Halving with 5-4-3-2-1
Tuesday, August 10, 2021 at 17:54 Recently my attention was drawn to Mel Robbin’s Countdown Method of getting going with tasks and projects which you’re resisting. It’s a bit like a method I used as a child of getting out of bed in the morning (in pre-central heating days). I used to count down 3-2-1. It was sometimes successful and sometimes not.
Space flight didn’t exist in those days so I didn’t have the example of a space rocket launch to add a couple more digits and a lot more excitement. I wish I had because so far I’ve found the 5-4-3-2-1 countdown to be very effective (why do you think i’m writing my first blog post for over a month?)
I haven’t yet gone much further into the ways Mel Robbins recommends this should be used, but it struck me immediately that it would go very weil with one of my methods which I call “Halving” to myself, but was originally published under the title Another Simple and Effective Method
This method has remained one of my “go back to” systems. The main problem with it is that eventually all the easy tasks in the early part of the list have been done and the result can be considerable resistance to the more difficult tasks which remain. So an infallible method of overcoming resistance would be just the thing.
If 5-4-3-2-1 can be used to remove the resistance to individual tasks, “Halving” would make an excellent system to go with it. Because of the way it’s designed, easy or urgent tasks get dealt with quickly but the more difficult or less urgent tasks nevertheless inevitably get dealt with without lingering.
I’m trying it out at the moment. So far very successful, but it’s still Day 1. I’ll report back soon.
Reader Comments (6)
I still don't know what the method is, but this countdown seems likely to be an effective method of priming, preparing the mind to engage when the countdown completes.
I don't know what Halving is. And I will now check out the video.
<< I don't know what Halving is. >>
The link is given in the post.
Sorry that I wasn't as clear as I should have been.
As I envisage it 5-4-3-2-1 can be used to remove resistance to individual tasks. So if the task you've just chosen is "Call enraged client", you won't have any resistance to doing it if you countdown before starting it. So far for me that is exactly how it has worked.
In addition, if you know that 5-4-3-2-1 enables you do any task on the list without resistance, that will have the effect or reducing your resistance to the list as a whole.