Faith-Based Productivity

Live the Life You Were Created For

Mike Schmitz

Perspective

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Sometimes all all you need is a fresh perspective.

Sometimes you just need to see things from another angle, or see what things look like from the other side.

Your perspective can either drive you to slay giants or keep you on the sideline instead of entering your promised land.

Perspective will either propel you with passion or paralyze you with fear.

David didn’t look at the size of the giant, he looked at the size of his God. The spies in Numbers 13 though couldn’t look past the opposition they faced. They had a “grasshopper mentality” which kept them small.

Don’t tell God how big your mountain is – tell your mountain how big your God is!

All In

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David Allen (the GTD guy) once said there are only 2 things you have to do: what your’e doing right now, and everything else.

The first time I heard it I laughed (you probably did just now too), but as I thought about it really made a lot of sense me. No matter how many things you have to do, you really can only do one at a time. Multi-tasking is a mirage, and “business” is a fictional badge of honor that we give ourselves to justify the fact that we can’t manage our time or our priorities. The human brain was just not wired to sustain this kind of lifestyle (short-tem memory can only hold 5–9 things at any one time). Tony Schwartz wrote an excellent book titled “The Power of Full Engagement” where he talks about how we really need to manage is our energy, and when you’re attention is being pulled in a million different directions your energy is constantly being depleted – it’s very inefficient. It’s like having 25 programs open on your computer at a time. You can only use one at a time, but having them all open will kill your battery pretty quick. You can skip back and forth between your different programs, but you won’t actually get anything done that way.

Jim Elliot, the Christian missionary, once said “wherever you are, be all there”. That is my goal this year – to escape “emergency scan modality” and quit putting out fires so that I can be fully engaged in whatever I’m doing at any given time. I intend to live my life in “Full-Screen mode”, eliminate distractions and focus on what’s really important.

I don’t do New Year’s resolutions anymore, but my 3 words for the year[1] are:

  1. Focus
  2. Order
  3. Fun

All of these (to me) revolve around the theme of being present. I need to focus on what’s important by putting in their proper place, which ultimately will allow me to enjoy my time with my 4 young boys. I don’t want to take them for granted and I don’t want to miss one opportunity to build a fort, read a story, or snuggle at bedtime. I won’t be able to make it happen 100% of the time, but I want to be fully there as much as I possibly can.

  1. an idea I stole from the Productivityist, Mike Vardy – I highly recommend you listen to his podcast “Mikes on Mics”.  ↩

Success

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Success is on the other side of inconvenience. – Dale Bronner

If it was easy, everyone would do it.

Details Matter

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Details matter. It’s worth waiting to get it right. – Steve Jobs

He would know.

Max Capacity

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I’ve been on a bit of a productivity kick for awhile now.

For me, the issue is bigger than just finding more efficient ways to do things. It’s a matter of stewardship, of doing the most with what you have, and hearing God say “well done, good and faithful servant! Enter into the joy of your master.”

So when I read 2 Kings 4:1–7, I see more than a woman who’s desperate. I see a woman who:

1) worked with what she had
2) tapped into God’s abundance as she increased her capacity

She had the oil to start with. She didn’t have much, but that doesn’t matter in God’s economy. God will work with whatever seed you are willing to sow, and He always works by multiplication so it doesn’t take long to increase.

But the oil stopped flowing as soon as she ran out of vessels. In other words, when she reached max capacity, the provision stopped.

Now she had enough to meet her desperate need, but how many Christians never get to the abundant life Jesus promised in John 10:10 because they reach “max capacity”?

In Deuteronomy 7:22, God tells the Israelites that he won’t give them the whole promised land at once because they wouldn’t be able to take possession of it. My goal is to help people increase their capacity so they can walk in God’s abundance, achieve their God-given destiny and take possession of their promised land.

So productivity to me is not just a passion – it’s the key to walking in your destiny. I hope you see the importance of it too and I hope when it’s all said done you too can enter into the joy of the master.

Tomorrow

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Start.

That’s all you have to do.

You don’t have to have it all figured out, you just need to get moving. God has given you a dream, a vision, a purpose, that only you can fill. If you don’t make it happen, then the rest of us miss out on what you have to offer.

Todd Henry, in his book Die Empty, talks about the potential that many people sadly never realize:

“In my first book, The Accidental Creative, I recounted a meeting in which a friend asked a strange and unexpected question: ‘What do you think is the most valuable land in the world?’ Several people threw out guesses, such as Manhattan, the oil fields of the Middle East, and the gold mines of South Africa, before our friend indicated that we were way off track. He paused for a moment, and said, “You’re all wrong. The most valuable land in the world is the graveyard. In the graveyard are buried all of the unwritten novels, never-launched businesses, unreconciled relationships, and all of the other things that people thought, ‘I’ll get around to that tomorrow.’ One day, however, their tomorrows ran out.”

Don’t look at the monumental size of the task – just start.

A musician doesn’t just pick up an instrument and suddenly their proficient – they’re not just born with it. They develop the gift within them through practice. If the guitar player expected to sound like Eric Clapton as soon as they picked up their guitar, they will quickly be discouraged and quit. However, if they decide to spend even 5 minutes a day honing their craft and developing their skill, after a year they will be amazed at how good they’ve gotten.

The saying “the longest journey begins with a single step” is true. Someday we’re all going to finish. Wether you are one of the ones who finishes well or never starts is up to you. You have what you have today because of the choices you made yesterday – make the choice today to better your tomorrow.

Sow into your future.

Just start.

Start

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“A year from now you will wish you had started today.” – Karen Lamb

Hashtag Etiquette

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“Like all good things, hashtags have been swiftly overused and destroyed by social media enthusiasts who don’t understand how to properly wield them. The Internet may not have rules, but it should at least try to learn some manners.”

Full article here.

#endrant

Die Empty

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I recently read a great book titled Die Empty: Unleash Your Best Work Every Day by Todd Henry. It’s an excellent read about achieving your potential and doing work that matters. One section that really stood out to me was what he titled “The 7 Deadly Sins of Mediocrity”. Here’s a very brief summary:

Aimlessness – This is for all the talkers[1] out there. You need to have a goal, and you need to have action. There’s a saying that goes “if you aim at nothing, you’ll hit it every time.”

Boredom – My Pastor says that “success is determined by your daily routine.” It may not always be fun, but you need to stay consistent. You become what you repeatedly do, and you have to put in the practice time before you ever see the stage.

Comfort – If things are easy, you probably need to push yourself more. You don’t gain muscle from going to the gym and lifting what’s comfortable. You have to push yourself until it hurts if you want to see growth.

Delusion – You need to know yourself (which is harder than it sounds). You need to know your limitations and what you’re capable of. This doesn’t mean you can’t grow, but you have to be realistic and start with what you have where you are.

Ego – You’re not as great as you think you are! Don’t be afraid to cut your losses and say “I was wrong” rather than go down with the ship.

Fear – Graveyards are full of people who were too afraid to step out and follow their dreams. Don’t be afraid to say “yes” to opportunities. You might fail, but then again you might not! You might find what you were destined to do.

Guardedness – Don’t close yourself off when you start to see success. A lot of companies work hard to get a competitive advantage and then stagnate because they isolate, trying to protect their intellectual property.

I learned a lot from this book and highly recommend it.

  1. Talker: one who likes to talk about doing something but never actually does anything (my definition).  ↩

Value of Order

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“Be regular and orderly in your life, that you may be violent and original in your work.” – Gustave Flaubert

A blog by Mike Schmitz about the intersection of faith, productivity, and technology.

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