Don't be a dumfuq 101: Avoid THIS!

Your Worst Enemy

I often browse Reddit and Facebook groups to get a feel of people's problems when it comes to their personal development journey.

Today, I’m tackling one of the most common ones related to productivity:

Being your own worst enemy!

When people realize that they desperately need to make a change in their lives, they often try to do a 180 and fix everything. Unfortunatley, this almost always results in them doing a full 360 degree turn and they sprint on from there…

A Young Dumfuq’s Mistake

Spoiler alert: It’s me, I’m the dumfuq I’m talking about.

Here’s how I messed up myself:

Back when I first tried getting into business (note: I was NOT ready for it), I set incredibly high standards and goals for myself. Things like writing a full article and entire video per day, and outcome-related goals that I just couldn’t pull off.

These goals were HUGE and nowhere near my level at the time.

This had a few effects:

1. It created quite a bit of anxiety and fear. After all, I had placed a mountain in front of myself that at the time seemed insurmountable.

2. At the time my discipline was pretty darn close to 0. So I missed my daily target almost every day. Resulting in frustration, feeling bad about myself, reinforcing an identity of being a loser and it knocked the confidence out of me.

3. Since the goals were too difficult for me, I procrastinated a lot.

4. And because the goals were so huge and out into the future, they eventually felt impossible. And so, I quit on those goals and stayed stagnant for years.

Shoutout to former me:

Lesson: Don’t be a dum dum like I was!

The Self Improvement Mistakes to Avoid

Let’s generalize:

When I see posts asking for advice or posts venting about self sabotage, it usually comes down to 1 of 3 things:

1. Trying to change a lot of things at once.

2. Trying to go from 0 to 100 instantly.

3. Overcomplication.

They should be fairly obvious, but let me give you some examples:

1.

Person A realizes he is messing up in every area of life.

His solution?

He’s going to change his diet to lose weight, start a side hustle, learn a new skill, exercise to gain muscle, try to fix his dating life, invent a time machine, try to find an honest politician and become the first man to walk to Saturn.

The result?

The good old “Deer in the headlights” look.

Welcome to Overwhelm Ville, population: YOU.

When you’re trying to change everything at once, you’ll face overwhelm. But additionally, you’ll be spreading yourself way too thin.

A professor once told me:

“There’s a time and a place for everything, but not now.”

Rather than trying to change everything at once, focus on making small changes, get consistent at them and THEN start to tackle the next small thing. Consistency > Intensity!

2.

Let me ask you this:

Let’s say you’ve never set foot in a gym or exercised for the past 4 years. How realistic do you think it is to then say “I’m going to exercise for an hour every single day” and be consistent with it?

Not very!

The change is too big to make that shift immediately.

These goals and tasks feel intense. Like you’ve created Mount Fucking Everest for yourself. Your mind becomes afraid of this huge hurdle and the only logical response it can think of is…

Drumroll please….

A car has multiple gears.

You wouldn’t start the engine and then put the car in 6th gear when you’re stationary. Likewise, don’t try to put yourself into 15th gear when you’re not even close to that level now.

3.

You know what one of the most common productivity questions is?

“What productivity app will help me become productive?”

Spoiler alert: NONE!

When it comes to productivity, people want to immediately jump into tools to create their “second brain”, plan every hour of their days with time blocking, create elaborate 83-step plans (that fall apart at step 1) and other dumfuqery…

Don’t be like them!

Here’s the truth about most “productivity systems”:

They are designed to help shift you from gear 5 into gear 6.

However, most people try to use them when they’re at gear 1. That’s why I often see posts like “I tried these 14 apps, but none worked… which tool WILL work for me?!”.

It’s not the cleverness of the system that solves it.

In fact, it’s the opposite!

My #1 Productivity Rule

If the above feels familiar, what’s the solution?

Simple, you K.I.S.S:

Keep It Simple, Stupid!

Here’s how:

At some point, I realize my ways were not working, at all!

So, I changed it up:

Because I was so intimidated by all these HUGE goals and action steps, I decided to break them down into the tiniest bits. Thereby, I lowered the factors of overload and intimidation.

For example:

• Write an article → Write a sentence

• Exercise for an hour → Step outside in gym clothes

• Read 40 pages → Read a single sentence

• Finish training course module → Pres play on 1 video

You get the idea.

The simpler you make it, the more likely you are to take action!

Please note that my ONLY goal with these changes is to get started.

Here’s why:

The longer we procrastinate on things, the worse we feel about ourselves and the more guilt we’ll have. This guilt is what turns 1 missed day into 3, which then turns into 2 missed weeks, which turns into quitting and giving up…

By keeping things small and simple, it’s easy to do something.

And secondly:

It’s WAY easier to keep going once you’ve started than it is to start.

Here’s what would often happen:

I sit myself down to write that 1 sentence. Techno music is blasting from my speakers. Some time passes. And before I even realize it, I’ve written over a thousand words for my article, or even finished the entire thing.

Once I stepped out of the door, I would start running for miles.

That one read sentence would lead me to the bottom of the page. And then the start of the next page, the bottom of it and towards the end of the chapter. Until at some point, I noticed I’ve been reading for an hour.

That’s the power of keeping it simple!

Note: If you want a SIMPLE way to get more done, check out the action steps section below.

The 1 Simple Concept to Get Ahead in Life

Not following this 1 simple rule wasted years of my life!

Please realize that life is a numbers game.

You can learn ANY skill, make ANY project work, create ANY change in your life and achieve ANYTHING you set your mind to!

However….

Most people VASTLY underestimate the amount of practice and repetitions required to get good at something. Any master has failed countless of times! Way more than the intermediate as even tried.

Focus on quantity over quality and get your repetitions in!

My Simple Productivity System

How do you make productivity simple?

People stress out way too much about what kind of productivity systems and tools to use. I’m here to tell you that the simpler, the better. My recommendation would be to use pen and paper for this.

Assuming you already know what your goal is, do this:

1. Every night before you go to bed, write down 3 must-do activities for the next day. These are things important to YOU, not your boss, not your friends, not work related goals. But for your personal goals.
   

2. Review these 3 goals first thing in the morning to start your day with clarity. It’s easier to avoid distractions when you’re crystal clear on what to do.
   

3. Throughout your day, find the time to do the things on your list. When you say (or write) it, match your actions to your word!
   

4. At night, review your actions and whether or not you got these 3 things done. Then, plan your 3 actions for the next day.

It does not need to be any more complicated than that! The simpler you keep things, the easier it is for you to follow through and the more likely you are to take action!

Here’s my 1-page framework for further reference and more details.