In a post from the archive, Dave Mashburn explains how to coax your mind into doing things it doesn’t want to do (like making recruiting calls). Dealing with your mind is a bit like dealing with a small child. It doesn’t always know what’s best, and our job is to take it by the hand compassionately and set it on the right path. The key, in my experience, is to stop arguing with the mind. The root of the problem is your mind doesn’t switch gears easily. “Time to go to the gym,” pits itself against “I’d rather stay on the couch” and a mental argument ensues. No thanks, I’m fine where I am. The gym is far away, and it will take too much time, and everything there is really heavy, and do you really want to spend your day lifting heavy things? And by the way, says your mind, you should be ashamed of yourself for laying on this couch. It’s easy to get drawn into an argument with the mind, and the argument is what stymies our progress and saps our motivation. How do you keep from being pulled in? Don’t engage in the argument. When the thought of going to the gym seems overwhelming, try shifting your attention to something more manageable, like the first small step that starts you down the path (ex. putting on your workout clothes). We may not be able to prevent lazy thoughts and urges, but we can control whether or not we focus on them. When recruiting, don’t focus on completing a 30-minute calling time block. Just tell your mind you just need to make one call. After you make one call, tell your mind you need to do one follow-up.
Before long, you’ll have fooled your mind into completing your time block.