Monday, July 18, 2011

Do Something Useless

There is a tired, weak, lazy, unambitious and careless part of each of us. Some call the ego, saboteur, demons or (as I say) scammer. I'm not very interested in what you call it but when you have thoughts that try to keep you comfortable, uninspired and immobilized...know what they are and deal with the enemy of The Uncompromised life aggressively.

Now having said that, I've found that there are many ways that top athletes, spiritual legends, and many other achievers have used to slay those voices that crop up to kill their initiative and efforts. One is the tried and true, "Do it NOW!" Do it now, regardless of how uncomfortable, hard or whatever a situation may be.

Let me offer another option used by some of these greats. Commit to doing something, seemingly useless that ruffles the feathers of your scamming inner-critic nonsense. Do it faithfully and do it well.

Set 10 rocks up at one end of your driveway, get up at 3:30 in the morning and methodically pick up one rock at a time and move it carefully, slowly and gingerly to the other end of the driveway. Do this with all 10 and then put them back where they were. Then, at say 3:55-or whenever you're done, go back to sleep.

It makes no sense, it won't directly put money in your pocket or peace in your heart but it will frustrate that voice that hacks away at your ambition and discipline-both of which are required for you to live the life you want.

If you normally like to run for exercise, go for a run on a local beach (at a nearby lake/the ocean) but first cover yourself with sand. No the Navy Seals won't come knocking but the seemingly meaningless and voluntarily created discomfort from the sand and the abrasion (pun intended) to your ego's insatiable desire for comfort will begin to tame the scammer's expectation for constant satisfaction-and as a result, the quality of your commitments and follow-through will grow regardless of the discomfort that comes with any commitment you might make.

You can do the above or something greater or smaller that frustrates the scammer but avail yourself of the power in doing something useless to do something special.

Enough Said,

RR



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