This post is 740 words, 4-min read.
Quote
I don't trust myself. I have evidence.
-Ryan Holiday
Common advice for people is to believe in yourself and trust in yourself to accomplish your goals. The saying always goes, "if you don't believe in you, who will believe in you?" Here is the problem with that, it is total nonsense.
The fact is most of us have lied to ourselves so many times saying we will do things just to end up not doing them. That now our brain instinctively ignores whatever we actually say we are going to do and begins to create a narrative of why we cannot do the thing we want to do.
However, when we become honest with the evidence of our past and are honest about our short comings. It forces us to face reality head on. It allows us to create systems that will help us avoid the mistakes we made before. It allows us to be willing to try things and adjust as we go. Failure no longer becomes the end of the road but rather the path to our goal.
Stop blindly believing in yourself, YOU ARE NOT GOD! Embrace the evidence of your past and adjust to meet your new future.
For my Christians, there is only one place your Blind Faith should ever be placed, and it is in Jesus. But you must learn and use wisdom in your life.
Idea 1: My Laziness is Why I am Productive.
I always find it shocking when people tell me I have discipline or ask how I am so productive.
I am shocked because I know myself and I know how lazy I actually am.
What people see are the systems that I have created that make it easy to do all the things I either have to do or things I want to do. I also choose to do less which allows me to do the most important things for me. Which makes it appear that I am more productive.
Create systems for yourself to get you into a default of accomplishing what you want to accomplish and ignoring all the excess things that drag away from your life.
Idea 2: To Say NO, You must Have a DEEP YES.
I love to say money is like water, it finds the path of least resistance to leave your pockets. The question is how do you create a dam strong enough to use your money when and how you want?
One of the answers to this is learning to say NO. Which is not exactly easy in our day and age. Will power alone will never be enough to see you through day in and day out.
One of the best ways to say NO, is by having a DEEP YES!
A few examples:
When you see that ad on Instagram for a fancy outfit or that link to buy a random trinket on Amazon. The only way you will be able to resist is by remembering that spending on this small niceness is taking away from you being the generous person you want to be.
Or when you get invited by your friends to take a last-minute trip and it will cost you $1000 that you do not necessarily have. The only way you will be able to stomach saying NO, is by remembering that choosing to take this trip will inhibit you from being able to pay down your credit card debt which has been hanging over your head for the last 6 years and has limited you from being able to do so many other things in your life.
Or when you get that invite for a $200 dinner and night out. The only way you will be able to say NO, is by remembering the $200 you have is what you want to use to surprise your mom with a nice dinner for the both of you.
Start with having a purpose for your money and it becomes a ton earlier to do all the things you actually want to do.
Recommended Reads
Katie Gatti Tassin from Money With Katie, goes against the doomerist belief that we will never be able to achieve anything financially that has taken over all our social feeds in her write up, Evidence to the Contrary. Her points are very similar to the quote at the beginning.