The One Thing By Gary W. Keller And Jay Papasan : Summary, Overview, And review
We are going to go over the The One Thing by Gary Keller. This is going to be like a kind of summary, Overview and review.
The most important thing that we should be doing every day is this focus question.
“What’s the one thing I can do such that by doing it, everything else will be easier or unnecessary.”
Base on their research this question will or should take about 66 days for a habit to be create. And we all should know how powerful a habit can be. Just think of one your habits. Weather it’s beneficial to your or not. Once your create a habit, it probably stay with you for life.
To my understanding a habit can be change or create by repetition or by some kind of experience or event that is so traumatic that our physical body is change instantly.
Any way back to the focus question. Once we ask , “What’s the one thing I can do such that by doing it, everything else will be easier or unnecessary.” and you decide what’s that one thing then until your one thing is done, completed or finished everything else is a distraction.
Like just now, Once I started typing oddly enough I am kind of hungry, No no no no no, I don’t get to eat until I finish this post. You see, I just notice this was a distraction. Why? because I know that if you read the book, is going to take you like 7 hours to read and if you listen to the Audiobook is going to take you over 5 hours to listen. This is one of the best book you could ever read. But it’s really long.
I hope this post is as useful to you, as it is for me when I come back to this post to refresh the learning.
Will Power, its one of the thing he goes over. How one day we have it and another day we don’t. To my understanding, if I understood correctly, will power is limited. Once you have it, you should use it on a beneficial way, because it will deplete.
Therefore, we should look at will power as energy. Sometime you want to do some kind of activity but you can’t do it because you don’t the energy. think of time when you wants to stay awake doing something but you body is going into sleepy mode until eventually you fall sleep.
Will Power is kind of the same thing, once you have it you should use it because it will eventually run out and it will need to rest to be replenish.
Going back to the focus question, this is like a map for your big and small stuff with a possible time frame.
he goes over asking questions for different areas of your life. And how you may want to add a time flame to the question. Like if you were to ask the question for physical health, it will goes like this.
Physical Health
“what’s the one thing I can do to achieve my physical goal in one month such that by doing it, everything else will be easier or unnecessary”
Or for your finance, it may goes like this.
Finance
“what’s the one thing I can do to improve my net worth such that by doing it, everything else will be easier or unnecessary.”
If you have a current job, the question could be ask like this. actually, next time you have a review of your monthly stats with your manager or higher up. You may want to ask them the following question. And just look at their reaction. Priceless 🙂
For your Job
“What’s the one thing I can do to ensure this month I hit my goal such that by doing it, everything else will be easier or unnecessary.”
He also talk about how when you ask this focus question, the answer could come to you in 3 forms.
Doable, in which you already have the experience and skills.
Stretch, where you most likely would need to do some research
and possibility, I am not sure about this one, I think this is a really big answer, so you know is possible but you may need to break it down into specific and small part.
Role models
He goes over how you should search for clues and role models that can point you in the right direction. who knows I may put link to some role models.
I like how he says that you could be smart but other humans have live before you. And that it will be quite wise to study what other people has done first and then build your action on the back of their experiences and lessons. how their experiences and their research is the best place to start since thanks to them we have actual data.
Bend matching and trending
I going to start taking better notes when I consume. I got nothing on bend matching and trending.
Purpose
He goes over your big one focus question should be your purpose. And your small one focus thing should be the priority you take to achieve.
I like this. I think physical health and Financial freedom should be every human Big purpose.
when it comes to physical health, Because when you sick and I mean Sick with capital S, you just want to get better. I’m almost sure that every one of us had experience some kind paralyzing body physical pain, where you priority suddenly change and you just want get better.
when it come to financial freedom. Just imagine, if you current assets or if you have a large enough capital that the interest from that capital or assets, is large enough to allow you to do two things,
one, a portion of that interest goes toward covering your monthly living expenses.
two, the other portion of that interest goes toward reinvesting back into the capital or assets.
accomplish does two things and you are set for life. Why? simple you get to work because you want to work, not because you have too.
I have had the privilege of taking time off, half a year off here and there, I have even taken over a year off, Just doing nothing but indulging. There was a time where I actually thought that playing video games, or watching animation, or tv … etc. would never get me bore.
I was wrong, So wrong, I was BORED, I learned that even things you love and like when taken to the extreme could be bad. That brings us the next topic. Call happiness.
Happiness
He talk about happiness, how once we get what we want the happiness quickly disappear. There is a reason for it. we got accustomed to it and eventually get us bored , forcing us or making us seek something new or different.
he also talk about how achieving and acquiring or acquiring and achieving without enjoying any of it could be bad too. so we should take the take to enjoy what we obtain. I think that’s true but let’s not go to the extreme.
he also says that happiness happen in the way to fulfilment. he said that his purpose is to help people live their greatest live possible though his teaching couching and writing.
I actually like how he says that he teach what he couch and it’s supported by what he write. to my understanding this is call congruency.
he also says how time bring clarity and if you find you don’t like it , you can always change your life.
Beside purpose he also talk about priority and productivity.
Priority
With purpose you know where to go, with priority you know what to do to get there.
he give quite a few examples,
Goal settings
This is how you go about setting goals, especially the big goal
Examples he gave
“what’s the one thing I want to do someday base on my daily goal, what’s the one thing I can do right now”
“base on someday goal what the one thing I can do in the next 10 years to be on track to achieve it”
“now base on my 10 year goal what the one thing I can do in the next 5 years to be on track to archive it my 10 year goal”
“now base on my 5 yeas goal what’s the one thing I can do this year to be on track to archive my 5 year goal”
“base on my 1 year goal what’ the one thing I can this month to be on track to archive my one year goal…”
he continue saying the same thing with
month…weeks, today , now, you get point.
he talk about how by doing this , you are training your mind how to think , how to connect your gold to the next, you are basically learning how to think big but goes small.
Write down your answers
productivity – we always doing something , eating , playing , sleeping, jumping, learning , breathing, even if we doing nothing we still doing something, he think you should be living for productivity.
he talks about what kind of system we use, how we use our time determine the money we make, and if is true that time is money the best way to describe a time management system, then it maybe just be by the money it makes.
therefore, are we using the 10k a year system , the 20k a year system…100k a years system, ….
he something about , he never bla bla bla anyone that wasn’t a millionaire or didn’t become one. I really need to start taking better notes, I missed the bla bla bla part, I try to go back but could not find it and had to move on.
he also talk about one goal is not to get more done but less to do, I like this too.
Time blocking
he talk about time blocking, viewing and using time, he just mean to start blocking things until it becomes a habit
The one thing gets 50% of the time , “today what’s the one thing I can do for my one thing such that by doing it everything else will be easier or unnecessary”
In order
first time block your time off, second time block your one thing, third time block your planning time
people don’t plan time off they don’t think they deserve it or can afford it
he talk about recharging and rewarding yourself. I also like this, is very important to allow the body to rest and is also important to reward yourself for a task well done. When you reward yourself the body remember and it may associate that task to something additive, which will result in you doing the task again.
Resting is as Important as working
he also goes over the time you have left after finishing a task.
If you set a time and finish your one thing before the do time, you should not waste the time you have left.
he goes over yo should work 4 hours at day on yourself then your one thing
he give an example like this “Does he get to do this because he is Steven King or he is Steven King because he does this” we don’t need to know who is Steven king to understand this statement. Here is clue just case. Start Doing.
he also talk about blocking one hour every week to review your monthly, yearly… goals
he also talk about acquiring the mindset of someone who is seeking mastery
he talk about 3 commitments
one, the path of mastery
two, move from e to p
three, leave the accountability circle
he says mastery is a way of thinking
he says, mastery is you are master of what you know an apprentice of what you don’t
he says, mastery never ends
he also talk about the best it could be done vs the best you could do and do what ever it takes
move from e to p ( I am still committed to growing so what are my options instead of moving to something else). This remind me of something that many people do at some point or another, me included, instead of picking one skill and mastering that one skill first , we just move to something new without mastering that skill, and then we dare to say that the program didn’t work or something along the line, when in reality we just move to something new. I think the call this the Shiny object syndrome.
he also talk about taking responsibility and accountability and how
action produce result and result produce actions.
he talk about you may want to get an accountability partner( like a coach or mentor, a partner that tell you the true)
The four thief of productivity
- The inability to say no
- Fear of chaos
- Poor health habits
- An environment that doesn’t support your goal
he goes over your One yes need to be protected by your one thousand no, basically to
says yes to your one thing and no to everything else
he talk about living with no regret and to live
a live true to yourself
he also says that success is a inside job
he also say that there is no balance
he also says to keep reading and researching
further notes
he goes into
saying 1234 and a b c d is easier than saying 1a2b3c4d, this make sense , you can try it yourself.
the reason is you waste time alternating between task , and you waste time by remembering the decision to switch
he talk about the domino effect, I did not like the metaphor, why? I just think it would be hard to prove. sure thing, you can test with dominos, but unless you are willing to build multiple things as big as the empire state to test, it just an untested analogy.
Conclusion:
Well lets make this conclusion super short and simple. This is the main thing you should take with you.
“What’s the one thing I can do such that by doing it, everything else will be easier or unnecessary.”
ask this question everyday, for 66 days, and Do the one thing. So a beneficial habit can be create.
My own opinion on this. Your purpose should be Physical Health and Financial Freedom. why? because with this two things, if you decided to help people you can really help. And if you decided not to help people well you still helping by not being a burden. 🙂
Sources:
If you want to listen to the audiobook click here.
If you are Interests in the Book click here