a trait that kept us from getting eaten millions of years ago, but today it’s killing our relationships. Why? Because we’re likely to only point out to a spouse, child, or coworker something they’ve done wrong–a negative pattern. Too much of that draws ire and frustration. You need to reinforce the ways people are doing things right. They’ll keep doing them and both your lives will improve as a result.
Pivot Toward Success Incrementally
People like to set big hairy goals.
Lose 50 pounds in a month.
Run a 6 minute mile.
Get promoted to Sales Director.
Put 20% down on a house.
Ambitious goals are great. But they cast long shadows and can become daunting. Fatigue sets in. We start to look for excuses why we should give up.
“I’ll never lose these last 20 pounds.”
“They should choose someone more qualified for the job I want.”
Dopamine is a neurotransmitter — a chemical released by neurons to send signals to other nerve cells. It’s the “I can get it!” drug our brain produces when we try to accomplish something.
When we set goals that take a long time to achieve, we don’t get that dopamine hit we want. We give up and start doing something else to satisfy the craving, like playing video games.
Incremental progress is the key to avoiding burnout.
Make your big hairy goals. Beneath those, set smaller more achievable goals. It’s a process called “micro improvements.” If your on a path to lose 50 pounds, you’re more likely to hit the main objective if you set smaller goals that only take a few days or weeks to achieve along the way.
If you want a steak dinner, you don’t walk up to the cow with a fork.
Slice your dreams into actionable pieces. Starting a business doesn’t being with a store front and an OPEN sign. Register a domain. Research the competition. Scout locations and narrow them down.
It’s all a game of inches.
Guard Your Time
If you work in an office you’re all-too-familiar with the constant interruptions of daily life. Every meeting you attend is the most important meeting of the day. Except it isn’t. None of them matter. The status quo says meetings are critical to operational efficiency. No they’re not. Meetings are murderers of productivity.
Carve out and protect your time.
Reject the status quo’s calendar. Your schedule should reflect your priorities, not someone else’s. A project you’re on may be headed by someone else, but your contributions to it are your priorities. The priorities deserve your full attention.
Decline pointless meetings.
Tell the organizer:
“I won’t be attending. There are deadlines and priorities that deserve my full attention. Please forward me any relevant notes.”
That’s it. No bullshit. No beating around the bush. And most importantly: no apology. Don’t say you’re sorry you can’t make it to the meeting.
First of all, that’s a lie.
No one in human history has ever felt bad for skipping a meeting. Second, when you say “sorry” you diminish yourself by appearing as if you’ve done something wrong by taking your time into your own hands. Stop. Apologizing by default is a hangover from childhood and it’s stunting your growth.
Call To Action
The choice is simple.
Accept mediocrity and spend your life wallowing in untapped potential.
Or adopt better habits to put you behind the wheel on the road to achieving your goals.
