Liberat.es
Cringe and do it anyway
Yesterday I installed a new app on my Mac. It’s something I do on occasion, test out an app that I read about on the interwebs. This one is called One Thing, and it’s a simple utility that lets you put some text up in your menu bar. I thought it seemed kind of fun, and thought I’d give it a go.
I had no idea what I’d put in it when I first installed it. You can set up a shortcut to put the most currenly due item from your Reminders list if you want. But I don’t do to-do stuff (hard to not make a do-do-dodo joke here) on my computer. Instead, I put a quote that came from Steven Pressfield’s email this morning. It said:
PUT YOUR ASS WHERE YOU HEART WANTS TO BE1.
I was amused by that for the first couple of meetings I had this morning. Up in the corner of my screen in a kind of neon green were those words. It made me smile.
Then I was in a meeting with my colleague and one of our clients. During the meeting, the client talked about a process that her team isn’t a huge fan of. It’s one that we have introduced, and we can see how it makes the team closer. Our client mentioned that they don’t really like it, but it’s good for them. And my partner said, “Well, cringe and do it anyway.”
I loved this idea.
When the meeting was over, I changed the text in the menu bar.
And then I went about my work. Until.
Until I hit an item on my to-do list that I just did not want to do. I spun a bit. I opened Facebook. I closed Facebook. I checked the news. I checked email. I hit refresh on my email.
And then I looked at the top of my screen:
Cringe and do it anyway.
I laughed. And I took a breath. And I did the thing.
Now it’s done and I don’t need to do it again until next year (can anyone say ‘taxes’?).
There’s something to this.
It’s nice to have some words to kick me in the pants…especially when they weren’t intended for that.
I’d share a link about this, but I can’t find it. Google it if you want to know more.↩︎