Taking Action
May 10th, 2007 by Ken D
Taking action - the ability to move and do something. I used to think that taking action was my greatest weakness, but I’ve recently come to the conclusion that my greatest weakness is taking action where action is required the most. I can stay busy for days at a time and cram my weeks full of all kinds of activities. The problem I have is choosing the activities that will benefit me the most.
It’s no coincidence my recent focus has been on setting goals, writing them down, and working on them daily. If I don’t have the structure, I find myself floating aimlessly around in my life moving my focus from one thing to another. (I’ve recently discovered why that happens to me and have taken steps to change it)
Sure, I get things done, but I feel like a waste so much potential and it has gotten to the point where it’s no longer acceptable to me. I have two young children so free time is rare and has taken on a quality of being priceless.
For the past week I have been working on figuring out my direction but in hindsight most of the week’s free time has been spent on needless floating among activities. Even when I seemed to be working on my direction, it was still a whole lot of wandering. I laugh as I type this because it is such a habit that it often fools me even when I’m looking directly at it. It’s like procrastinating at improving your procrastination.
Can you actually set a goal to set goals? Or set a goal to get a goal setting program up and running? Well I can!! And then I proceed to think about thinking about it. So I’ve managed to ‘list’ myself to death and have done a bunch of stuff but I don’t feel like I’ve actually made much headway in what I’m trying to accomplish. I don’t beat myself up over it because I know that it takes repetitions of seeing the behavior and taking action to change it where the true change comes.
What set me off on my analysis above is this: A few minutes ago I went over to Christine Kane’s blog, and as usual, she wrote something that I needed to read. Her article Taking Action Makes You Happier Here’s Why is part of a series she is doing on taking action. I realized I have been feeling a bit off this week and haven’t felt much drive and was wondering why; then I read this:
“3 - When you take action, you decide.
Deciding is a big deal. Deciding creates direction. Lingering in indecision is a guaranteed way to get depressed. Making decisions forces you to ask yourself what you want, rather than just following the usual course of what you “should do.” Or what you “usually” do.”
It’s the reason I’ve been feeling a bit off this week and here’s the answer staring at me. I’ve been lingering in indecision and doing what I usually do. It always amazes me how that synchronicity works.
I know that action breaks the stalemate; action brings about the much needed inspiration and motivation; action beats down depression; but I still fall into the trap.
The best part of seeing this is now I can take action to change my current state. And that action makes all the difference.
