Putting Plans into Action

[philosophyx]

Not really sure where this comment belongs but here seems as good as anywhere else. Yesterday I wrote down an excel sheet of life goals and ways to live my life by. One of those things included putting my plans into action and persevering with them. My INTPness has always come up as light on the P which I take as a good sign. One day in, I have been following my plan. It feels good to finally strive to put these ideas into action, but man I am exhausted. I am wondering whether I can keep this up long term. Has anyone else tried anything like this and how did it go?

Usually I would ignore these sort of ideas as hopeful crap spouted by self-help gurus, but I figured, it worked for Benjamin Franklin and I don't have much to lose. Also, I put this in the work section because it relates to where I want my career and life to go, but if there is a better place I'm open to hear suggestions from the more experienced of you. Cheers.

 

[MissQuote]

"Putting Plans into Action"

I had a plan for that once... um, ok, more than once.

 

[MissQuote]

This was my favorite plan for putting things into action. Didn't work out so well.

 

[Cognisant]

I find myself some lofty goal, figure out what my first step towards it should be, do it, then figure out what the next step will be, do it, etc.

I find it's easier to work on big projects with lots of little things that need doing so when I get bored or frustrated I can work on something else and come back to it latter, also whenever you feel like giving up consider how much time and effort has gone into getting you so far.

This is what works for me, maybe it'll work for you, maybe not.

 

[Amagi82]

I'm terrible at doing things, but I'm excellent at not doing things.

 

[EyeSeeCold]

One day in, I have been following my plan. It feels good to finally strive to put these ideas into action, but man I am exhausted. I am wondering whether I can keep this up long term.

I think this quote is relevant:

We're the artillery because we take a really long time to load and for the most part we just sit there trying to figure out the most precise, effective angle to point ourselves. When the opportunity comes and we feel sure enough of the target, we fire a whopping huge shell that clears the field in one blast. We might only fire a few shells in the entire battle but it's those few shells that can change the course of the game.
After a shell has been fired it's not just that we want to sit around and do nothing for another 30 minutes, it's that we HAVE to. Expending all of our energy at once means we'll inevitably have our weak, vulnerable, and immobile phases where the reloading and readjustment happens. Plus, if we never get around to firing a shot it's probably because the target isn't worth the price of the ammo.
Does it look lazy? It won't look lazy when your ass is pinned and the only thing that can save you is a shell bigger than your mother coming from a location you can't even see.

Instead of trying out decisive efforts, which leave you exhausted for awhile and kill the momentum, it's probably better to get some kind of routine going where you make small increments of accomplishment.

Unless you have someone around who's a natural go-getter to help you out.

 

[philosophyx]

I liked that artillery quote but I'm not so sure about it, artillery guns were fired pretty non-stop during WWI (not to much effect). I got a lot done while I was at school and during my brief time in investment banking. I hated both places, and I didn't particularly value the stuff I did get done, but I survived, so I figured, it must be possible for me to get things I actually value started and completed.

There is no go-getter girlfriend in my life to push me. My parents who I am living with are go-getter types, but they will only push me to accomplish their goals for me, not my own. I've gotten much less done today, but I'm still on track to complete my goals for the day and also I'm only half-functioning due to a hangover.

 

[Chronomar]

I have been here before so many times. I too am low on the P according to tests. Can never tell if that's "real" or if the imaginary person I'd like to be who gets stuff done answers some of the questions.

Sometimes I go on a planning-acting streak and it all works out, other times plans fail within minutes of being created. Perhaps the close P / J just means one constantly has the drive to plan and make plans (I love plans! and lists! and goals!) but lacks the J kind of taskmaster skills to always stick to the plans, lists, goals.

Some of the things that can keep plans together:

- multiple people working on -Plan X-, who are aware they may fall behind and keep each other working / following the plan. For example, if many people are training to run a race and plan to run every day as a group, it becomes much harder for any one of them to drop out without realizing it unless somehow all of them do.

- not going overboard on the plan. If you front load the thing, or make it out in your mind as this great "Universal Plan of Plans!!!", that is probably just setting it up to be an impossible task you can rationalize away later.

- I like to get around this by having tri-layered plans. Have the "big vision" you don't worry about that often, but which guides you, the "maximum yield" plan, which should be a place to get down all the things you'd like to ultimately accomplish (much like your excel sheet), and then the "day to day" plan, the bare minimum set of things you need to do each day to at least remain able to complete your plans. If you fall back on some of the more complicated or difficult parts, at least keep up the bare minimum.

- Keep track of things. You might hate keeping records as I often do, but it adds a layer of self-awareness and accountability (not to mention yet more practice at keeping up a routine, routines being at least for me what I fail at. Records could be a daily journal or a progress log. I fail at these, but can generally get myself to write a few words about goal keeping / progress at the end of each week in my planner. (If the planner is being used...which I have managed for the past...week.)

Good luck to all with Plans.

 

[Roni]

Has anyone else tried anything like this and how did it go? .. I'm open to hear suggestions from the more experienced of you.

Ah, you shame me youngun. (yes, I know I took the appeal to experience out of context. Shoosh. I need a good shaming.)
Lately I've been thinking of putting a similar question to the group. And to facebook, twitter, myself, strangers in the pub, etc. It would be a giant tldr exercise in talking about talking about planning. If it then moved beyond this information gathering stage the next step would be considering which spreadsheet software, organiser, diary or whiteboard I didn't already own was essential for the planning to continue.
It's very easy for me to be so "overwhelmed" planning my plans that nothing gets done. "Overwhelmed" is in quotes because it's a big fat lie. If I really want something done I need to just get off my arse and do it - "planning" is usually secret-Roni-code for "procrastinating."

The 'just do it' method robs me of the satisfaction of ticking something off a list but that's a small price to pay for getting stuff done. I've learned to keep all my essential household chores in this category. They're not list-worthy anyway.

I do find it useful to indulge a need to plan daydream about non-essential goals (especially right-brain things like redecorating) but only if there's no timeframe in the plan. If I tell my self to achieve something by a certain time I (a) take all the fun out of daydreaming and (b) set myself up for feelings of failure over something I never needed to do in the first place.
My non-time-specific daydreams somehow get realised eventually - one day I 'just do it.' It's as if an unconscious plan was running in the background the whole time.

For essential goals (especially left-brain things like finance) my most effective plans only require me to take a single action. If I want this much money by that time I may put a lot of thought into calculating achievable $$/week but then set up automatic payments once and forget about it.

The only multi-action, time-specific plans that work for me are ones that apply to multi-action, time-specific goals. I can create a colour-coded, contingency-planned, multi-level holiday schedule that would make a J shudder, stick to it and enjoy myself the whole time - as long as it's only for a short time.

When strict planning is successful I'm tempted to think my whole life would work out better if I planned more. I ignore such thoughts. I'm now old enough to know too much structure suffocates me and I function better without it.

Although I'm pretty sure there was something else I was supposed to be doing instead of writing this....

 

[philosophyx]

Update -

Thank you all for your replies. My list has been going one week now, I added a daily part, so in the morning I put down what I want to achieve that day and cross it off as the day goes by. I have put very few tasks down for starters. I have been getting them done every day so I'm thinking it could work. On the other hand, I hate being told what to do, now I'm realising that even being told what to do by myself in the morning automatically makes me less interested.

 

[Ripuli]

Become finishers, dammit.

 

[HDINTP]

I always solve this in my head having little monologue and i do the problem is i do nothing or do so much you know that is why i think for example that i am not enough challenged at school i mean yeah school system sucks in my opinion but anyway if we went i don't know 4 times faster than we do right now or did and will do now summer is isn't it? It would motivate me i suppose but i prefer self-educating anyway. But to your question yes plan after monologue stay usually 1-2 weeks then i am just exhausted and you know what... I just hate routine. So i just do it how i feel about it in which mood i am and so. You know in case you are interested in something you can give it great effort can't you? My advice is: Try to do it different way whatever it is.

 

[pjoa09]

@Ripuli damn, I read everyone of them. Love the sperm one.