Jim Rohn was one of America's foremost self help
philosophers. He was at once very profound and yet
very simple to understand. His advice was at once
simple to implement and yet almost magical in its
results. How does he do it?
I want to share with you some of his key
principles.
The first principle. Focus on 5 or 6 key things in
any area that you want to master.There really are
no more factors than these.
In other words the Pareto principle.
For example to get to a higher standard of living,
higher in all respects, Jim says we need to focus
on fundamentals such as happiness, action instead
of delusion, discipline,etc.
Another principle of his that took me a while to
grasp is that you need to work harder on yourself
than you do on the job. But when I grasped it it made
a big impact on my life as you can see by my story.
I have been a project manager for a few years or
rather I was leading teams. When things got bad
such as when someone was absent or we were in danger
of missing deadlines I just rolled up my sleeves and put in
extra time. Sometimes that helped and
sometimes it did not. When you are working
continuously till 11 PM you tend to make mistakes.
I was working hard on my job as you can see. Then
I took a certification exam in project management.
I spent 3 months preparing hard for it. I was
working on myself by improving my project management skills.
The payback, I recently completed a 10 month long
complicated project without missing the deadline
by even one day!
One of the reasons why Jim's philosophies are
simple to implement but almost magical in their
results lies in the very nature of us human beings
- what is easy to do is also easy not to do.
That is it. Jim's principles are easy. But since
when did that make them easy to implement. It is
the same with common sense is it not. How common
is it?
My personal example with this is similar to what
Jim shares, the habit of eating an apple a day.
Most days at work, I am fried by 6:00 PM. I come
home and plop. But on those days I have the
foresight to bring an apple and get to eat it in
the evening I am a different person.
To prevent what is easy to do from becoming easy
not to do make it a habit. I made physical
workouts a habit.On those days I don't workout I feel
unclean like I did not bathe or brush my teeth.
One of Jim's most powerful philosophies is that
in whatever area of life you want to succeed you
need to educate yourself in that area. This blew
my mind away because I am the classic case of
someone pursuing education for the sake of education
and not for an objective other than the vague one
of landing a great job. I got a bachelor's in
engineering and two masters in computer science
and business administration.
To become a more effective project manager I
educated myself in the art and science of project
management and of course continue to do so.
This sounds like an obvious example. But to become
a better husband you need to educate yourself. To
become a happier person you
need to educate yourself as well. You thought
happiness was a by product of some thing else such
as a big promotion etc? So did I.
As a project manager I love the next principle -
don't start the day until it is finished. What
does Jim mean by this?
Each evening write out what you want to accomplish
the next day. You could list only the most
important tasks or you could write down what you
want to do in each time slot. It is upto you.
The results are almost mystical! On those days
that I do this I accomplish far more sometimes
every thing that I listed down than my normal days
when I just drift from one fire to another. It is
not like I am trying set myself up for success
either by listing just the easy stuff. I am not
trying to prove anything here. Try it. It will
probably be the most gratifying thing you did that
day.
The last principle I wish to share is also my
favorite.
Just get started.
Tiny acts done daily compound to a remarkable level
in a very short period of time. Andy Jenkins calls
perfection the lowest level of achievement and 'doing' the
highest. Mike Litman says it is more important to
get going than to get it right.
When I wrote the book on 'True Stories of
Personal Achievement', available for free on my
website, the graphics on the cover were
amateurish, the formatting not so great. But the
content was and that was more important to me.
When I started out with my website to sell comics
I was the one who became a comic with the number
of mistakes I made. But for them I could not have
created a far better website with a far better
process. But make no mistake knowledge is
important you will end up a motivated idiot if you
have one without the other.
I shared several of Jim's philosophies that
impacted me personally with you. But don't just
follow them blindly. Try them out and if they work
make them a part of your own philosophy.
In Jim's own words if you want for example to
multiply your income by 3, 4 or more times you
can't say to the company "I need more money".
You've just got to say to yourself "I need a
correction in my philosophy"
For the Youtube Video on this article click http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1GSPZ0NlrNY
