The Successful Never Wash Their Own Dishes
publication date: Jul 30, 2009
|
author/source: Tristan J. Loo
"The biggest mistake people make in life is not trying to make a living at doing what they most enjoy."
-Malcolm S. Forbes  I have a personal confession to make…Actually, I have several. I don’t wash my own dishes. I don’t wash my own car. I don’t clean my house. I don’t buy groceries. I don’t wait in line to send packages at the post office. I don’t mow the lawn. I don’t scrub the tub. I don’t vacuum, nor do I sweep or mop. I don’t do laundry. Heck, I won’t even put together that new desk I just bought! You might be thinking, “Wow, this guy is really worthless and lazy,” but the truth is that I work far harder than the average individual…and I work smarter because I incorporate a powerful little success tip that I’ll share with you in this article. Pareto’s Principle Vilfredo Pareto was an Italian economist who basically theorized that 80% of a country’s wealth was owned by 20% of the people. His principle has since been heavily adopted by personal development experts as a working model of time management, more commonly known as the 80/20 rule. The 80/20 rule (Pareto’s Principle) states that 80% of all the results in your life is achieved by only 20% of all the actions that you make. Big Rocks, Pebbles and Sand Stephen Covey popularized a demonstration of Pareto’s principle using a glass jar and a three separate containers full of large rocks, pebbles and sand. I’ll itemize what each of these items represents:
But I Thought We Were Talking About Productivity, Not Your Rock Collection! What does all this have to do with time management? Okay, I’ll get to the point. Like the glass jar, all of us have the same amount of time in a week: seven days, or 168 hours, or 10,080 minutes, depending on how you want to measure it. The problem that many people have is that they spend their week pouring the pebbles and the sand into their jar – the really unproductive activities that net poor results in their lives, instead of trying to put their biggest rocks first, the things that will make the biggest impacts in their lives. Only the Unsuccessful Say “I Have NO Time!” If you’ve ever caught yourself saying, or thinking that you don’t have enough time during the day to get stuff done in your personal life, then you need to re-evaluate your priorities. What exactly are you trying to get done? You know the main difference between hard workers who are unsuccessful and hard workers who ARE highly successful is that the unsuccessful hard-workers spend the bulk of their time trying to hammer out the 80% of their activities that produce very little added value in their lives. The highly successful spend the bulk of their time working on the 20% of activities that net a tremendous amount of value in their lives AND here’s the part that most time management systems and gurus don’t tell you…The key to the greatest amount of personal success is to delegate out the 80% of the other "low-yielding" activities to other people who can do it faster and better than you could ever hope to do. My Parents Taught me How to Work Hard, But NOT How to Work Smart My parents taught me some great values. They taught me to work very very hard and determination has been one of my trademark values. Unfortunately, they also they never understood the concept of leveraging their time. This is true with many people. They see hiring others to do the small stuff as something that “rich people” do, without realizing that most rich people do it to maximize their time to do what they do best, or have the freedom to do what they love to do. I work very hard, but I also work very smart. I work on the things that produce the most value in my life and I delegate all the small stuff to other people. What is Your Hour Worth? I know that some of you will protest that hiring someone to do your small stuff is too expensive and that you can’t afford it, but let’s examine that. What is the dollar value of your hour worth? Are you spending the bulk of your day doing minimum wage tasks? If you’re reading this article, then I’m sure that you’re one who values your time. Let’s say that you earn $65/hour on average. That means that when you are doing menial tasks like cleaning or running errands, you are costing yourself $65/hour doing those things. Would you pay someone $65/hour to vacuum your carpet or wash your dishes? Of course not! But in a sense, if you do those menial tasks yourself, then that’s exactly what you are doing. A company would not do that and neither should you. Delegate those minimum wage tasks to someone else and focus on those activities that are the best use of your $65/hour. The Successful Use Their Core Genius Everyone has something that they do better than everything else that they do. It comes naturally for them. They excel effortlessly when using it. Some people call this talent. I like the term core genius. If we are all naturally gifted at something, then it would make logical sense that if we wanted the greatest return on our time investment, that we invest our time doing activities that fall in line with our core genius. The highly successful people understand this. The highly unsuccessful don’t. The $95 Dollar an Hour Janitor A while back, I coached a friend of mine who was a janitor getting paid a very minimal amount of money, but she loved to clean and organize. She thought her skills and passion for cleaning and organizing would never amount to anything more than minimum wage and this made her depressed. She was contemplating looking into another line of work that would net more income for herself. I asked her if she was really passionate about those other careers. She said she wasn’t, so I advised her not to go into those areas because without the passion to fuel that motivation, burnout would set in and she would be miserable. I introduced her to the National Association of Professional Organizers (NAPO) which is the trade association for organizing consultants. She instantly fell in love with the association and started up her own business as a professional organizer. It took her no time to build a thriving business and she went from $10/hour to $95/hour and is in high demand. She focused on core genius by doing what she was good at doing and doing what she loved doing and she reached a greater level of success by doing so. Your goal should be the same. Focus on the Big Rocks, Delegate the Rest Okay, so just because I don’t do my own chores doesn’t mean that I’m lazy. It means that I realize that I only have 168 hours a week to get stuff done and if I spend most of those hours doing the small stuff that really doesn’t produce much added value in my life, then I’m really wasting my life. I choose to focus on the BIG ROCKS in my life, those activites that have the greatest impact on my future, rather than wasting my time doing the menial activities that really lack substantial results. This is a skill that all the most highly successful people in the world understand and it's the secret that eludes the hard working people out there who don't seem to get anywhere in life. Focus on the big rocks and delegate the rest. Where to Find Help? There are countless places to find help these days. If you consider these expenses to be extravagant, then you’re either paying too much or need to re-evaluate your values. Small things equals small pay, so you shouldn’t be paying top dollar for services that cover the small things. I don’t pay more than $10/hour for my army of personal helpers to do the things that they do. If you have children, then I’m sure you’ve hired a babysitter. Now, I consider that to be a VERY important task because they are taking care of your own child, but the concept is the same. I put an ad out in Craigslist every time I need to find someone to do something for me. It’s really simpler than you think. You Suck at it, But Someone Else Loves Doing it I’ll use washing dishes as an example. I hate it. I suck at it. There’s very little in this world that can get me to do dishes, except for the fact that I love to cook and need a pristine kitchen. One of the things you should be cautioned about when delegating is putting your own value system on the things that you hate because the things you hate doing might be within the core genius of another person. Yes, there are people who love washing dishes…Or washing in general. So you have to get away from the fear that others will judge you as being above everyone else or being extravagant. What you are realizing is that you suck at something, or that you hate doing something with a passion and you are allowing someone else with a better core genius in that area to do it faster, better and more efficiently than you could ever possibly do. That’s not extravagance – That’s smart working! The Exception to the Rule I have to mention that there is an exception to the rule of delegating everything away and that exception to the rule involves PASSION. No matter how menial a task is, if you find passion in that particular activity, then by all means keep it. Others hate cooking, but I’m so passionate about it that I’ll cook for any of my friends or family who drop on by. Cooking is a passion of mine and therefore it does not fall under the menial tasks lists. Instead, I put it in my wellness list along with all the other activities I do that reduces stress and promotes well being. About the Author  TRISTAN LOO
is the founder of the Self Improvement Association (SIA) and a leading authority on
human potential and personal effectiveness. As a life coach, author and
presenter, Tristan has inspired thousands of people all over the world
with his passionate message of overcoming adversity and creating the
ultimate life that they desire. His vision is a world where everyone is
able to achieve their dreams in life. His life is dedicated towards
facilitating that dream.Get more information about joining the Self Improvement Association |