365 Days of Living the Dale Carnegie Principles
Day 82. Wednesday, June 15, 2011
This day was jam packed with opportunities to use Dale Carnegie principles. I had so much blog material I made notes throughout the day so I wouldn’t forget. I even bragged to my friend at work that I can’t keep up with production—business is booming with too many blogs to write. By the end of the day I had eight blog topics to choose from—a new world record. (Usually I have at least two stories to choose from)
Surprisingly, as I sat to write earlier this evening I was struggling. I wrote two drafts just for one of the blog topics and neither draft was any good. Too much chatter and details—you’d fall asleep with what I wrote!
How can I have eight fabulous topics and not be able to write them well? That’s when I realized the problem. It’s that pesky principle from How to Stop Worrying and Start Living:
Rest before you get tired.
For once I was not worried about topics when I sat down to write. Yet—my mind just couldn’t come up with anything coherent—despite having lived the day’s events. (it might have something to do with the fact that I was up until 3 am on Wednesday)
I have to keep reminding myself that rest is important—otherwise my efforts become futile. This is not an easy task for me! Even now as I type this I see it as a fake blog. Yes, it’s 3:30 am. But in my mind I can and should just dig my heels in deep and figure out how to write the best blog from the 8 topics I came up with. Yet, I am also aware that I did try… and it didn’t work. GRRRRRRR!
So remember, work actually does become easier with the proper amount of rest—both physical and mental rest. Odds are I will struggle with this one for the entire duration of the blog….
I was discussing this challenge with a friend we will call the Tofu Fairy. He said something very brave and very true about me. I am stubborn. Let’s hope that I can figure out how to harness my stubbornness in such a way that I do rest before I get tired and not feel like I have to apologize for it.
