Be excited – Hell Yeah!

Ive been re-reading through some old newsletters. On his blog, entrepreneur David Sivers, founder of CD Baby, once shared a great way to find focus.

Instead of committing yourself to everything, instead of agreeing to things that only half way excite you, Sivers says you should either be so excited by something that it makes you say hell yeah! Or you should say no to it.

When you say no, to the things that don’t excite you, you leave lots more room in your life to passionately pursue the few things that make you go Hell Yeah! We should aim to do things that we can be excited about.
It’s a really interesting idea, and one I want to follow.

So many times we agree to things that don’t excite us. I’m not suggesting you tell your boss that you are no longer doing things that are part of your job description. But many times, we agree to do things that are important to others but not us. Or the other person wants to hand over responsibility. We have limited time, so we should focus on what we want to do and if we have a choice, why not aim for something we can be excited about.

It’s not just at work, it’s also in our personal life, and that’s why I’m posting this up in the run up to Christmas, to give you chance to practice choosing to be excited over the holiday period, or to consider how you will take this forward when you return to work.

For the next 7 days I’d like you to give conscious thought to all that you do and be ready to say no.
Then make a note of how this makes you feel

Don’t beat yourself up if you end up agreeing to do something, think of this change as a muscle and you need to build it.

Make a note below of how you are getting on.

A version of this article first appeared on the Amazing People website on 12 November 2015