How to ensure dissatisfaction is a key to success
by Guest Tickler Filed under Effectiveness, Entrepreneurship, Leadership, Life Skills, Motivation, The Martian Take
In the important areas of our lives, dissatisfaction is a positive – a way to constantly improve. At the same time, dissatisfaction has its limitations. Applying dissatisfaction to many areas of life just leads to frustration and regret.
In my first job, as a salesman with Procter and Gamble, at the annual sales meeting the Vice President of Sales got up and gave a speech on “divine discontent.” He told us we should never be satisfied with what is, we should always be striving for more, we should be aiming for the stars. We all got up and cheered and applauded. That was years ago, and the message in that speech has always stuck with me. He was right – being content with the status quo as a salesman is a recipe for failure.
We are constantly given the message that to stay in place is to lose ground; that today is all we have; that the future can be better, if we make it so. Those are all terrific messages and beliefs, and shape the behaviors and motivators of achievers.
But taken too far, those messages and beliefs can become a trap that can lead to all kinds of problems. Problems that grow out of the habit of thought called dissatisfaction. And that dissatisfaction – that habit of thought that can be so positively powerful, can lead to failure, dropping out, leaving things unfinished, procrastination, perfectionism and constant frustration.
In the new Woody Allen movie, ” Vicky Cristina Barcelona,” in a very intense scene, Maria Elena, Penelope Cruz’s character, accuses Cristina, Scarlett Johannson’s character, of being addicted to dissatisfaction.
“Addicted to Dissatisfaction.” What a great description! That state of mind where everything can be better – or different. That place where whatever is being done is not good enough. Where there is always something more important, more exciting, more fulfilling, more valuable, more rewarding. It’s being in that emotional place where nothing seems to be right, where everything is just a little bit off, a little bit less than desired.
We’ve all met people who seem to focus only on what didn’t happen, what wasn’t just right, what didn’t meet standards, what was a little off balance. Their dissatisfaction just sucks the life out of whatever it is they have focused on.
And when dissatisfaction extends to the unimportant areas, and it’s easy for that to happen, dissatisfaction becomes a destructive force. And recognizing that it has happened is often difficult. But “Addiction to Dissatisfaction”can negatively affect relationships, performance, health.
How to focus dissatisfaction on the important few, and adopt a more tolerant approach to the unimportant many – to get rid of an “Addiction To Dissatisfaction”?
The first step is recognizing the symptoms. Here are ten key symptoms of “Addiction To Dissatisfaction.”
1 – Being unable to separate the really important from the not really important. Treating everything the same, with the same intensity and focus.
2 – Increasing a performance expectation as soon as soon as the old expectation is met – without regard to its real importance.
3 – Criticizing yourself for not doing more – whatever that means. And then extending that criticism to other people, situations and solutions.
4 – Finding it difficult if not impossible to celebrate victories because they fall short of the ideal.
5 – Considering “good enough” to be unacceptable performance – on anything.
6 – Being convinced that you could have done much better if you had more time, more training, more focus, more resources. Feeling that what you did wasn’t your best work.
7 – Feeling that the people you associate with, work with, live with are not quite up to snuff, Not quite what you imagined, not quite what you expected, not quite what you hoped for.
8 – Striving for the ideal solution, behavior, outcome, and being satisfied with nothing less, without measuring the importance.
9 – Judging accomplishment against the ideal, and finding fault with the difference between the two – without evaluating the importance of the difference – or the accomplishment.
10 – Thinking that there are more important things to be done than what is being done now – without being able to really define what those more important things are.
Once recognized, how can you overcome this Addiction to Dissatisfaction while keeping dissatisfaction as a key to improvement in the important things? It starts with being aware that this habit of thought is imbedded in motivators and behaviors.
Start by reviewing the key symptoms, and determine if they describe you. You can’t fix something that you don’t know exists on a conscious level.
And then:
- Treat only the very few really important things as worthy of constant striving. Constant striving on everything just leads to never doing anything very well.
- Realize and accept that “good enough” ain’t bad – almost all of the time.
- Create SMART goals – for only the few important things and be satisfied with meeting the goals and then celebrate meeting them. SMART stands for Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic/Relevant, Time framed.
- Create goals that align with the goals of others who have influence over what you consider important – like your job.
- Continue to resist the very human impulse to add goals – keep the truly important to 3 to 5 goals – no more.
- Understand and accept that “meeting goals” for SMART goals is excellent performance.
- Beware of goal creep – that self inflicted monster that keeps moving the bar higher and higher – even when it makes little if any sense.
- Accept that there are areas in your life where performance is not what it is in the core areas – that doesn’t mean failure – it means being human.
- Be as focused as that fabled fictional detective, Sherlock Holmes. In one scene he tells his assistant, Dr Watson, that he doesn’t care if the moon goes around the sun or the earth goes around the sun. It makes no difference to him – all that knowledge could do to him would be to divert him from his truly important work. That work – in his case – is being the best detective he can be. Focus works to brush aside dissatisfaction with the trivial many.
Then keep striving – on the few things where striving will make a difference. Watch that Addiction To Dissatisfaction disappear, and be replaced by effective, focused accomplishment.
————————
Andy Cox helps his clients select and develop teams and talent. He focuses on helping leaders and emerging leaders define and develop their skills and talents using goals. He can be reached at http://www.coxconsultgroup.com , or at acox@coxconsultgroup.com
You will like these as well!
|
Featured Tickles  Heal Your Relationships to Heal YourselfIt has been rightly said that this world is a mirror. It reflects back our inner/true reality to us. As within, so without. Everything in our life; our job, our economic condition, our dwellings, and the people in our life reflect one or the other aspect of our reality. Isn’t this a beautiful arra The Power of UnlearningAs I picked up the vacuum machine and started vacuuming the carpet in my living room, a sense of dissatisfaction loomed over me. It had been just about a year since I bought this vacuum cleaner and it was already low in its efficiency. The buzzing sound of the motor from that machine sounded healthy 15 elephant tethers that stop you from being creative!The problem is never how to get new, innovative thoughts into your mind, but how to get old ones out. Every mind is a building filled with archaic furniture. Clean out a corner of your mind and creativity will instantly fill it. - Dee Hock When still a baby, the elephant is tethered by a very thick Smoking a cigarette is like talking to your mother-in-law because...Once upon a time, many years ago, in prehistoric times, at a time when there were no cities, no buildings and perhaps even no villages, there was a hunter. He had had a successful day and was walking through a forest back to his tribe. He had slung a deer across his shoulder with some homemade rope Here Is Your D-I-Y Kit For A Leading Edge LifeManagement gurus and their disciples, thinkers, strategists and business process re-engineers have been busy propelling the modern world into not only coping with, but also keeping in step with the rapid changes of an ever shrinking, increasingly competitive and exhaustingly demanding global market. I Wish I Were A GoldfishI am told that a goldfish cannot remember anything beyond a 3 minute time frame. One of my favorite pastimes is to sit and watch our goldfish swim around lazily and rising up only to gobble at the food before going back to their contented existence. Their swimming around actually reminds me of chil The Fine Art of Persuasive Communication!There are many areas to look at in communication: a message is communicated through visual, vocal and verbal means. From that, comes the importance of body language, how we present ourselves, and so on. The visual and vocal elements are indeed very important to effective communication, but we will Teaching the teacherThe arbiter of knowledge and skills, the teacher, is a revered figure around the world. In India, the teacher is known as the guru, the wise one who can be trusted to lead the knowledge-blind and shine the light of competence and skills in the darkness of ignorance and incompetence. Over time it ha How To Nurture A Successful RelationshipHave you ever wondered how certain couples were able to stay together for many years? What are they doing right? What are the factors that contribute to the success of healthy, long term relationships? There are a few fundamental components that will improve your chances of having a successful relat Waves Of InspirationI stay in the coastal city of Chennai and one of my favorite pastimes is to explore the coastline that borders one side of the city. Starting from the crowded marina and Eliot’s Beach to the less crowded and secluded ones that dot the East Coast Road (or ECR as it is called), I have always found How To Be Depressed"Depression was, indeed, the hand of a friend trying to press me down to the ground on which it was safe to stand--the ground of my own truth, my own nature with its complex mix of limits and gifts, liabilities and assets, darkness and light." Parker Palmer I've never been through pregnancy depress Make an ass of yourself but do not let the world know...Many a time we are swept by that overwhelming feeling to bare all. Not to be mistaken with confession which is done after ensuring that there is nothing further to lose on account of reputation. I am referring to pure tear jerker stuff. Born out of righteous indignation. Or plain stupidity. The form Time management with the monksOne mile south of Georgia O'Keefe's beloved Ghost Ranch in New Mexico, thirteen miles down a cliff-hugging dirt road in the heart of Chama Canyon, you will find Christ In The Desert. The Benedictine Monastery is cloister to about twenty monks. I'd fantasized about retreating to the remote monastery Forcing yourself to get up early in the morning is pointless!A google search on early rising gives 1,500,000 results. Amazon has 6699 books on getting up early. Countless self-development ‘gurus’ have written books and articles that extol the benefits of getting up before your friendly neighbourhood rooster does. They have together compiled a list of 10 5 Reasons Why I Got Off My Tail And Found A New Passion!I've taken some time this month to clean out my Gmail inbox, the main goal being to have a completely empty inbox. I went through each email one by one, until I got to the very last entry. It was labeled "journal" and dated 12/14/06. I knew it was there for me to print and tape into my actual jour If Excellence Is Your Ideal Everything Else Will Fall Into PlaceA young man went to Gautama Buddha and sought the Master’s guidance on how to achieve Enlightenment. The conversation, which in my opinion must be required reading for anyone, went roughly as follows: Young Man (YM): Master, how long will it take for me to achieve enlightenment? Gautama Buddha ( |
Loading ...
Twitter 
Facebook
Subscribe