Am I a Man of Thought, or a Man of Action? That idea smacked me in the forehead a bit ago. Most guys try to be one or the other – but then, I’m not most guys.
When I was young, I was exclusively a Kid of Thought. I was a reader, a dreamer, an artist and schemer. But I desperately wanted to be a Man of Action – I wanted to be Indiana Jones before there even was an Indiana Jones. When I joined the Air Force, I threw myself into the Man of Action persona … with mixed reviews. I didn’t really know how to do the stuff I thought I could do. For many years afterwards, I was neither. My actions were all desperate and pointless, my thoughts all jumbled and dark. I flopped incessantly between wanting to do stuff and wanting to create stuff – doing and creating nothing, just wanting to.
Now I’m in a position where I am doing some things – not rapidly, mind you, but still. And I am also creating things out of nothing but thought. Again – not quickly. Certainly not as quickly as I would like. And so, the question asks itself: ‘Which should I be, a Man of Thought or a Man of Action?’ And I ask back: ‘Why can’t I be both?’
It’s late in the game for me – I can’t waffle back and forth forever. I insist on creating as much as I can for as long as I can. However, I want to do things, as well – I want to travel, I want to invent and build and fly. It seems to me that the typical either/or answer to this question is just not sufficient. Let’s see if we can create a better answer.
I’ve spent too much time and ink already answering the Lameist objection to being both a Thinker and a Doer – that no one can do both, it’s just too difficult. My simplest answer is: ‘It may be too difficult for normal people, but I’ve never been normal.’ I absolutely can do both, I already do. Not going to go into the ridiculously long list of past accomplishments or present capabilities. I know what I can do – other people just need to pay attention. My issue is, how can I do more of both? Time is short.
There are dozens, hundreds, possibly thousands of different ways that people recommend (and get paid a lot of money to recommend) to other people on ways to do more in less time. I’ve never found a single system that works for me for more than a week. The primary hold-up, for me, seems to be whether or not I want to do a thing. Any task – no matter how difficult – if I really have an itch to do it, I will spend hours, days sometimes, focused on the task until I get it done. But if it’s something I really don’t want to do, even if it’s simple or quick, I will avoid doing it at all costs. Productivity gurus would say, ‘Well, okay – just do the thing you don’t like first and get it out of the way so that you can do what you want.’ Nope. My refusal to do the hated thing will stop everything else from happening. Horrifying.
There has to be some way to just power through the odious tasks in order to get to the ones I want to do. Who knows? Maybe it really is just as simple as adulting my way through the crappy stuff early in the day so I can be child-like and play for the rest of the day. But in the back of my mind there’s a voice that says, ‘There’s a better way.’
Now, what would this ‘better way’ consist of? Well, I know what it can’t be. It can’t involve trying to fool myself or hypnotize myself – those don’t work on me. I have been fooled occasionally by others. But once I see through the deception, I never trust the source again. Any better way cannot involve ‘pumping myself up’ to get the job done. I simply turn my back on such foolishness. I don’t respond to bribes or threats – at all. If I am told (even by myself) that I MUST do a certain thing by a certain time, my stubborn streak kicks in. I have a real issue with deadlines as a result. However – I have learned over the past year or so that I can make deadlines work for me. It’s all in how I phrase it to myself. Now there’s the beginning of an idea.
For simpler or quick tasks, I find that if I get up and do the thing immediately, without thinking about it, I just get it done. Two or three things can be done in short order.
What if I re-phrase the entry to the longer or more boring tasks? If I say to myself, ‘If I just do A and get it done, I can go on and do B as much as I’d like’. Simple logic, no ultimatums. That might work.
For more protracted cases, I could set a time limit on Task A – a half hour or an hour – and then play the rest of the day. That might also work. And if I take a little longer, no harm.
It’s possible I can also turn my stubbornness into an asset. By changing my POV and turning a ‘job’ into a ‘project’, I can engage all my resources into getting things done. I’ve painted several rooms in the house this way.
My only real issue after that comes from ‘time-wasting’ activities: YouTube and reading manga, for instance. With those things, I also need to set time limits, or they end up eating entire days. I don’t want to avoid them entirely; I get a lot of relaxation from these things. Moderation in all things is a good rule.
Overall, I think that mindfulness is probably the rule of the day. No need to belabor things, or overschedule, or fret and fume. In the words of Yoda, ‘Do, or Do not. There is no Try’. Seems like a plan.
pax et ama
bcd