Get Everything Done

Hi Avrum
I think you're messing with the statistics. Research basketball, baseball, soccer, olympians, etc. While you're at it, research all areas of success that require unending determination, practice and mastery. Musicians, scientists, doctors, entrepeneurs, etc.

Your parents, school system, community, church/synagogue, etc can help or hinder your trajectory and ambition. Even the 5% truly talented and/or brilliant people have to have ambition to develop it. No matter what mastery you're attempting to attain, it requires a hell of a lot of determination because it always involves doing much that isn't "pleasant". Even amateurs and hobbyists are sometimes willing to put in the grueling days, years and decades. Bottom line: upbringing and talent alone isn't enough. The world is filled with "almost champions", almost famous musicians, almost famous writers, only pretty good doctors, only very good academicians and scholors, etc. Discipline is just a synonym for determination which is feuled by how much you want it to happen. Many heros, musicians, scholors, professional sports players, doctors, etc started life in a very disadvantaged position yet were ambitious enough to do whatever it took. Conversely, many people have many more advantages and the talent and/or intelligence that could guarantee success but they decide to piss it away. It's a combo of luck and determination to succeed but luck or being fortunate isn't worth a damn without enough determination to put up with the grueling/unpleasant aspects of attaining it.

Your past can greatly affect you and it will. But your determination can override it. It may cause it to be much harder for you but if you REALLY want it badly enough, that won't ever deter you enough to stop you.

Also, you don't even factor in genetic propensities. Just as you are born with propensities that give you advantages, those same genetics may also give you challenges to overcome as well. Ask all those successful people who have only average abilities and no mentors or other advantages. They weren't born with any edge nor did their circumstances give them any edge. They just used their determination to beat the odds.

Your genetic challenges and ghosts of the past may make things harder for you but your determination can override all that......if you want it bad enough.

Productivity systems basically keep you abreadst of what's on your plate and your ambitions. Some may offer tips, procedures and rules. Bottom line, any system that allows you to be aware of what your responsibilities are and what your ambitions are do their job. You have to rule yourself via your determination to discover how to overcome your challenges and shortcomings. No productivity system will do that for you. OTOH, any of them will work if you want them to. Most people use a system that takes advantage of their strengths and mitigates their weaknesses. That's what all of Mark's systems have offerred. If you need to tweak it to work better for you, that's smart. If you're tweaking it to avoid the work you don't like, that won't be helpful. Mark has created many, many systems that will help people to get their work done and meet their aspirations. He suggests to try them out to see which one is a good fit. He also freely expounds on the principles so that you can create your own system. He never mentioned great intelligence, excellent mentors, an advantaged position, supportive people, etc. as preresquisites to successfully work his systems. They are helpful but not required.

Hi Avrum
Productivity experts aren't trying to solve your issues. That's on the person to learn what they have to do and/or get help and find the determination despite what life hands you.

I went through a lot of years of hell. Doctors have offered to remove some of the scars but they never even mention anything about the really bad ones that can't be removed. It was hell and I was taught that I was evil. The beatings were the least of it. Musch worse crap happened which caused the PSTD I just kept saying to myself, "Hang on, God might have mercy on me." Well, after a couple of decades the PSTD got the best of me. The docs said that they can't stop the flashbacks and nightmares. The horrors caused huge synapses that will get triggered for the rest of my life. (Talk about being embarrassed!)They taught me how to cope with them and wear a plate because of the bruxism. I did well in my schooling and my career but it wasn't easy. I'm ashamed of the scars, the nightmares that make me scream and the flashbacks that embarrass me in public. I worked around it. What choice did I have? Lots of people work around challenges. It might make things more difficult for you but it also gives you confidence that you are "strong enough". In fact it was a blessing because it made dealing with the auto wreck that much easier. Horrible experiences never leave you but life is generous. Many people spend their lifetime coping yet they also use their determination to carve a good and successful life for themselves. Events in your life stay with you forever but you're also living your own life. I say that if you want something bad enough, your determination will keep getting you over the hump. Being productive may require determination and figuring out ways to build on your strengths and figure out workarounds for your weaknesses. Boredom has always made doing certain work painfully effortful but I'm not going to allow that to stop me. It's a matter of how determined you are even if it's simply to avoid penalties or letting somebody down. Applying effort against resistance is a PITA but that's what you've got to do. Mark specializes in helping people work despite resistance. I owe much to him and the posters here. I've always done my work but now I'm more confident about facing resistance and it goes much easier because of Mark's teachings. He's even made several systems. He can't give you determination. What gives me determination despite HATING boring and tedious work is Mark's little and often. I'm driven by keeping the WHY I bother putting myself through it at the forefront of my mind. Without the WHY, I'd never finish my MITs. Without Mark's little and often and DIT principles, it would be much, much more difficult. Mark can't give you determination. You have to pull it out of your own thoughts, values, desires, etc.

We all just do the best that we can. You can't stop some **it but you also can work around it depending on how much you want to. Discipline is just determination. Determination comes from WHY you want to bother and endure. That's outside of productivity systems.

p.s.
I don't want you to think I had anything extra to make it. I was just lucky enough to find something in me to carry on. My brother didn't make it. I have to do as well as I can because I'm living for both of us.

avrum, I'm not sure why this has to be an either/or thing. I know what you are saying. My father had a habit (and still does) of saying he would get around to such and such, or start something and then give up half way through. That passive behaviour rubbed off on me and I tended to work the same way. So there's the nurture factor. In retrospect I can identify plenty of lost opportunities in my life through thinking like that.

However the research factor has great value too. For example WHY did he abandon things half way through? I know for me it was the feeling that the end was within reach so I could finish any time, so the drive to finish right now was put to one side for something more instantly gratifying. It's the same process which causes marathon runners to collapse 50 yards before the finish line. Why does someone procrastinate? Some degree of fear? Why do we learn to game the very systems we've outsourced to to try and force our behaviour to change (the person who has been on ten diets becuase "none of them work", the person who starts using their tenth productivity system because this one "feels like the one").

After trying 25 years of productivity systems and methods, I came to accept that the only person who can get me over that line is me. I covered all that in the single text file thread so won't repeat it here.

So nurture moulds the way we act, research increasingly explains why those actions happen and knowledge and experience reshapes our behaviour.

Mark, I sleep because I'm a human, not because I learned the behaviour from my father. But I used to treat opportunities and projects the way I did precisely because I learned the behaviour from my father.

I think we're in agreement so I'm not sure what point you were trying to make there.

Chris

If my father had instead had a different attitude I would have grown up taking that on board instead.

Do a search for the video of the two little girls, I think their names are "Link" and "Lamb", who play music at white supremicist rallies. Coincidentally their parents are hard right white nationalists. We're all genetically predisposed to be fearful of things which are different (there's the research part), and nurturing can turn that into irrational hate in the context of modern society, which is what this example is.

In a nutshell - mostly we can all change our behaviour with knowledge and research but the way we are raised clearly sets a very powerful baseline from which we start.

Ace, a great example of what I wrote: "So nurture moulds the way we act, research increasingly explains why those actions happen and knowledge and experience reshapes our behaviour". I'll stand by that.

Avrum seems to be saying it's all about parenting, you seem to be seeing it's nothing to do with parenting. I'll leave you both to it.

(Apologies for the long post)

Fascinating topic.

For what it’s worth, I do believe that family/background is often a more powerful influence than most disciplines recognise. However – and as has already been mentioned – I also believe that it’s only one ingredient within life’s recipe, and it has very different degrees of influence depending upon the individual (as per the examples given above, not to mention the obvious differences between siblings of the same parents).

From my perspective, the careful exploration of underlying patterns / dynamics / beliefs / behaviours that may have arisen from one’s background experiences has the potential to do two things: (1) Provide invaluable insight into the possible primary source of some of our difficulties / weaknesses; and (2) Give us a new vantage point from which we can launch a fresh assault upon these difficulties / weaknesses.

Therapy can fall short of the mark (and sadly, often does) when the individual doesn’t manage to move beyond the new insights to a place of responsibility and action. Here’s a simple case study to try and make the point:

I may discover that my tendency to be easily distracted and avoid finishing projects may be strongly related to my mother’s chronic fear of being criticised (which I now share). This insight may prove a useful means of understanding how firmly entrenched my avoidance of finishing projects is (as opposed to, for example, realising that it is merely because my manager doesn’t check on me as much as my old manager did).

But it’s what I do with this insight that’s really the issue here; and as I see it, there are three broad responses that are possible:

1. Acknowledge the new insight and do nothing about the associated weakness (apart from, potentially, use family / background as an excuse for any subsequent counterproductive behaviour)

2. Acknowledge the insight, have a good crack at doing something about the associated weakness whilst you’re still fired up about the new insight, but ultimately allow yourself to slip back into old patterns before too long.

3. Acknowledge the new insight, and realise that this means you’re likely to struggle with the associated weakness far more than the ‘average’ person will struggle with the same weakness, and therefore resolve to fight it each day with grit and determination (until the day when it eventually – after many moons – becomes more habit than hardship).

Interestingly (I hope), I’d like to try and introduce another angle to this discussion:

When one frequently tweaks and changes one’s system, are we doing the equivalent of the second response? Do we become temporarily fired up and excited about a possible solution to a weakness of ours, before slipping back into old patterns before too long when the excitement begins to fade (and/or the hoped for change is not as significant or as long-lasting as we would like)?

I have no wish to argue against the rare tweak or change to make a system more adaptable to our needs and circumstances, as I believe there is a good case for such tweaks. But that aside, here is my question:

Does our hope in that break-through tweak or change actively stop us from moving towards the third response – that of acknowledging we are caught in an extremely hard-fought battle for a long time to come, and unless we resolve to fight against our weakness with a grit and determination that might eventually become habit one day, then we will never get the better of our weakness/es? I think this is probably the case, because attached to our hope in that break-through tweak is a hidden reliance upon something which is currently outside of us, rather than a determined reliance upon that which must come from within us.

And unless we choose the latter, we will never find ourselves consistently productive.

Hi Neumatist
Brilliant post! If I may, I'd like to add an addendum to the third scenario. Some challenges are life long. My lifelong bugaboo is dealing with boredom and tedium. The skies opened up when I finally realized that there is no cure. It's part of my brain's propensity. Rather than only focusing on the shortcoming, I'm grateful for other advantages as part of the package. When I realized that I'll ALWAYS find approaching boredom or tedium as a HUGE, effortful step, I don't fight it any more as something that can be fixed. It never gets easier. Gather the kahunas to approach the work is always effortful. That will never change. It's been like that since I was a kid. A little bit of procrastination is OK but not if the work is still sitting there anyway. When I was a kid and had to do gardening and lawn chores, I'd ask my dad when I could stop. The labor didn't bother me but the boredom surely was hard to take. His answer was "You can quit when you're finished or the sun sets." It didn't take me long to learn that playing the hare didn't help. All that meant was that the next day, the unfinished work was still there to ruin another weekend day. LOL! If I know that I hate certain work but it won't go away unless I do it, it's better to suffer now and get done so that tomorrow won't be more of the same.

Later, when I had a career there were some lousy jobs. My boss and I took turns who had to do the boring jobs. He'd reward us with lunch and cocktails and closing up shop early if we were drowning in work for a long time. I've always associated effortful work as inevitable. The only cure is to do it. The sooner you get it off your brain, the better you can focus on the work challenges that you gain satisfaction from. It also makes your evenings more peaceful when you know that you're doing your best. It's silly but I get a perverse feeling of victory after finishing work that I hate. The rest of the day, week, etc has an extra sweetness to it without the dread continuing on in your brain. Until I learned Mark Forster's DIT, I used to turn myself into a knot to finish the work in one hit. Little and often is just as effective and MUCH EASIER to accomplish! I like my DIT in a weekly version. With the overview, I can choose MITs in a way that breaks down the effort into less tortuous steps! Mark is a Godsend. Thank you, Mark! When it's genetic, it will always be effortful. With Mark's principles it makes it easier to face the resistance. If I really hate a job, it might take me many little steps to get it done. For some reason, it's so much easier that way. I with I learned about it sooner than 2007! LOL!

Neumatist, thanks for the great post. Even if something can't be habituated into second nature like mastering music or dancing or studying, your post shows that there's no shame to keep at it if that's what you need to do. I believe that Mark has offered so many ways to fight resistance, that I'm sure that many, many people have been helped by him. He can erase genetics or create determination but he has definitely made it far easier for me to get the same work done. I'll say that it's MUCH EASIER to get lousy work done with little and often yet it magically gets done almost as soon as when I used to practically bust a gut making myself keep at it until it's finished. They aught to teach Mark's stuff in schools.

p.s.
I've never been consistently productive except at work. At home, I've always been free to do things my way. Intelligent procrastination can help. Negligent procrastination can make it worse. We all probably do a bit of both without any real damages. Like Mark says, being productive "on average" works well unless you're on the company clock! LOL!

Thanks so much for the entertaining discussion. I'm a psychologist with six children. While I know for a fact my husband and I relate somewhat differently to each child, we provide a very similar environment for them. The way they approach their school and home responsibilities is pretty different. My oldest is a maniac about school. I once punished him by taking his school books away. My fourth son would forget to take care of even basic hygiene without reminders, let alone school and chores.

I account for the majority of these differences with personality which is primarily genetic. My second son is slow and meticulous, which is nothing like his father or me, but is very much like his uncle.

More and more I am realizing that we ought to choose approaches that work with our personality (or natural bent, if you prefer) than against it. Maximizing results from what we already do makes sense to me. Yet those who market their productivity approaches never ask what their students are already doing or about their personality. Then there's the even deeper question of whether there's anything really wrong with the student's approach or whether s/he has just been convinced by our productivity-driven culture that there is.

I posted a lengthy reply last night that has disappeared. Weird! Now I will just have to say that I agree with you both. :-) I think I said something about the environment determining where in the range of our genetic possibilities we fall. I find it comforting that I have some control over my life. That it's not just genetics and upbringing.