"Shut up and do the work"
#25 - finally finished a book in 2022!
Hi there,
It’s been a terrible week for humanity with the fast-moving Ukraine crisis. Millions of innocent civilians, people like you and me, have been shoved out of their homes, thanks to a game of politics. It is at this painful time that I suggest you a) recognise the privileged position that you are in and b) help alleviate the struggle for those affected however you can. A quick Google will bring up an extensive list of efforts you can take to improve another person’s life.
Returning to my little life, school life has picked up so easily, it seems like we never hit ‘Pause’. It has also been an eventful week cricket-wise, with the start of the Women’s World Cup, India bullying Sri Lanka at home (sorry to the two SL fans subscribed) and the groundbreaking news of the legend leg spinner Shane Warne dying. I’ve never been so niche about cricket here but his passing is massive, being a man who redefined the game. I also rehearsed hard for a concert, featuring in the
Highlight of the week: performing in a concert at Elgar Hall. It was my first time performing in a purpose-built musical arena and albeit medium-sized, the acoustics were a new experience to play in. You can listen to our pieces here - I’m the one at the end on the left, smashing out jazzy tunes on the super saxophone.
Today’s title comes from something I said to myself on Thursday evening. Feeling fatigued and a bit under pressure from a tall order of work, I had decided not to go to hockey training. The workhorse in my brain got in on the act,
“Alright then. Let’s use this time better. Let’s do…English Literature, got a bit of work to do there.”
It’s not a subject I avidly relish but I do care about it. Still, I didn’t have the motivation to get myself to do some video-watching and note-making on why Macbeth was a bad king. Following my previous advice,
I decided to walk away and dry the clothes that had just been blessed by the washing machine’s wonders. Before that, I had to remove the clothes already drying on our two 3-tier clothes airers. As I did that, I noticed how all of the clothes I had laid out the previous day had all fully dried, not common in the current climate. As I set about drying the new batch, I noticed my mind realising exactly where to put what clothes, going through a logical process for each dress.
Bear with me, I’m going somewhere with this. It turns out that by pure virtue of doing this staple chore on repeat for nearly 4 years, I had perfected my craft and nailed the art of drying clothes. I now arrange them in terms of their thickness, size and how long I think they’ll take to dry. I had practised it so much that I had gotten better at it. Simple as. No trying to source the scientifically optimal way of drying clothes, no manipulating the washing machine’s settings to reduce my workload, nothing.
It got me thinking: sometimes, you’ve just got to put the work in. And sometimes even when you don’t feel like it, you need to grit your teeth, warm up your discipline and get to work. Waiting for motivation is a dangerous exercise, which can lead you to inaction and ultimately, failure. The best of humankind work their socks off, and there are times when everybody isn’t feeling like they want to do what they want to do, even Elon Musk. But, in order to help out future you, in order to feel good about yourself for pushing through the psychological mountain, in order to make progress, you need to sometimes quit the moaning, stop being a baby, shut up and do the work.
There are a few caveats to this:
‘Grinding’ or ‘sweating it out’ without motivation is not sustainable, from a mental health point of view and also from the viewpoint of quality of work. You aren’t going to achieve loads, like I didn’t with my English (but I took the view that something is better than nothing) and it will be a constant sprint uphill, fighting against the resistance. Ultimately you’ll need to discover your reasons for accomplishing what you need to, whether that’s an extrinsic motivator or even better, sometimes inside of you.
Whilst there is the hard truth that you need to put a shift in and dedicate the time, the hours a mission needs, productivity matters. Efficiency and usefulness matter. If you’re constantly sifting through your textbook, and feeling like you’ve succeeded, unfortunately, you haven’t moved a lot. A quote that comes to mind is Einstein’s infamous advice of “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." Of course, do the work, but make sure that it’s worth it.
Countering my previous point, there are things in life where you simply can’t cut corners. Learning a skill, like a musical instrument or a language, or getting better at a sport, like football, it just needs the so-called ‘10000 hours of practise’ to master. In such domains, whilst there is room for effective training and knowledgeable guidance, it can be useful to think of your hours as being deposited in a bank account. The heftier your balance, the better you (should) will be.
In life, we all have things to do and there are ways to complete these tasks, the best way. But sometimes, you won’t feel like it (which is completely human). In those moments, choose to be your higher self. Choose to be the one that you’ll look back on and be proud of. Choose to shut up and get the work done.
Feel like a motivational speaker after that. Anyways…
Book of the week 📖
Let the party begin! Adi’s finally got to the finish line of a book. Tomorrow Will Be A Good Day was a fantastic read about a century-long narrative of highs and lows. The plan is to read Cashflow Quadrant next
Podcast of the week🎙️
On Purpose with Jay Shetty: 10 Ways to Get Things Done even when you don’t feel like it
Fits in with our topic of the week.
Article of the week📰
How to Be Successfully Content with Your Life
Found this from a while back, maybe the thing you need
Quote of the week💬
“Sometimes the bravest and most important thing you can do is just show up.” - Brene Brown
Adi