Do Things That Make a Difference

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One of my most effective daily mantras is:

Do things that will make a difference today.

I started using this about 15 years ago when I was still a fresh entrepreneur and struggling with the unstructured nature of the journey. Even though I only worked a regular job for 3 or 4 years, I was so used to operating in structured environments that I found it rather hard to accept full responsibility for my daily activities. Basically, I was too used to being told what to do.

I blame school for this. If there’s a downside to getting good grades and excelling at standardized tests, it’s that it teaches you some wrong lessons about real life. First of all, you become conditioned to believe that success is about learning how to answer questions and do really well on discrete tasks given to you by authority figures. In other words, it prepares you perfectly for having a job. Secondly, it makes you think of life as some kind of predictable series of sequential challenges. 

Nothing could be further than the truth. 

Success in life is not about answering questions but rather in learning how to ask them. And life is not some pre-defined game but rather a completely unpredictable wide-open field of endless possibility. 

Don’t get me wrong, if you are a young person, I want you to excel in school. That path can open many important doors for you. Just don’t let yourself get caught up in false beliefs along the way.

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When I was first becoming an entrepreneur, I had to make a big, conscious effort to not waste the day waiting around for instructions. I kept looking for my work to manifest in neat little pre-defined tasks. I got really good at things like answering all my emails and staying on top of administrative matters. But I really struggled with all the creative uncertainty of entrepreneurship.  

“What to do, when there is no one telling me what to do?”

It’s 10am. There’s nothing in my Inbox. All my bills are paid. All my files are organized. Now what? For a while, I defaulted to things like reading books about investing, taking online courses, and trying to schedule meetings with other investors and entrepreneurs to pick their brains—i.e. more school-like actions.

It wasn’t just the blank canvas effect and the not knowing what to do; it was also a discomfort with the whole idea of doing speculative work. You see, in school, everything has an obvious goal and a clear beginning and end. Yeah, you might get a dumb assignment from time to time—the ones that don’t seem to have any purpose or make any sense—but at least you know what to do—i.e. just try to get a good grade. But when you are looking for real estate deals and trying to raise money from investors, not only is there no clear end or beginning to the work, but there are also a lot of times when you put in a ton of effort and nothing happens in return. Often, it can all feel like a waste of time.

One day though, something clicked. I’d like to believe that after months of hard work and sacrifice, I finally just figured things out, but it was probably more a function of necessity than anything else. It’s amazing what dwindling cash reserves can do to a young, exceedingly ambitious young person! 

Anyway, on fire with motivation, fueled by equal parts stress and ambition, I started asking myself, “What can I do today that will actually make a difference in the trajectory of my life?” 

It didn’t take long for the obvious answers to emerge. At that time, there were really only two things that could make a difference for me: 1. Finding a new deal and 2. Finding an investor to fund it. Everything else I was doing was at best necessary but not sufficient and at worst a complete waste of time. So, armed with my mantra—“Do things that will make a difference today”—I got to work finding deals and investors and the rest is history.

Well, sort of. 

I’ve been in the entrepreneurship game for over 15 years now and I still need a good reminder from time to time. The reward system conditioning I picked up in school runs deep in my psyche, I guess. 

Whenever I’m feeling stuck or stagnant though, my mantra helps me figure out how to break through. By asking “Does what I’m doing actually have a good chance of getting me where I’m trying to go?” you give yourself a kind sanity check. As long as you are honest with yourself and bring sufficient strategic intelligence and awareness to the table, it won’t be too long before you know exactly what to do and what not to do. 

As you experiment with this mantra, it’s important to remember a few things:

1. While it’s a good idea to have powerfully motivating goals, it’s a huge mistake to engage in “if only” thinking. 

You cannot condition your happiness, sense of self, or purpose on any wished-for future states. Otherwise, you risk getting caught up in the emptiness of the achievement trap, where you are always feeling unsatisfied and asking “What next?” Resist the temptation to think “if only this…” or “if only that…” no matter how motivating or inspiring it may feel. 

2. It’s a big mistake to seek the elimination of the responsibility for work. For life is work.  And I mean “work” in the largest possible sense.  Even if you are not engaged in economic work, there’s the work of just staying alive and being a good human.

I see too many people believing in the false promise of a life of leisure at the end of the rainbow. To be sure, there are many things you should absolutely try to permanently resolve—things like:

• Having too much debt

• A bad boss / employer

• Addiction

• Work that makes you feel empty

It’s wise to seek the resolution of negative matters you want to get out of your life and it’s totally legitimate to seek a better life. However, to seek a permanent resolution to the challenges of life is a fool’s game. It’s not over until it’s over! This is one of the many problems with the whole idea of retirement. More on that some other day. 

3. Finally, it’s a good idea to keep in mind that life is both linear and cyclical.

Life is linear in the ultimate sense—being born puts you on the path towards an inevitable death. But it’s cyclical in the way that it manifests to your consciousness. Life is always something that must be lived day by day no matter what kind of success you achieve along the way.

To make a difference in daily life and deal effectively with the cyclical energies of life, you need to install a good set of habits. The best way to think of these habits is to treat them as completely non-negotiable. My current list includes:

• Exercise

• Reading

• Journalling / Writing

• Meditation / Prayer

And I do them every single day. It’s important not to forget these essential, life-giving practices as you are pursuing your big, difference-making goals!

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