In this episode, we discuss the best strategies to tackle big tasks.
Full Transcript
Hi Everyone, welcome to the You’re Daily Cup of Joe Podcast, with your host Joe Bautista. In this podcast, my goal is to give you quick lessons that you can reflect on in your journal so you can grow yourself physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually and have a better career, better relationships, and better personal finances while you enjoy your morning cup of coffee.
I’m also the author of the book “More You Know, More You Grow: How to Get Better Every Day”. In this book, I wrote down over 30 tips to help you grow in those four cornerstones. I’m also the founder of Grow With Joe, where I combine self-development coaching and financial planning for Latino Professionals.
At the end of today’s podcast episode, I’m going to give you a prompt question to reflect on in your journal. The idea is to take one to five minutes to reflect on today’s lesson and write a minimum of one paragraph on how you can apply the lesson in your life. You can use an actual journal, a word document like on Google Drive, or your note-taking app like Evernote. The idea is that you’re actually thinking about how to process the information to help you improve your life.
In today’s episode, we are going to talk about the best way to eat an elephant. And the best way to eat an elephant is one bite at a time. The quote is about doing things in chunks and how we shouldn’t focus on the entire problem. Just start on one area and start getting to work.
One of the worst things I hate in life is packing, but I just tell myself that I’m going to start in this area, and just focus on this area until it is complete. Then I’ll move on to something else. That’s how I accomplished my last couple of moves and this is the same strategy I use in other parts of my life.
Just focus on the smallest piece that I can accomplish, then work on that piece until it’s done. Then you just move to the next thing. You don’t need to eat an elephant in one day, it can take you a week, a month, a year, or a decade to finish eating your elephant but you just need to get started.
Then I find that once you start getting momentum, then eating the next piece gets a little bit easier. It’s like the quote, you don’t have to be great to get started, you just have to get start to be great. But also realize that some elephants require you to start as early as possible. If I was to wait until the day before moving day to start packing, I’m going to fail. There is not enough time in the day to get everything done, because when we fail to plan, we plan to fail.
I know that I don’t want to be a failure, so this is why I plan out my future. I pretty much know what I want to accomplish over the next five years and what I need to do. It’s going to be a lot of work trying to build up my own financial planning firm, but I’m just going to take it one day at a time, and do what I can. Sometimes that requires me to rest but most of the time it requires me to get to work on the things that will get me the future that I desire.
So I’m just going to start working on eating my elephant, and this is all I can do. Or this is all I want to do because I know once I eat my elephant, then I’m going to have the life that I desire and I’m going to make the change in the world that I desire as well. This is going to require me to live a few years of my life like most people won’t, so eventually, I can live the rest of my life like most people can’t.
Has my journey been difficult, yeah, but I can’t see myself doing anything else in life and I feel that when I accomplish tough things, then it gives me a lot of joy and satisfaction? When I was in Marines and going through boot camp, if you just focused on the entire three months, then you would go crazy, but the way a lot of Marines did their times, was just go from chow to chow. I would wake up, get ready in the morning while being yelled at, then we would head to the chow hall, and then we would train and just think about making it to lunch, then after lunch, just thought about making it to dinner. Then all of sudden your three months was up and then you’re a Marine.
I tell everyone, you can be a Marine, you just have to say yes to getting on the plane and the drill instructors will take care of the rest. They will ensure that you eat your elephant one bite at a time. It won’t always be joyful, but you will accomplish something amazing and will be a better person for it. I believe life is about challenging yourself to do a little bit better every day, and if you do this for long enough, you’re going to be unstoppable and accomplish any task that comes your way. Then live your best life.
That’s it for today’s episode, to summarize it, the best way to eat an elephant is one bite at a time. So if you have a big goal or task that you want to accomplish, just focus on the smallest thing that needs to be accomplished, and then do that, then once that is done, then move onto the next thing. But also you have plenty of time ahead of you so you finish your task on time. If moving is going to take 40 hours, just make sure you spend 3 hours a day for 14 days packing, and you will be done. Or find a friend to help split up your time. I believe that there is nothing in life that can’t change with enough persistence, so understand why you’re eating this elephant and that should help you keep going.
So in your journal, ask yourself, what is a big task that you have in front of you? What is the first thing that you should do to get started? Is the thing you’re working on the most important thing to do? Have you tried creating a Gantt Chart to help with your progress? If you don’t know what a Gantt chart is, I highly recommend that you look it up. It will definitely help you with accomplishing your goals. Also, ask yourself, is there anything that I’m confused about doing or scared of doing to help me reach my goals? What is causing you to feel this way? Sometimes our own self-limiting beliefs hold us back from trying to eat the elephant, so just explore your thoughts and feelings as well.
Thanks for listening today! To get a free copy of my audiobook “More You Know, More You Grow: How to get better every day” just go to my website growwithjoe.me/book and you can download it right there.
I have a quiz on my website that grades your inner circle, so if you want to find out if your inner circle is an A, B, C, D, or F, you can take that quiz at growwithjoe.me/quiz
I’m also trying to do a feedback Friday episode, so if you have a question that you would like to have my answer on the air, just e-mail me at [email protected]
I’m also on Instagram at Grow With Joe and Facebook just look up Grow With Joe
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Thanks for joining me today and remember if you go with Joe, you can grow with Joe, cause Joe knows Dough.
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