
June 2, 2020
Essentialism Explained: How To Focus On What Matters | Greg McKeown on Modern Wisdom Podcast
Check out the Modern Wisdom Episode Page & Show Notes
Key Takeaways
- Just because someone is busier than you doesn’t mean they’re more important
- Being busy isn’t an achievement
- Ask yourself: “What is my mission? What is the thing I came here to do?” – Greg McKeown
- Once you’ve identified your mission and your important tasks, you can focus on them without having FOMO
- “Instead of the fear of missing out or FOMO, you start to have the joy of missing out or JOMO”
- Once you’ve identified your mission and your important tasks, you can focus on them without having FOMO
- “When you’re sleep deprived, the executive function of your brain goes down so you can’t discern properly between what’s important and what’s not important” – Greg McKeown
- Top performers tend to sleep 8.4 hours per night
- You don’t become successful and then become disciplined, you become disciplined and then you become successful
- Every day you should be writing out your to-do list and then prioritizing it
- Create a new list every day, what was important yesterday isn’t always important today
- Two questions you need to ask yourself:
- Who am I?
- Why am I here?
- If you never ask yourself those questions, the stuff on your to-do list could be completely wrong
Intro
- Greg McKeown (@GregoryMcKeown) is the author of the New York Times bestseller, Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less
- Host – Chris Williamson (@Chriswillx)
Books Mentioned
- Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less by Greg McKeown
- Scott Kaufman’s new book Transcend: The New Science of Self-Actualization talks about the importance of helping others
Being Busy ≠ Success
- When you become successful, you get a lot more opportunities which can pull you in too many directions and end up hurting you
- “Almost universally people will feel stretched too thin at work or at home, busy but not productive” – Greg McKeown
- Just because someone is busier than you doesn’t mean they’re more important
- Being busy isn’t an achievement
- It often means you’re being reactive instead of proactive
- Being busy isn’t an achievement
Having A Clear Mission = Success
- Ask yourself: “What is my mission? What is the thing I came here to do?” – Greg McKeown
- Once you’ve identified your mission and your important tasks, you can focus on them without having FOMO
- “Instead of the fear of missing out or FOMO, you start to have the joy of missing out or JOMO”
- Do what’s essential, ignore what is not
- “Instead of the fear of missing out or FOMO, you start to have the joy of missing out or JOMO”
- Once you’ve identified your mission and your important tasks, you can focus on them without having FOMO
- Find out what you’re really good at, then focus your energy in that direction
- “Take the time to explore, figure out what you really can make a great contribution in and then go big in it” – Greg McKeown
- If you don’t know what you want to do:
- Use inversion: List all the things you don’t like to do so you know to avoid them
- Ask yourself what you’re passionate about or what you’d be interested in learning how to do
- If you don’t know what you want to do:
- “Take the time to explore, figure out what you really can make a great contribution in and then go big in it” – Greg McKeown
- If your mission is to be a writer, your first article doesn’t have to be the best thing ever written
- You just have to start by publishing your first article and not letting perfectionism stop you
- “It doesn’t have to be perfect, it just needs to be published and then the feedback will come and then you’ll learn something” – Greg McKeown
- You can always go back and edit that article to make it better
- “It doesn’t have to be perfect, it just needs to be published and then the feedback will come and then you’ll learn something” – Greg McKeown
- You just have to start by publishing your first article and not letting perfectionism stop you
Finding What’s Essential
- How do you find out what you should be doing?
- List all of your tasks on importance from a 0-100 scale
- Anything that’s under a 90, question and maybe even eliminate
- “Every time you do something that’s below 90%, you’re taking it away from something that is 90% or above, you’re making a trade-off” – Greg McKeown
- Anything that’s on the bottom 10%, just eliminate it
- “Every time you do something that’s below 90%, you’re taking it away from something that is 90% or above, you’re making a trade-off” – Greg McKeown
- Anything that’s under a 90, question and maybe even eliminate
- List all of your tasks on importance from a 0-100 scale
- We have to protect our ability to prioritize
- You have to ignore both the internal and external nonessential voices
- Really listen to your conscious about what you should be doing
- “If you do that today in small ways, you don’t wake up 20 years from now and go, oh my goodness I’ve just given myself 20 years to the wrong goal” – Greg McKeown
- Really listen to your conscious about what you should be doing
- You have to ignore both the internal and external nonessential voices
- Just because you have a goal, it isn’t necessarily a worthwhile goal
- Someone else’s goal isn’t your goal
- Serving others is a great essential task
- “As soon as we step out to serve somebody else, I think a lot of that non-essential stuff starts to fall apart” – Greg McKeown
- Scott Kaufman’s new book Transcend: The New Science of Self-Actualization talks about the importance of helping others
- “As soon as we step out to serve somebody else, I think a lot of that non-essential stuff starts to fall apart” – Greg McKeown
Life Advice
- It can be hard to admit to yourself that you were wrong about something, but it’s important to be humble and admit mistakes
- You don’t become successful and then become disciplined, you become disciplined and then you become successful
- Don’t keep your phone in your bedroom at night
- Try to take a 10-minute nap every day, a vast majority of people are sleep deprived
- “When you’re sleep-deprived, the executive function of your brain goes down so you can’t discern properly between what’s important and what’s not important” – Greg McKeown
- Top performers tend to sleep 8.4 hours per night
- “When you’re sleep-deprived, the executive function of your brain goes down so you can’t discern properly between what’s important and what’s not important” – Greg McKeown
- Every day you should be writing out your to-do list and then prioritizing it
- Create a new list every day, what was important yesterday isn’t always important today
- Two questions you need to ask yourself:
- Who am I?
- Why am I here?
- If you never ask yourself those questions, the stuff on your to-do list could be completely wrong
- First, you need to find out the right things, then go spend time doing those things
- If you never ask yourself those questions, the stuff on your to-do list could be completely wrong
- Two questions you need to ask yourself:
- Create a new list every day, what was important yesterday isn’t always important today
Additional Notes
- If you play stupid games, you’ll win stupid prizes
- Often times there’s something we could be good at but we don’t know it since we’ve never tried it