Sacrifice for Success
As human beings, it is in our nature to be reluctant to give things up – particularly if we enjoy it. The reality however, is that sacrifice is necessary in some instances to allow us to grow and succeed. Join us in this week’s podcast for a few tips and tricks on figuring out when you might need to make some sacrifices.
Improve Every Day
When we look at a goal we’ve set, it can often appear that the difference between where you are now and where you want to be is so great that it’s simply not possible. Host Andrew Baxter points out that we do not need to concern ourselves with these great leaps and bounds, but simply focus on slowly and steadily working towards these goals by simply improving ourselves from the day before. By improving every day, you can establish healthy and productive habits and these improvements become the new norm, then you can find new areas to improve in and keep working away.
Discipline is very important for establishing and maintaining these habits, but without resilience it is not much use. It is easier to maintain our discipline and habits when things are going well, but to have the resilience to keep it going when things get tough is vital to being successful in the long-run.
Why Sacrifice is so Important Right Now?
Many peoples’ lives have been consumed by instant gratification. But the payoffs from such activities can be fleeting and perhaps lead to negative consequences in the future. Host Andrew Baxter is well aware of the importance in engaging in activities with delayed payoffs and knows that they can be more satisfying. If you choose to start reading a new book over watching Netflix, or have a piece of fruit instead of that bowl of ice cream, you may not get that instant gratification but you are making a sacrifice that will pay off in the future. This can come in many forms, but sometimes treating yourself now is merely doing your future self some harm.
Right now, times are tough and you would not be the only one to have gone into self preservation mode rather than finding new opportunities. Although it may seem painful now, there are opportunities out there and the future payoff could be great.
Sacrificing with Money
In terms of the economy, we are in something of a recession. Costs have gone up and nobody likes to be short on cash when they need it. Host Andrew Baxter explains that making sacrifices involving money can be quite simple. In essence, spending lots of money now may be enjoyable – buying nice food or new clothes or whatever it may be. The problem is, however, this may hurt our financial position in the future and by then we will have forgotten the enjoyment we got from buying those new jeans or that delicious meal.
The key tool you need is the ability to note that you can do something, but you are not going to because of how it might just help you in the future. Budgeting and investing in future gains can be difficult, but overall it might just be the difference between financial freedom and struggling to make ends meet.
Making Sacrifices for your Health
Our health can be broken down into a few different categories with both mental and physical health at the forefront. When we look at our physical health, the sacrifices are quite simple. Host Andrew Baxter points out that while ordering delivery and takeaway instead of cooking is also more expensive, it is certainly not as good for our health. We must be able to sacrifice some enjoyment in what we eat for the sake of our health in the longer term as that is certainly more important. Exercising is another area key to our health and we need to be able to make sacrifices in order to prioritise fitting some exercise into our days. Not only will we physically benefit from exercising but this improvement is likely to translate also into improved mental health.
We may have to watch that episode of our favourite show later or miss out on an outing, but getting that exercise in is critical and you will certainly thank yourself later. Although there are all of these active things we should be doing, sometimes we do need to sit back and relax and allow ourselves a chance to decompress – which can be the fuel we need to be able to keep up our development.
