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If you are anything like me you perhaps know the following. You want to improve your life but there are so many construction sites in your life that you don’t know where to start.
You feel overwhelmed by all the areas you want to improve and in the end, you are paralyzed.
However, there is one simple solution to this.
Start with one area first.
I know this answer might be anticlimactic but let me explain why this is actually a very effective way to start improving your life.
Improve Your Life With Less Stress
Ok, the first reason is obvious. If your main focus is one area you are not stressing out about all the other areas you ‘should’ work on.
Improving in every area of your life simultaneously will take a tremendous amount of willpower. It might work.
But if you start trying to improve everywhere there will be so many new values and habits you want to implement that it will be difficult to keep them up and eventually burn you out.
Often, we are stressed out in life because we think we have to constantly be productive and improve in every way. We are frantically jumping from one thing to another and thinking we are ‘progressing’ in life.
But what we are doing is just keeping ourselves busy. We are not tackling the problem by the root.
Constantly checking off things we have done gives us a good feeling because we feel like we are getting somewhere. Although this might be true sometimes more often than not this can be deceiving.
Because we are so busy all the time, we rarely take the time to ask ourselves if what we are doing is really improving our life.
When we work at the root of a problem, we will actually get less busy in the long run. The reason for that is because we’ll spend less time on things that don’t really matter.
Constantly spending your time on superficial things, thinking those will improve your life, will just keep you stressed out.
It’s like painting an old fish. It might look nice from the outside but it will still stink.
“Lack of direction, not lack of time, is the problem. We all have twenty-four hour days.” – Zig Ziglar
Transfer of Life Improvements
Now one main reason why it works to focus on one area in life you want to improve is the transfer of improvements.
Let’s say one of the areas you want to improve is health. So your main self-development focus becomes health.
You start to work out regularly and eat healthily. After a few months you not only feel healthier, but you look better, you have more energy, are more disciplined, and you are more confident and happier.
Let’s say other areas of your life you want to improve are work and relationships.
Now that you have more energy, discipline, and confidence, you become more proactive and focused in your work. You suddenly start to stand up for yourself.
And because you are happier people around you will be happier also. Since you are more confident you have the courage to ask your crush out, and so on.
You get the point.
Principles, values, attributes, and skills are always transferable.
We have that misunderstanding that to improve our lives we have to work on every aspect individually.
While this can work, we should consider that when we are improving in one area we are automatically improving in other areas of our life as well.
When I implemented a regular workout habit, I realized that the discipline I gained from keeping a workout routine up, could be transferred to every aspect of my life. In the end, I didn’t just improve my health but acquired the attribute of discipline.
From Improving Your Life to Degenerating it
It’s important to say that improving your life in one area shouldn’t be a way to compensate for aspects of yourself that you try to avoid.
Nor is it advisable to identify with this area, so that it consumes your whole being.
We all probably know a person who is so obsessed with lifting weights and their looks that they disregard other problems in their life. In this example, working out can then lead to false confidence.
One can become even narcissistic and care about their looks more than anything else. Hence a good habit can turn into its shadow aspect.
As soon as this shadow aspect starts manifesting, other areas of your life won’t improve but degenerate.
Your girlfriend/boyfriend leaves you because you don’t give her/him the attention she/he deserves. Your performance in work decreases because you only think about yourself. The confidence turns into insecurity and you worry that everyone judges you.
As you can see improving your life can turn into an obsession and this obsession might damage you more than it helps.
Be cautious of not losing yourself in pursuit of improvement just to go the wrong way.
Go for Long-Term Life Improvements
When you feel like one area of your life is at a level that you strived for when you started out, stop and reflect. Evaluate every area of your life and see which ones improved, which ones didn’t change, and which ones perhaps even degenerated.
Ask yourself if you can keep up the improvements you made without disregarding other aspects of your life.
Can you keep up that regular workout routine without neglecting your family, friends, work, spirituality, and every other area in which you want to improve?
Keep in mind that you don’t want a quick fix, you want long-lasting improvements.
For example, a diet might help you to lose weight. But if you can’t eat like that for the rest of your life, chances are high you are going to have a Yo-yo effect and regain the weight you lost.
Therefore, when improving your life, you should implement habits that you can incorporate into your lifestyle.
How to Choose The Right Area to Work on
Ok by now you might wonder: “How do I decide which area I should start working on?”
I’m glad you asked. Before you jump into improving your life in any area you should ask yourself two questions:
1. Which area do I care the most about?
2. Improvement in which area will have the best effect on other areas of my life?
For instance, if you want to be better at chess but chess is not the most important area of your life and doesn’t improve other areas of your life, chess might not be the priority you should focus on.
On the other hand, if good relationships are important to you, improving your relationship with your spouse might be a good choice. Improving this relationship will provide you with the principles and values to also improve your relationship with friends and family.
“Everything is perfect and there is always room for improvement.” – Shunryu Suzuki
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Key Take-Away Points
• Focus on one area first when you want to improve your life.
• You can transfer your improvements from one area to another.
• Don’t neglect the rest of your life by obsessing about one area.
• Go for long-term improvements, not quick fixes.
• When deciding on an area you want to improve in, pick one that you care a lot about and that will have the best effect on other areas of your life.
Luka
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