Positive Productivity

“Do not mea­sure your life by your goals but what you are actu­ally doing to achieve them.“
– Peter Drucker

“The ulti­mate goal of life is death — the expe­ri­ence of life is where the value is, not the results we achieve.“
– Anony­mous

When peo­ple refer to pro­duc­tive­ness, they usu­ally refer to “busy-​​ness.” Pos­i­tive pro­duc­tiv­ity, on the other hand, is the result of doing what’s impor­tant and will hinge greatly on how well you adhere to this process of align­ment. Align­ment can also help you to dis­cover not only what you need to do but also pro­vide you with short­cuts as well.

Rec­og­niz­ing your intrin­sic val­ues will most likely aid you in find­ing bet­ter ways to reach your goals and greater results that you can pro­duce along the way. When you trans­late your val­ues into actions, many alter­na­tives and oppor­tu­ni­ties will nat­u­rally jump out at you. While they were always there to begin with, align­ment merely makes them more vis­i­ble to you.

The dif­fer­ence between the pro­duc­tion of results and the com­ple­tion of tasks is in most cases a very sub­tle one. When I ignored my core val­ues, I even­tu­ally became stressed out, less pro­duc­tive, dis­or­ga­nized, busier, and irritated.

Lack­ing moti­va­tion, I tried to find and felt com­pelled to use encour­age­ment or inspi­ra­tion from other sources. How­ever, the most impor­tant down­fall was that I had gen­er­ated a great deal of dis­tress on the peo­ple around me, espe­cially those who were cen­tral to my life.

I cer­tainly made myself busier and more effi­cient, but I wasn’t truly pro­duc­tive. Some­times, I pro­cras­ti­nated doing what was impor­tant and even ignored some of my pri­or­i­ties because I was not inter­nally dri­ven. I said to myself, “I have to do this?” or “I have to do that?” I was frus­trated even at the onset.

How­ever, when I found out what was impor­tant in my life and worked in reverse, I was nat­u­rally enthu­si­as­tic, pro­duced bet­ter results, had greater sat­is­fac­tion with the lit­tlest of results, and had a deeper under­stand­ing of what was required from me. I also faced chal­lenges with greater ease and patience. Solu­tions came to me in an instant. My qual­ity of life soared. And the peo­ple in my life encour­aged and sup­ported me.

Work­ing in reverse in indeed the key to effec­tive­ness and suc­cess. As one of Dr. Stephen Covey’s habits, in his truly excep­tional book The Seven Habits Of Highly Effec­tive Peo­ple, the idea is to “begin with the end in mind” or to plan your way on back­wards, from the final result to where you are now.

You see, the dynam­ics of suc­cess are not a mat­ter of tal­ents, skills, or atti­tudes but a mat­ter of pri­or­i­ties. Arm your­self with the knowl­edge of yours in all you do and you will, directly or indi­rectly, make the best choices for your life and do so with greater inner peace. Mak­ing the right choices is the active out­come of con­sis­tently focus­ing on your true pri­or­i­ties.

The Law of Cor­re­spon­dence says that your outer self cor­re­sponds to your inner self, or that the out­side is but a mir­ror reflec­tion of the inside. There­fore, when you work in cor­re­spon­dence with your true pri­or­i­ties, it will pro­duce enough self-​​motivation to empower you to act on those desires. Sim­ply, your actions will be — as it should be — a mir­ror reflec­tion of how you feel deep inside. As a result, you will be con­gru­ent and lead a bal­anced life.

When peo­ple look for out­side stim­u­la­tion or encour­age­ment, whether it’s from pep ral­lies or drugs, it’s because they do not appre­ci­ate what they must do in order to reach their goals. This is the mis­align­ment I dis­cussed ear­lier. It hap­pens when there is the lack of a clear purpose.

For instance, if peo­ple get pumped up on the out­side, their inner selves will even­tu­ally find ways to down­play that exter­nal moti­va­tion. It’s really a fake sense of enthu­si­asm. They may appear excited and enthu­si­as­tic, but some say that peo­ple who appear too happy or excited are phonies. I’m not say­ing this is true all the time but it is cer­tainly true when the moti­va­tion or the rea­son for their excite­ment does not come from deep within.

About the Author

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