closet – From the desk of Adam Thomas

Let’s make it happen

The last two days we talked a lot about closets. I use the closet not only as a practical example but also a metaphor. Drop dead conditions are ideal for all sorts of things, ranging from decisions on products to where you want to eat for dinner.

How are we putting the drop dead condition(DDC) into action?

Before we use it to decide when we are going to launch our next initiative, let’s stick to our closets.

Exercise:

Block out at least 30 minutes to review your closet with a pen and a pad.

Review each item in the closet. Each one gets 10 seconds, no more! I’ve found that our emotions don’t change after 10 seconds. After 10 seconds, we tend to rationalize.

If you like it, NEXT!

If you don’t like it, jot down the reason.

Bonus points! Remove it immediately from your closet. There’s no reason to keep something you hate. Coordinate a gift donation with a local not-for-profit. Get that thing out of your house, for real.

When you’re done reviewing your closet, you now have a list of DDCs!

Place this list in your wallet. Look at it every time you go shopping.

Schedule a DDC action three months later. You will review your closet’s contents and toss what no longer serves you.

This exercise an easy way for you to get comfortable with this framework.

[bctt tweet=”I witnessed my mental space go from large room full of space to tiny closet. “]
I don’t listen to music anymore when I walk, and because of this, I end up having a lot more thinking time.

A lot more.

I am more productive as a result, but since I have more conscious time, I have a lot of thoughts.

Those thoughts, both good and bad creep in a place where they were not present for months at a time. It’s like an alcoholic getting sober, all those things that were put off mentally because of distraction find themselves in place.

One thing that arrives more often now is self defeatist thinking. I recognized how little permission I give myself on days where it strikes.I witnessed my mental space go from large room full of space to tiny closet.

In short, self defeatist thoughts and other types of self doubt ruin your ability to be productive.

But they exist. There is no way to completely squelch the noise.

Sorry, if you were expecting a 10 ways to article after that intro, but I don’t want typical here.

What I do want, is to spend some time writing about where these things come from, and how close they are when we are “boxed in” that closet.

Prior experience – A tricky one here. We all have that thing that makes us cringe, and more importantly, we remember how that thing made us feel. Very easy to apply this to everything once we’re boxed in. Its the darkness of the closet.
Restlessness and Anxiety – Take the excitement of Christmas morning, and flip it. Usually when this washes over us, were worried that we don’t measure up. Think of it as the small space not letting us move and bounding up our energy.
Uncomfortable – This isn’t something we don’t like, and it stings. Bad news, for example. This feels like the unstable floor, like shoe were standing on.

The key is to remember that you only make progress by moving, but sometimes – its really hard.