Do your work -- especially when you don't feel like it

In this video, I'm going to encourage you to do your work, especially when you don't feel like it. Because I think it is an important skill to become excellent at your work, whether you're talking about your career or in your own personal life. The work of becoming a better person. And so there is a common misconception that people have about this teaching called go with the flow or follow your bliss. And there's my sweet dog Buddy there just poking around and people think, oh, follow your bliss. Go with the flow means you just do whatever you feel like in the moment. Like if I feel like eating a bag of chips, I'll eat a bag of chips, right? If I am supposed to be doing my work, but I don't feel like doing my work, then just take it easy. Self compassion, all that stuff. Of course I believe in self compassion. Of course I believe in that, right? But I believe in bringing your self compassion and your gentleness and your light and your love into doing the work that is your duty to do, that you plan to do, that you know is the right thing to do, that you feel in your conscience is the right thing to do. And so if you are willing to do that, you will become, you will become an above average human being. You will be able to excel in that area of work or of life, wherever you are willing to do the work, even when you don't feel like it, you will become above average and excel in that area where others don't. Okay? So I'm very grateful that I've been able to apply that to my content, for example. So right now I don't really feel like making this video. I'm dealing with some seasonal allergies. I'm in a particular field that I don't visit with my dog buddy very often. So I'm not really sure what kind of little trouble he might be getting himself into. Not a big deal. But it's not optimal. And that's the key. Even when conditions are not optimal, I do the work anyway because I planned to do it. And each time I do the work, even when conditions are suboptimal, even when the environment, the situation is not perfect, I do what, I do the right thing. What happens is I empower myself to do more of the right things in the future, especially when conditions are not optimal. Does that make sense? So let me just end this video with three words that may help you to do this. Plan it. That's planning is number one, whatever you feel is the right thing to do for your work. So for example, for me right now, my content, my videos, my plan is do it Monday, Wednesday, Friday. That's when I release my videos and make sure the plan for you, you can see yourself doing it. It's not too onerous for you, but it is maybe a little bit of a stretch, but not too onerous. And it makes you feel like, yes, if I do that, I'll feel really good about doing the right thing. So planning is important and seeing yourself doing it, you can see yourself doing it without making a too much of a hardship on yourself, but it's still a stretch. So it's not just taking it easy. Right? Again, bring yourself compassion to doing the work. And that's really the second word is practice. I see doing the work as practice. I don't see it as, oh, now it's time for me to make a perfect video. I see it all as practice. And that's where I think self compassion can come in. We need to be doing what we are meant to do, what we're supposed to do. Let's do the right thing. But then bring our self compassion when we don't do it perfectly. Because to be honest, I don't feel like I ever do anything perfectly. And if you have high enough ideals, you realize you don't do anything perfectly either, but that's perfectly fine. Bring yourself compassion. So, so practice is the second word which is as you do the right thing, see it as practice. The process is more important than the product, how it turns out. Because the process of doing the right thing, even when you don't feel like it, will empower you to do the right thing in even bigger situations. Okay? And then the third word I have for you is praise. So once you've done the right thing as a practice, doesn't matter if you did it right, perfectly or did it excellently, but the fact is that you did it even when it was hard, or at least a little bit hard, then you praised you praise yourself to say, I'm so grateful that I did that. And if you believe in God, praise God for giving you the strength and reminder to do the right thing, even when conditions are suboptimal. So plan, practice and praise. I hope this is helpful. Until the next video. I'm George Kao and I encourage you to remember the important human skill of doing the right thing, especially when you don't feel like it. Be well.