Fresh Start Monday #71: From knowledge to action

Each of us has natural tendencies. The way we navigate through life. The grooves well worn from repeated behaviors.

Last week, I wrote about my three words for 2024. One of them was bold.

The word bold came up for me because it's naturally the opposite of who I am. I've been studying the Enneagram this year and recently read The Enneagram Guide to Waking Up by Beatrice Chestnut.

I'm a type 5. The first line on how to identify a type 5: "You focus much of your attention on learning new things as an end in itself, not as a means to achieve something else."

That's wonderful, but not bold.

In the journaling group, bold is a word others also had as one of their three words for the year. Other similar words that came up were confidence and influence.

The theme that arose is to step into one's own power.

One of the most common things I see in my coaching clients is that they possess this Mariana Trench of knowledge on a unique topic or field. However, they have not yet applied their knowledge to be considered experts in their topic or field.

For too long, you've been in this accumulation and knowledge phase. Never ready. Never the right time. It's time to step into impacting others.

The transition between:

  • Learner and doer

  • Consumer and creator

  • Passive and active

At the end of each coaching session, I ask clients what action they want to commit to before the next call. All too often, I hear action disguised as:

  • I need to research X

  • I need to take X course

  • I need to look up how X did it

  • I need to read X book

  • I need to plan X

One great way to know if what you're doing is actually creating progress is by asking yourself, if I keep doing this for the next five years, will I have the results I want?

Let's say you want to create a YouTube channel. If you keep researching how to do it, taking courses, watching other channels for inspiration, outlining videos, and planning your content strategy will you have created a YouTube channel? Isn't the answer an easy no?

It's about pairing knowledge with action.

There are a few root causes to unpack here, primarily fear, but today I want to share two ideas about taking action.

Action is a muscle that can be built like anything else.

1. Rule of Two-Thirds

This rule comes from The Talent Code by Daniel Coyle:

Our brains evolved to learn by doing things, not by hearing about them. This is one of the reasons that, for a lot of skills, it’s much better to spend about two thirds of your time testing yourself on it rather than absorbing it. There’s a rule of two thirds. If you want to, say, memorize a passage, it’s better to spend 30 percent of your time reading it, and the other 70 percent of your time testing yourself on that knowledge.

Let's say you spend 100 hours watching YouTube videos on running. I spend 50 hours running. Who will be faster?

If you take a weekend course that's 10 hours long on a subject. Spend 20 hours taking action on what you've learned.

Or if it takes you five hours to read a book. Spend ten hours applying it to a project you're working on.

You might scoff at how much time you spend taking action. If you do, track how much learning you're doing on a specific topic. What’s the balance of time and effort learning vs doing? Treat learning as complementary to action. Not a substitute for action.

2. Everything hard in life is just a series of easy things.

Let the first step be the domino that topples the hard thing.

For example, running a marathon is very hard. Running a 5k is hard.

Putting on your running shoes is very easy. Walking around the block is easy.

When we think of action, we only think of the big scary thing at the end that we've never done before.

But dominoes can't be skipped.

If direct communication at work is the action, speaking up in a large meeting with executives present is very hard. Having a difficult conversation with your boss is hard.

Sending an email is very easy. Sending an email and replacing one filler word with something more direct is easy.

Set up the dominoes for the action you want to complete.

Whatever your intentions for 2024, consider whether you're stuck in this knowledge phase. Challenge yourself to DO, however small that might be.

Local to Boulder, CO?

Join us Tuesday (1/16) on Meetup for a biweekly journaling group! This week will be at Tonic Alchemy Lounge. It's a cozy, intimate space with a wide variety of tea, kava, tonics, desserts, and cocktails available.

Thoughtful Tuesdays - Journaling Group

Tuesday, January 2nd at 6pm MT at Tonic Alchemy Lounge!

Books

Currently reading: Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones

  • I’ve been rereading this book as I prepare to host a workshop on it. I’ve been reflecting on how deep I’ve been getting into the material, the notes I’m taking, and how much I’m absorbing, contrasted with my impatience to finish it.

Finished reading:

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