Bruce Lee said it: strip away the distraction of things you don’t need and you make room for what matters. This principle applies to business and life as well as it does martial arts.
This exercise may feel unproductive (it is not) – you can’t distinguish the wheat from the chaff while multitasking or juggling chainsaws. This task may require a quiet mental process.
How to determine what best feeds your practice? Good clients and hard work are easy answers. Know yourself before moving forward. In my experience, I have found a need for the odd tough challenge. If that is also your point of view, take care to balance these. Too many extreme challenges run the risk of overwhelming your time, your cost funds, and your mental health. Pick a limited number and make sure to knock one or two out before taking on more. That will leave time and room to continue working on the bread.
This may seem counterintuitive to Bruce Lee’s mantra, but it is not. You need to understand yourself. If challenging yourself is in your nature, that challenge becomes an essential part of what you do. You can’t strip it all out and remain yourself. But you can certainly limit yourself to just what you can handle and no more.
