How To Do Absolutely Anything in Three Easy Steps

1. Set your intention. Decide what you want. Do you really want to get that prize or learn how to do that thing? Really? If you do, then great. But if you don’t, don’t. Don’t waste your time and other people’s. Time is a finite resource. Put it where it counts.

I am not so good at this. I find myself metaphorically prancing uphill, enjoying the exercise, and it’s only when I’m halfway up that I bother to ask myself, why am I here? Do I really want to climb this mountain? And I’m often too embarrassed to admit I was too distracted by the view to have noticed where I was going. 

2. Give yourself permission. Give yourself permission to not want what you’re supposed to want. Give yourself permission to want what you’re not supposed to want. Give yourself permission to face the hard stuff, to take a break, to laugh, to cry. Stop telling yourself to stop.

Also very very hard. Peer pressure doesn’t go away as you get older. It just gets less blatant. But here’s the secret I’ve found of growing up: nobody else knows what they’re doing either. You’re looking to them, but they’ve been looking to you all along.

3. Take a tiny step. Every trainer tells you: just put on your sneakers and get out the door. Addicts are told: take it one day at a time. It’s not big and it’s not dramatic, but that’s who wins the race.

This sounds like simplistic crap, doesn’t it? But I promise you, honestly and truly, it works. Where I haven’t succeeded, it’s because I didn’t do one (or more) of these three things. Where I have, I did. Pinky swear.