I’m so freaking lazy!

Are you like me where you have great intentions to do some amazing things, but they often don’t come to pass? Ever thought to yourself later, “I’m so lazy! Why didn’t I do something productive!”


credit: psit_group

Last week I had a whole day off where the kids where at school, my wife was working, and I really had no responsibilities. I had some great plans about all the stuff I was going to do – finish a book, do some banking, set up some spreadsheets & do some planning for the next few months…

My intentions really were to get up early & spend a great, productive day getting through many different things! By the time the day off arrived however, it basically went like this:

  • Woke feeling tired at 8:30
  • Snoozed until 8:40…. 8:50… 9:00…. 10:00
  • Got up & watched some tv / ate breakfast – 12:00
  • Hung some washing out, surfed the internet (is there a term for surfing the net where it’s a complete time waster & nothing is achieved? Waste-surfing? or, NTK? (Net Time-Killing) – 2:30pm
  • Spent some time showering, cleaning up the kitchen, playing guitar… and before I knew it, it was time for the kids to be picked up…

Why is it that we really have such great intentions of following through with ideas, but when the time comes we get caught up in the day to day patterns of real life & often don’t follow through?


credit: curoninja

Have you ever bought motivational tapes or books & thought – this is my chance to make some changes in my life! “It starts with you”, “How to be successful”, “Make a trillion bucks by the time you’re 20″ etc….. How many times have you read half way through one of those & never returned to it?

For some people, this extends to other parts of their lives – the exercise regime that lasts 2 weeks. The sport they stop going to. The gym membership that’s not being used.

Many motivational pages elude to the fact that it’s important to finish what we start & commit to. The question is, how do we do that exactly? How do we make sure we stop being lazy! What do we do when we want to get motivated, start something and (more importantly) stick with it !? Are you even intending to finish reading this article?

Kill Laziness & Make Habits Stick!

From a great article by Scott Young on tricks to make new habits stick, here are some of the tips on creating new habits, commiting to them, and sticking with what you have started:

- Commit to Thirty Days – Three to four weeks is all the time you need to make a habit automatic. If you can make it through the initial conditioning phase, it becomes much easier to sustain.


- Make it Daily - Consistency is critical if you want to make a habit stick. If you want to start exercising, go to the gym every day for your first thirty days. Going a couple times a week will make it harder to form the habit. Activities you do once every few days are trickier to lock in as habits.


- Start Simple – Don’t try to completely change your life in one day. It is easy to get over-motivated and take on too much. If you wanted to study two hours a day, first make the habit to go for thirty minutes and build on that.


- Stay Consistent – The more consistent your habit the easier it will be to stick. If you want to start exercising, try going at the same time, to the same place for your thirty days. When cues like time of day, place and circumstances are the same in each case it is easier to stick.


credit: MooreALX


- Remove Temptation - Restructure your environment so it won’t tempt you in the first thirty days. Remove junk food from your house, cancel your cable subscription, throw out the cigarettes so you won’t need to struggle with willpower later.


- Associate With Role Models – Spend more time with people who model the habits you want to mirror. A recent study found that having an obese friend indicated you were more likely to become fat. You become what you spend time around.


- Write it Down - A piece of paper with a resolution on it isn’t that important. Writing that resolution is. Writing makes your ideas more clear and focuses you on your end result.