Hi, I'm michaelpporter 👋

#1

Why did you sign up for the Faith-Based Productivity community?

To connect with others.

What is your church background?

Weekly attender at Redeemer Lincoln Square. My wife and I started attending there December 2018 when we moved to New York.

What is your biggest struggle?

Getting started.

What is your favorite book (and why)?

Are you a Mac or a PC?

I’m a Mac

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#2

Welcome @michaelpporter :smile: Glad you’re here!

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#3

Welcome to FBP, @michaelpporter!

Would you be willing to expand on this a bit? Is the struggle to start on your self-care projects? Starting prayer time with your spouse/kids? Starting to volunteer at church? Kicking off your work projects?

Maybe a follow-up to that, is it hard because of motivation, technical know-how, or something else?

#4

Good question. In parts, all of them (no kids).Mostly starting tasks that do not have a natural flow. If I am curious or have an idea to make something better I can jump right in and do whatever it is. If the task is something new and I do not have a clear goal or next action in mind I have a hard time starting on the task/project. In short I need to find the motivation. I know this is backwards. As Mark Manson said in “Subtle Art of Not Giving A F”

Action → Inspiration → Motivation
If you lack the motivation to make an important change in your life, do something — anything, really — and then harness the reaction to that action as a way to begin motivating yourself

Lately I find when I take action I find motivation. It is still hard to start an action in the right direction.

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#5

As an outsider, my perception is that what you need is an in-depth review of your projects and clarity about what comes next in each of them.

When I find myself putting off tasks, I usually need to make the next action crazy small (ex. open MailMate). That way it’s easy to do and quick. Most of the time that’s all it takes to get the process moving.

Disclaimer: I suck at this.

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#6

Likely. I think the reality is I have wishes not goals. I need to take time to give them structure.

#7

@michaelpporter May I suggest a good book to help with goal setting? It’s Atomic Habits by James Clear - best book I’ve read on the subject… it’s more about building routine or habits as the name indicates and how this is a more affective way to change your behavior to get you where you want to go and become who you want to be.

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#8

A great recommendation. I have read it already.

Expanding on my last comment, I need to clearly define where I want to be. I have never Ben great at thinking about “where I want to be in five years”. I tend to say I want to be X and start moving towards that goal.

One year, almost to the day, after I added an entry in OmniFocus; “I want to become a DevOps expert” I got the first call that lead me to Signafire and got the job title “DevOps Engineer”. Unfortunately, that was the position I was just laid off from.

I have also gone through The Focus Course. While I my values have not changed since then, my situation has. I with to refocus and set better mor tangible goals then I did last time. My plan is to go though Faith Based Productivity and apply this approach along with what I picked up from the Focus Course. If needed I will do the Focus Course Short review.

#9

@michaelpporter it’ll be great to hear your progress as you walk through the FBP course, there’s a ton of alignment with the Focus Course. I’ve almost completed the entire FBP course and I went through the Focus Course a few years back as well. This process of evaluation, combing through the current state of my life, discovery my why and where I want to go is so powerful and I have full confidence that you’ll gain insight and clarity on your why and how to get there from FBP. I have gained so much clarity on my big goal and I have confronted the obstacles that have kept me from taking action. I believe that this entire process is a continual lifelong ritual for anyone who wants to live a life of significance and make an impact on the world around us.

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#10

I love this book - it starts out with small things. I also read to the “if you want to change the world, make your bed” author (short you tube video to start out with) and his ‘small habits’