Unsurprisingly, most worthwhile things in life, like getting in shape, building a business, or raising kids, are often not easy.
Easy is often a short-term friend but a long-term enemy, while hard is a short-term enemy but a long-term friend.
What if it were possible to, instead of bringing your usual grunty face when you need to do something hard, you could enjoy it and even look forward to it?
That’s the thesis of Feel-Good Productivity by Ali Abdaal: When you learn to enjoy doing hard things, you get more energized and productive and last for longer in the face of adversity.
Let’s dive in, shall we?
1. Lower the stakes
Sometimes, we say we are not allowed to enjoy what we are doing because what we are doing is “extremely serious” and “very important.”
And once we put our stakes too high, the fun is all gone.
It’s what happens to some professional musicians; what once brought them immense joy is now their job where the stakes are high, and they find it hard to enjoy it like they used to.
We fail to realize that we perform at our best when we feel good and enjoy the process.
“Success dosen’t lead to feeling good. Feeling good leads to success.”
Ali Abdaal Share
The bottom line?
Next time you find yourself bringing your “let’s suffer through this” face, remember to ask yourself:
- How can I approach this work with less seriousness and more enjoyment? What would this look like if it were fun?
Would you be playing some of your favorite music? Would there be friends around? Would you go to a park or cafe?
There’s always something you can do to bring more enjoyment and play to whatever it is that you need to do.
2. Take ownership of the process
Humans don’t like to be told what to do.
In hindsight, that’s probably the reason I used to hate writing in school, and I enjoy writing and improving my writing.
I would bet something similar happened to you in some way or another.
There’s something incredibly motivating about doing hard things because you want to and not because you need to.
People need to feel like they have some control over their lives.
That said, there’s plenty of stuff in life that we need to do, and don’t want to do.
But here’s the good news:
Even if you can’t control what you have to do, you can always control the process of doing it.
Maybe you need to study for that assignment you hate, but how will you approach it? Will you do it alone or with friends? Will you study today or another day? You might find out you have much more control than you thought.
Bringing it home
Lower the stakes: When the stakes are high, the fun goes away—try approaching your work with more play and enjoyment and less seriousness.
Take ownership of the process: Doing hard things because you want to and not because you need to is incredibly motivating. However, even if you can’t control what you do, you can always control how you approach doing it.
Choose one insight from today and take action on it.
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Stay curious,
— Idris Moura
In case you missed it, here’s your chance to catch up on last week’s newsletter about 3 stoic lessons to follow every day