Speaker 1: Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: Good Morning, This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast.
Speaker 1: Today's tip is to realize that few things go perfectly
Speaker 1: the first time. Unless in experience is absolutely miserable, it
Speaker 1: doesn't hurt to try again. We all love stories that
Speaker 1: hinge on a moment when everything changes. A kid picks
Speaker 1: up a basketball and its love at first sight. A
Speaker 1: novel idea comes to a writer in a moment of inspiration.
Speaker 1: Such epiphanies make for good storytelling, but real life seldom
Speaker 1: works that way. I know this has been the case
Speaker 1: for me. I was on another podcast recently and the
Speaker 1: host asked when I knew I wanted to write about
Speaker 1: time management. The answer, honestly was several years after I'd
Speaker 1: written my first book on the topic. I've been trying
Speaker 1: to get a book deal for a while, casting around
Speaker 1: through a variety of topics, and finally landed a contract
Speaker 1: to write a book called A hundred sixty eight Hours
Speaker 1: that came out in May of two thousand. It got
Speaker 1: some nice publicity, which was great, but it didn't sell
Speaker 1: all that swiftly. So when I wanted to write another book,
Speaker 1: my publisher and I came to the idea of writing
Speaker 1: about personal finance. So I wrote a book called All
Speaker 1: the Money in the World, which came out in early
Speaker 1: two thousand twelve. That didn't do all that well either.
Speaker 1: But while I was waiting for that one to come out,
Speaker 1: I wrote a short e book on productive mornings called
Speaker 1: What the Most Successful People Do Before Breakfast. That one
Speaker 1: did much better and nudged me to start declaring myself
Speaker 1: a time management expert. In retrospect, it seems obvious, but
Speaker 1: at the time not so much. I just had to
Speaker 1: keep trying things, figuring eventually something would stick. There are
Speaker 1: all kinds of things that might be worth trying again.
Speaker 1: The general and census from nutritionists is that kids may
Speaker 1: need to be exposed to new foods a dozen times
Speaker 1: or more before they'll actually eat them. I love running,
Speaker 1: but I tried to become a runner multiple times before
Speaker 1: it finally took. It's a well known psychological phenomenon that
Speaker 1: people are prone to fixate on the negative. If three
Speaker 1: things go wrong and three things go right, we tend
Speaker 1: to focus on the ones that went wrong. But maybe
Speaker 1: the next time two things will go wrong and four
Speaker 1: things will go right. The first experience wasn't bad. It's
Speaker 1: just that parts were bad, and those were the parts
Speaker 1: we remember. Plus, there are many reasons that things might
Speaker 1: not go perfectly the first time, but that you can't
Speaker 1: see because well, you don't have much experience to understand
Speaker 1: why they're happening. This has been the case with me
Speaker 1: and i KEA style furniture building. The fact that your
Speaker 1: first shelf building experience felt long and painful does not
Speaker 1: mean the second will be. It will probably be much
Speaker 1: better as you figure out how not to misplace screws
Speaker 1: and such. And sometimes the explanation you assigned for something
Speaker 1: not working well isn't actually the right explanation. I have
Speaker 1: definitely lost emails. When a person follows up, I remember that,
Speaker 1: Oh yes, I actually did want to do that thing.
Speaker 1: I'm glad they bothered to try again. Of course, there's
Speaker 1: no reason to keep trying things forever. Time is finite,
Speaker 1: energy is finite, And if the answer is a definite no,
Speaker 1: well more trying is just annoying for everybody. But if
Speaker 1: it's not a definite no, being open to possibility can
Speaker 1: lead to good things. My first date with my husband
Speaker 1: did not go well enough to suggest that we'd be
Speaker 1: married within eighteen months, but the second date did good.
Speaker 1: We tried again today. I think if there's some thing
Speaker 1: you've tried in the past that you've just written off,
Speaker 1: is it worth revisiting. Why did you tell yourself that
Speaker 1: it didn't work? Are there alternative explanations if you try
Speaker 1: it again? What could you do to maybe generate a
Speaker 1: different outcome? If it doesn't work, it doesn't work, but
Speaker 1: it might not hurt to try. In the meantime. This
Speaker 1: is Laura. Thanks for listening, and here's to making the
Speaker 1: most of our time. Hey, everybody, I'd love to hear
Speaker 1: from you. You can send me your tips, your questions,
Speaker 1: or anything else. Just connect with me on Twitter, Facebook,
Speaker 1: and Instagram at Before Breakfast Pod that's B the number four,
Speaker 1: then Breakfast p o D. You can also shoot me
Speaker 1: an email at Before Breakfast podcast at i heeart media
Speaker 1: dot com. That Before Breakfast is spelled out with all
Speaker 1: the letters. Thanks so much, I look forward to staying
Speaker 1: in touch. Before Breakfast is a production of I heart Radio.
Speaker 1: For more podcasts from I heart Radio, visit the i
Speaker 1: heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to
Speaker 1: your favorite shows. H