Operating at a deficit

If we’re not paying close attention to our mindset, we can walk around for a good portion of the day operating at a deficit.

We tend to move through the day focused on all the things that are not going the way we want. Our mind is very good at drawing our attention to areas of concern and anticipating stressful situations.

Consider how often you end your day by reviewing all the things you didn’t accomplish. When we think this way, we carry around the idea that we’re constantly behind - constantly operating at a deficit.

This kind of thinking has a powerful hold over us moment to moment. It trains our brain to live and function with this default mindset, and our actions correspond with those thoughts.

We feel tired, we’re short tempered, we’re unhappy, we’re less confident, and our work and our interactions with other people suffer.

But it turns out that at a moment to moment level, you can make a choice each day to shift your focus from things that haven’t gone well to things that have - and move from living in a state of deficit to experiencing a surplus.

Try this:

Start by focusing on how you’re thinking at the two most critical inflection points in your workday - the start and the end of your day.

At the start of your day, focus on setting realistic expectations for what you can accomplish. Every time we start our day with unrealistic expectations, we position ourselves to come up short.

At the end of the day, review the things you accomplished or that went well instead of experiencing regret about what you didn't get to. Take a moment to pause and take stock of things you completed and positive interactions you had.

Go have a great workday.