The 3 Most Important Skills to Learn Now to Thrive in 2019
By: Danny Forest
Tags: Life Lessons, Inspiration, Personal Development, Self Improvement, Life

Tired of your current situation?

Do you want to make 2019 better than 2018 and the years prior?

I was in that situation last year. Back in September of last year, I went to live in Cambodia to work remotely on my own startup. During that time, I grew the company from 4 people to 8.

But that’s not all.

In the course of the next 12 months, I also lived in Spain, India, Canada, and now I’m in Colombia. I started 3 businesses, wrote 2 books (with two bigger ones in process), wrote 300+ articles on productivity, learning, life lessons, etc, became a top writer in 16 categories on Medium.com (including top 1 in Travel and top 5 in Inspiration), became healthier, opened my own light coaching program, learned 36 new skills, etc.

Reading that, you may not guess that I’m actually a software engineer by trade, building video games for a living.

Needless to say, I did thrive in 2018, and that can happen to you too, to levels you may not even imagine possible (I certainly didn’t).

In fact, one of my first article on Medium.com was this one:

So, why am I writing this now? We’re just in October after all!

Truth is, to become who you really want to become, you’re going to need to change, and change doesn’t happen overnight. Two to three months from now though, that’s reasonable. I’ve been there and know other people who have also been there.

But trust me, it’s not easy. What I’m proposing in the following paragraphs is no shortcut to success. It’s a set of skills that, once learned and honed, can lead you to any success you may strive for.

Of all the skills that contributed to me thriving in 2018, I narrowed it down to the three most important in my opinion. This also comes from compiling and testing theories in some of the best self-help books in the world.

I ordered them from least to most important in my mind:

Skill #3: Learn to Get to Action

If there’s one thing I can say without any doubt it’s that I’m a pro at getting to action. I often surprise people with having done something less than 24 hours after we talked about it.

But this is also one of my big weakness. I tend to charge ahead, sometimes not thinking enough about if I even have the time to commit. This often led me to do too many things at once, not having the time to deliver quality results.

But I stand by this skill.

In this world, there are underthinkers and there are overthinkers, with hardly anyone in between. Underthinkers don’t think things through, and hardly follow through. Overthinkers spend so much time planning that they forget to act. You don’t want to be like that.

Getting to action is also not about not planning. It’s about planning just enough and carrying through within less than a week of planning.

If you don’t act, you don’t get. It’s that simple. Nothing meaningful comes to you for free.

How do I learn this skill?

Get into the habit of putting actions in your calendar. That’s the first step towards knowing where your time is spent and where you have actual free time. In your daily planning, always leave room for important but not urgent tasks. From 5am to 9:30am, I exclusively do things that are not considered my main job. I write, go to the gym and practice 3 skills.

Take notes. Your memory is not good enough to recall things you’ve heard or seen. When you can refer back to a thought you had, you’re statistically more likely to act on it. Take notes in class, while watching videos, while listening to podcasts, while talking to people, etc.

Do daily, weekly, and monthly planning. Every Friday or Saturday, I plan my activities for the next week. As mentioned above, that gives clarity on where my time is spent on my productive activities and hobbies. But everything is not set in stone. Every evening, after work, I review my priorities for the next day and move things around as needed. And every end of the month, I write down my goals, both professionally and personally, for the next month. I try to be as specific as possible. How much mass do I want to put on? How much money do I want to make? How many new followers do I want to have? When you have goals you firmly believe in and you review them at least once every week, you align your plans with your actions.

Journal your heart out. Sometimes there are too many decisions to take and that clouds our judgment on what we should act on, leaning us to more often than not work on urgent but not important tasks. Journaling is a great way to free your mind and be aware of all the decisions that are “required” from you. It also helps for your daily, weekly, and monthly planning.

Do things for others. That’s an easy but greatly overlooked trick. Aren’t we just so much more motivated to do things if it benefits other people? Or even out of obligation. It brings a sense of necessity. So whenever there’s something you want to do, think about what it brings to other people. I’m no people pleaser but it helps to think that way. Even for things you think only benefit you. I learned to rock climb to help fight my fear of heights. I seem to be the only benefactor in that, right? Not really. Now that I’m less afraid of heights, I can do more activities with other people involving heights. I have also a new activity I can practice with friends I meet around the world. If there’s something you procrastinate doing over and over again, think about the benefit it brings to others.

Do these things consistently over the next few weeks or months, and you’ll notice that not only you’ll act more, you’ll also act better. But remember the number one rule to action: