“Don’t judge each day by the harvest you reap, but by the seeds that you plant.”
-Robert Louis Stevenson, Scottish novelist, poet, and essayist
What makes a day’s work worthwhile?
Is it the money you make? A sense of accomplishment? The feeling you get when you reach inbox zero?
Fighting real fires is a good and necessary thing, but if it consumes all of our time, we feel that an opportunity to improve our future has slipped past.
Here are three simple techniques you can use to make sure you’re always planting seeds for your future:
1. Plant seeds early in the day. As early risers will tell you, some of the most productive hours are first thing, before the rest of the world is going at it.
2. Look for projects that pay recurring dividends over time. For example: Incremental improvements in your website will help you generate more leads and serve your clients better. While the expense of those projects may take a while to recoup, the benefits over time are unlimited.
3. Recognize that a kindness or conversation is never wasted. You may have five “must do” tasks in a given day, but know that a 30-minute call with a customer– even if it’s just a casual chat– is never time “down the drain.”
Weigh the day’s worth with the number of seeds you plant. No, they won’t all bear fruit, but how else will you get anything to grow?
