4 Exciting Ideas to Ponder This Week

Short-term motivation and long-term plans.

I’ve recently realized that long-term goals are much needed to have a direction in life, but it’s short-term motivation that will keep us going.

We basically need to constantly trick our minds into going after a certain goal in life, so that we can ignore the distractions on the way and get closer to it slowly, but steadily.

That’s not a bad thing, of course. But it’s important to know it so that we can see results.

So how do we stay motivated in the short-term? Well, it’s easier than looking at the big picture. Our triggers will change, we need to boost our motivation daily, to include inspirational practices, to find new reasons to keep hustling.

It’s like a game, really. You just need to take the next step today towards your ideal lifestyle. But you also need to stay motivated till tomorrow so that you don’t give up on the whole thing.

Dedicate your morning to your passion project.

If you wake up 2 hours earlier, you’ll have around 700 extra hours per year. Imagine what you could do with all that time!

I write more about that here, where I also share why it’s important to use that time to do some focused and productive work.

If you already have a side project you’re super passionate about, then invest your early morning in working on it and you can be sure you’ll see progress pretty soon.

The early hours of the day are peaceful, there’s no one to disturb you, and – most importantly – there’s nothing else you should be doing. You’re basically sacrificing hours of your sleep in order to be awake before dawn and hustle.

That’s not crazy. It’s what successful people have been doing for a long time in the beginning.

Seriously, if you want to start a business, write a book, exercise daily and get fit, or else that requires a huge transformation, get up at 5 am if you have to and do nothing else but things that will get you closer to the goal.

Your mind will be laser focused. You don’t even need to share all that with other people, as their opinion too is a distraction. Soon, they’ll see how you’re changing for the better.

Optimized planning

One of the things you need to get good at before you enter the entrepreneurial world, or before you make big changes in your personal life actually, is planning.

We’ve all heard how important it is to have a vision, to set specific goals and measure them on the way. But are we really doing it?

There’s a lot more to planning than we think.

I’ve been doing my research lately as I’m setting 1 big goal for the next 5 months, with 3 sub goals each of which will lead me to the end result.
But I’ll do some things differently this time. I’ll be tracking. A lot.

There will be daily review, plus a bigger weekly review. In the end of each of the 5 months, I’ll also go over the whole strategy and plan again and make adjustments based on what has worked better than the rest during this month.

I have a list of actions to take. These are the only things I’ve seen results with in terms of what I’m after. So I’ll do more of them and will dedicate my most productive time of the day to these. Everything else comes second.

There will be research during that period too, but it will be considered part of my free time. If I come up with anything that seems promising, I will give it a try. If there are results, I’ll add it to the overall vision.

I learned all that from what I’d call the best article on planning I’ve ever read. It’s by Taylor Pearson.

Productizing a service

For a long time now I’ve been trying to figure out the best way for me to go from freelancing to starting a small business.

I can’t say things are going slowly. But it’s something I need to start brainstorming and working on now if I want to see results any time soon.

So the best option, after going through almost anything possible, is productizing a service.

It’s what every freelance writer/programmer/web designer/etc. can do when he gets tired of the billable hours, of having to be at the computer to actually make money, and to be selling his time and not being able to take some time off (as it means he won’t be making money until he gets back).

The goal is to remove yourself from the work, streamline and systemize your services, hire other people to do them for you, and be able to work on the business instead of in it.

You’ll still be working hard, of course. But not doing mundane, repeatable tasks as usual. You’ll focus on finding clients, scaling, planning, etc.

The best advice I’ve found on the topic is anything Brian Casel has to share.

I signed up for his newsletter (I don’t usually do that!), and it was some of the most useful content I’ve ever received in my inbox.

I first heard of Brian and his story of how he broke free from freelancing and turned his services into a product that is ‘done-for-you’ and requires someone else to do the work, on an episode of the Smart Passive Income Podcast.

I wanted to know more. So I joined the free newsletter, started reading his blog and checked out his podcast too.

If you’re interested in the idea, these are some great resources.

So that’s what has been on my mind this week. What do you think about these ideas?