Few things about the book, ‘The One Thing’
The one quote that describes the book ‘The One Thing’ is,
“The things which are most important don’t always scream the loudest.” — Bob Hawke
Conventional To-Do Lists take you to nowhere
The One Thing, by Gary Keller & Jay Papasan, describes why conventional ‘To-Do’ lists take you to ultimately to nowhere other than getting yourself busy & stressful, every day, for less value-adding reasons in long run.
“The problem with trying to do too much is that even if it works, adding more to your work and your life without cutting anything brings a lot of bad with it: missed deadlines, disappointing results, high stress, long hours, lost sleep, poor diet, no exercise, and missed moments with family and friends — “
Multitasking is Bad, Very Bad!
‘Success is sequential, not simultaneous’.
The writers provide a broader definition to ‘what multitasking is’ (and what multitasking isn’t ).
The One Question
From the other hand, to find your one thing, you need to answer for the following question.
‘The One Thing you should do, such that by doing it everything else will be easier or unnecessary? ‘
Start big, with a bigger scope. It is better to have a higher expectation for big question, something you think little ‘out of your league’.
Now keep asking the question, to get that ‘One Thing’, what should you do.
…To get above one thing done, what should you do?
……To get the above one thing done, what should you do?
………….
…………….To get the above one thing done,what should I do now?
Domino Effect
To answer the above questions, we need to use it with 80/20 Principle.
To get a better idea,
What is the one (20%) thing I can do, which would favorably cause my goal by 80% ?
Now we break this down, until we find our 20% thing that we need to do, that would effect our secondary goal, by 80%.
This is called domino effect, more preciously, A geometric domino progression.
So basically, the right thing that you do (smallest domino) would exponentially affects your ultimate goal.
Willpower is like Gas
Ever feel like you do not have ‘motivation’ to work on something?. Well, this might be due to you ran out of willpower.
“Willpower is like gas in your car. … When you resist something tempting, you use some up. The more you resist, the emptier your tank gets, until you run out of gas.”
‘The brain makes up 1/50th of our body mass but consumes a staggering 1/5th of the calories we burn for energy.’
‘Every-time’ is not the right time. If the task is new, (i.e. a new habit) willpower drains quicker. If a task is repetitive, likely willpower will drain slowly. So it is important to choose a time where your willpower is maximum, especially if you are attempting something ‘new’
The One book I wish I have read little earlier
This book is worthy every penny you invest. This is not just a book, this is a playbook for success.
Only thing I wish, if I could, is that, I wish I read this earlier!
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