The Self-Improvement Strategy That Works For Me

Over the years, I’ve tested a bunch of self-improvement and goal attainment strategies. Only one approach seems to consistently work for me.

Anyone who reads what I’ve written over the years is aware I’m amid a constant productivity struggle. Infected since childhood with the misguided imperative to forever strive for increasingly loftier goals and a better me, my life has at times felt like it’s on a repeating loop that can only be stopped by a metaphoric slap upside my head.

I know I’m not alone. I read about other people’s challenges with whatever version of keeping up with the Joneses manifests in their lives. For some it’s never feeling like they look good enough. Others can never have enough money. Some wrongly measure their worth based on the price and coolness of their possessions. Corporate ladder climbers rate their job satisfaction based on their fancy title. Self-improvement junkies gobble up the latest self-help book as if reading about improving yourself results in improvement. The list goes on.

Based on what I’ve read and some of the conversations I’ve had with friends outside the United States, Americans in particular seem to fall prey to this malady of never having enough. The particular flavor of not having enough might look somewhat different person to person, but underlying all of it is the…