One of the things I promised myself in another blog (not ready for sharing) was that I would commit myself to writing more. But you know… it’s HARD. Obviously, not physically hard. Physically hard work is stuff like what my brothers-in-law do: manual, hard, unrelenting, don’t-notice-the-time kind of stuff. Typing words into a computer is not hard in that sense – but having the discipline to make time for it is – for me – as hard as digging a trench or building steps from old railroad sleepers.
You’d think that maybe because I sit at a computer for most of the day most days, that it would be easy to squeeze off a couple of lines now and again, just to keep my rhythm going. But things get in the way. And don’t get me wrong – they’re not always work things. They are… distractions. And it seems to me that a productive life is one with fewer distractions. Or, maybe… a productive person is someone who is able to manage his/her distractions better than I do. Everyone must have temptations to do something that is actually nothing. Watch TV. Surf the web. Sleep.
Don’t get me wrong – I think that those things are great (well, I would, wouldn’t I?). But it’s occurring to me more often more recently that all the time spent doing those things is time not spent doing the things the better part of me really wants to do. Read. Write. Exercise.
It’s just… it’s the discipline thing. I am easily distracted and very easily entertained. I can -and have been known to - while away whole afternoons watching episodes of Friends that I've already seen dozens of times. Everybody must have their time-stealers... what is it that people find within themselves that helps them get beyond those kinds of obstacles?
One of the things we show our new players over here is a video called ‘how bad do you want it’? As coaches, we play it to our newly-freed university students to try to get them to realise that if you want to succeed in American football (or in anything else), you’ve got to want it more than you want other things. More than you want to spend time with your girlfriend of the week. More than you want to drink. More than you want to go home for the weekend because your dirty laundry basket it full and your gran has baked you some cookies. You’ve got to want it badly enough to realise that all of those other things are just distractions; they are obstacles to your goal. It’s not always an either/or choice – but it is a choice, and the choices we make define our ability to capitalise on opportunities.
If I were to sit down and add up the time I spend doing things during my day, I am sure that I would realise how much time I've really spent doing nothing at all. I’m tempted to keep a diary about my working day… but also more than a little scared of what it would reveal.
So there’s that. There’s the WANTING. And WANTING something is important. But we also go on to say that it’s not enough to want. Everybody wants. The difference between the ambitious and the successful is not the wanting, it’s the doing. And so many times, that is where we fail. We want, but we do not do.
My goal is simply to do more.
