Be a doer

This reminder from TEM228 courtesy of Martin McCain of The McCain Duo was something I needed to hear. And while I’ve heard different variations of this advice countless times in my life, it always seems to be timely!

I am constantly preaching to my TEM Coaching clients that if you want to evaluate your belief systems you must ignore your thoughts and your feelings. Only look at your actions.

This is easy advice to dole out to paying clients or my kid. But it tends to be much harder to actually live on a daily basis!

I am currently sitting on a number of projects that “need” too move forward. I am telling myself (and frequently others!) that they are important and that they will move forward. But at some point I need to stop saying that and start actually doing that or else I need to come to grips with reality.

The trap that I can frequently fall into is that I work really hard. Not all the time. But most of the time.

The problem is constantly completing tasks is not necessarily doing the work that is the most important to me as an artist or as an entrepreneurial musician who is trying to pay the bills.

It is easier to spot when I am being kind of lazy and not putting in real sustained effort. It is much harder for me (and I think for most) to identify when we are working hard but on the wrong stuff. (I recently started Deep Work by Cal Newport which dives heavily into this stuff. I will be revisiting this quite a bit over the next month or so.)

So thank you, Martin, for reminding me yet again of the value of actually doing rather than just talking about doing.

Apparently I needed to hear it. Again!

Be sure to check out the rest of TEM228 with Dr. Martin McCain and Dr. Artina McCain. They are wonderful!