When I look how come I get to accomplish so much in a day, ultimately I always find that I set up my life differently from most.
I started back in 1987…
I was in a seminar called “Excellence” and I was clearly not in excellence in my life. The biggest issue was how much I hated my job, how much I would have preferred to do something else. Anything else.
But that was my job, and I didn’t see any alternative…
So I decided to do what I could… And I decided to pull back my power.
- I told all my friends that I can’t take phone calls at work.
- I didn’t take my phone list with me to work.
- I took my lunch from home to work.
- And at work: I worked. No interruptions, just work.
Within a few days I started to actually enjoy work. It surprised me… but I loved it.
So I learned that long ago that having a phone that can ring, or that you can use is a foolproof way to unhappiness.
Fast forward to today:
- I don’t receive phone calls on my home phone… I actually don’t give out my number.
- The ringer on my cell phone is turned off.
- My skype account is on a computer I only use for Netflix… in the evening.
- Only clients have the only email account I check.
- And everyone is dicouraged from emailing me, willy nilly. I don’t socialize
I have become a cross between a skunk and a badger…
Oh, I have unsubscribed from 95% of all email lists…. And I keep on pruning…
Everyone has their own agenda… I prefer to be guided by my own.
No TV, no newspaper, no chit-chat.
Another thing I don’t do that I see some students do: they use their cell phone to listen to audios, replays, which means: they have their cell phones near and dear… Pretty much meaning: they are a slave to it.
I listen to my stuff through unconnected equipment… like the headphones I raved about in my previous article.
Of course: I am up to something.
If you tell the truth: you are probably up to nothing… 99% chance of that.
But, here is the bad news: becoming up to something happens in the silence between you and you. In that tension. No sounds, just you and you. And something sparks.
If you always have sound… whether it is you speaking, or someone else… you’ll never be left alone with yourself long enough to connect, and to connect to something bigger than the business of the day, that will call you to be.
