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I have been pondering the say “Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”.

So the questions are:

  • how do you detect what things you are doing over and over again
  • how you change those things?

Perhaps you question what I want to change? I have some plenty of time right now and I feel that I'm doing nothing with my time. I'm somewhat lazy, but I'm learning something I don't know right now for a little change in my professional career (it is only another area, not a real change of career).

I also have some projects in mind but I don't feel I'm doing any progress in any of them.

so

  • how do you change yourself in a more productive, self-awareness and proactive person?
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for optimal results I would recommend to try to split your question, because it is to general. – hellectronic Jan 13 '12 at 18:39
Thought I think I have read what I want. How I can split it? doing new questions? or you mean that I can split the thread? – tyoc213 Jan 13 '12 at 21:21
I said it because Productivity, Self-Awareness and Proactivity are big topics in itself :) – hellectronic Jan 14 '12 at 13:02

3 Answers

up vote 7 down vote

One of the best advice I read about trying to change habits is this:

Do not try to break old habits. Form new ones.

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You mean, old bad habits with new bad habits? or habits in general... if that is the case, then with what you replace an habit? – tyoc213 Jan 13 '12 at 17:16
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new bad habits :) ? To make a new behaviour a habit, you have to do it once every day and this ca. 30 days long. You have to be clear what you want to do. Maybe this can be helpfull too productivity.stackexchange.com/questions/1976/… – hellectronic Jan 13 '12 at 18:36
I have asked, because I misread your quote and instead read some like "Do not try to replace old habits. From new ones."... So you get now why I asked. Now I get it clearly. – tyoc213 Jan 13 '12 at 21:19
up vote 1 down vote

Start tracking and reviewing your actions each day. If you notice how much time you're "wasting" or spending on things that aren't priorities, it can trigger a change.

As for "how do you change yourself into a more productive, self-aware, and proactive person", you can start by listing your various projects, and making sure that you always know the next action that you'd need to take towards completing each one. Then, when you're deciding what to do, just pick one of the actions and do it. Review your project list regularly and make sure that it aligns with your overall priorities in life.

That's just a portion of the "Getting Things Done" organizational system, that you can read about more if this little bit of it appeals to you.

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I have started to use a software to track the programs I use more. I will do a post-mortem (one that I have been deliberately letting aside) and see if it can trigger the change. – tyoc213 Jan 13 '12 at 17:22
up vote 1 down vote

You pose several different questions.

"How do you detect what things you are doing over and over again?" I respond with "How do you track what you need to do?" Your answer is hidden in my question. Whatever method you use, periodically take your completion data, and do some analysis to identify things you are doing repeatedly. Then you can decide if that's something you should change.

If you aren't tracking your tasks now, that's the first change I recommend you make - use GTD (Getting Things Done) or some other organizational system that leads you to track your tasks. Which will provide the data you need to answer your question.

"how do you change yourself in a more productive, self-awareness and proactive person?" - set goals, devise projects that move you toward those goals, and tasks to accomplish the projects. Break them all down into small steps that can be done easily ("Next Actions" in GTD-speak) and a lot of small steps will add up to successful accomplishments. This is the "higher goals" part of GTD, where you set goals with time spans of 1-2 years, 3-5 years, and life, so you know why you're doing various projects.

Goal setting is a very powerful practice. I'm trying to get better at it.

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You pose a different, but interesting and intriguing point to me, I have always think of objectives like projects and not use projects to lead to an objective. I have watched this days that I fail at have objectives and priorities... or that my little decisions are moved easily either by opportunity or lack of, or by some one else necessities. – tyoc213 Jan 13 '12 at 17:20
By the way, I'm not tracking my task, objectives, projects right now... I always have been like this. – tyoc213 Jan 13 '12 at 17:21

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