It was a wild ride; I declined my top b-schools offers like London Business School and Rotterdam School of Management because of the pandemic, moved to a tiny hill station from a metropolitan area, and started a hiking challenge to hike at least 300 miles amid the pandemic, that was one of the best decision I made.
Here are the top 10 things I learned along the way that can help you to make your year better.
1- Stay consistent
This is one of the top lessons I learned to stay consistent. It doesn’t matter how successful you get; you have to stick with the plan.
Like everyone, I was really focused and disciplined at the beginning of 2021 then my progress started to decline. As I was becoming a part of a bigger project, getting busy, I started to be more perfectionist instead of just delivering as I did — the beginning of the year.
First lesson, perfection does not exist, it’s just wasting your time, stay consistent, and keep executing the plans as you made at the beginning of the year.
2- Delegate your workload
Delegation is really hard to do if you’re a perfectionist. When I got more workload, I was working extremely busy and thinking to delegate but was unsure if it was the right time or I could handle the workload, especially in my side projects.
I quickly learned if someone else can do a better job than me in less time, just delegate the task. Believe me; it’s a life-changing experience.
3- Focus on tiny improvement
One of the resolutions was to look good by eating healthy food and hitting the gym 2–4 times weekly.
I know most people in my social circle are struggling to lose weight. I was quite the opposite, with 6.3 feet tall frame and weight merely 130lbs. I hired a trainer and started to work on my goal. My goal was to hit at least 170lbs. The following article will help you how to build tiny habits.
I am super happy with my progress and learned what healthy food is. Focus one step at a time, as I did one meal at a time.
I still don’t look like Captain America.
4- Quit
I can understand everyone learns the hard way; never give up. Even after giving our 100%, we need to understand that it’s not working out. Maybe it’s not for us, or maybe there is another way to handle it.
Here is a great tip: leave the task for a few days, weeks, or even months, then start again. When I was trying to put on a healthy weight, I missed the gym many times, cheated on food, and even quit for 4–6 weeks. But still, I almost hit my goal of 165 lbs.
You have to know when is the right time to quit.
5- Reading
I am proud to say that I spent quality time reading last year. I love structural reading; therefore, I focused on biographies, business failures/successes stories, and mental wellness books. That was one of the goals to read for at least 1 hour every day.
I started to use Kindle on iPad mini; that was the sole purpose of my iPad mini. I know it’s peculiar who reads on iPads. I watched a YouTube video and explained how Kindle changed his reading habits one day. After watching the video, I bought the Kindle and kept it next to my bed. Believe me, it’s one of the best products I purchased.
6- No cell phone in bed
I don’t take my cell phone to the bed anymore and also do not check my cellphone first thing in the morning. I remember when I was taking a phone with me in the bedroom, I was literally on the phone scrolling until 1am. Try to avoid taking your phone to your bedroom, instead buy a good physical alarm clock.
7- Keep asking what you want from life
Life is super short, and it’s moving super fast. There are many possibilities to move around if you are not happy where you are at the moment. Just make a quick stop every few months to ask yourself why you are doing this. Are you enjoying it? This article will help you with what you want to do with life and your time.
I know it is pretty easy to get stuck in the never-ending societal circle like school, university, job, b-school, a bigger job, more money, bigger house, cars, big retirement. Just make a quick stop and think if you are enjoying it along the way. If the answer is yes, keep going, and if it’s the opposite, it’s time to optimize your life.
8- Be yourself
Don’t pretend to be someone you are not, especially when you meet someone new and try to impress them to get a job, relationship quest, and/or simply in a social circle. Always show your genuine personality to other people because you never know which part of your personality impresses the person.
Just be yourself!
9- Divide and rule
Always try to divide the tasks into tiny chunks; therefore, you can focus on one thing at a time. Consider it you own these tasks, and you have the right to and how to do it. You will be more peaceful when you 100% know that it’s my task; I own it. You will be happier. The following article will help you to master productivity.
10- Question your premises
There is the possibility that you live in a shell of many premade thoughts like what people will think if I do this or that? What will my friends say? I did M.Eng in Petroleum Engineering, now working in the tech company for the last few years and working on my side hustles to ditch the 9–5 am.
It’s not that I don’t like the job or hate people at the company. In fact, it’s quite the opposite; I am fortunate to meet, learn, and work with all the incredible people. But I don’t like to be at work from 9 am to 5 pm. I really want to control my time; this is one of the main reasons I’m focusing a lot of energy on my side hustles.
Simply question yourself, why you are doing this? Do you put yourself first, your thoughts or the people’s? In the end, it does not matter as long as you’re happy
Bonus: Procrastination
First, accept this everyone is a procrastinator at some tasks in life. It’s all about is important vs. urgent. I trained my brain last year to just do the task at hand. For example, recently I started to write, I promised myself to write at least 1000 words a day.
But if I don’t like to write some days, I just say it’s fine to write 500 words or less. That inertia is the main point; I always end up writing more than 1000 words.
Thank you for reading, and let me know what you learned last year in the comments; what did you learn last year?
