Kelford Labs Daily: How to do so much less

How’s your “One Big Day” energy this week?

Feeling supercharged, energetic, and ready to hit the ground running?

No? Maybe? A little?

Well, whether you’re bounding with endless energy, or wondering why you committed to so much—and how you ever thought you’d get it done—the lesson is the same:

Stop trying to do too much.

This lesson is repeated over and over again by athletes, entrepreneurs, visionaries, and leaders across time and disciplines.

Marcus Aurelius, thousands of years ago, said that cutting back on our commitments and goals allows us to “do less, better.”

In Do Hard Things, Steve Magness talks about a 1960s running coach who admonished his client to, “Not halfway rest,” but to fully and appropriately balance hard work with no work at all.

This is important for our marketing—and our work broadly—because we have things we must do. But, as one historian put it, “Enthusiasm is incompatible with compulsion.”

Or, put simply, we won’t stick to what we don’t like.

That’s why more than 90% of New Years Resolutions fail, and almost a quarter fail within one week.

As legendary explorer Road Amundsen said that if we are “tired and slack,” we’ll put off the more important work because we’ve busied and exhausted ourselves with trivial matters instead.

So, this is today’s lesson:

Look at the list of things you want to achieve this year, this quarter, this month, this week—hell, look at today’s list.

And start cutting things back, removing unnecessary items, and focusing your time and energy on what truly matters most.

Ditch your marketing resolutions and decide on what you actually need to do—and find a way to do it slowly, sustainably, and joyfully.

So that you actually do it.