Motion but No Forward Movement: The Mind Games That Fake Our Progress
Before the week starts, I make a to-do list of everything I want to accomplish. Lately, I have found myself completing tasks not on the list but adding them afterwards and then crossing them off. By Friday, I felt accomplished because I had so much crossed off, but when I really look at the activity, the tasks that would truly move the needle for me were the very ones I kept sliding to next week...over and over again.
That is what I call a mind game and I am the one getting played.
How I see it is that the game itself is not the problem. The problem is whether the game creates movement or just motion. Motion feels productive. It keeps us busy, occupied, and tired. Movement is what actually carries us toward the destination we said we wanted.
So let me ask you what I had to ask myself. Are the things you are checking off taking you somewhere or are they simply keeping you busy?
These games show up everywhere. At home, it is straightening up the office before you start the real work, then finding one more thing to straighten. It is buying the gym clothes and never wearing them to work out. For me, it was making my own herbs, labeling them, and lining them up in pretty glass bottles I rarely opened.
In relationships, it is saying “I’m fine” so you never have to have the conversation. With friends, it is announcing the business you will start or the class you will take until the telling quietly replaces the doing. At work, it can look like a leader who assumes the team is happy simply because no one has said otherwise. Silence is not satisfaction.
Shonda Rhimes paints a beautiful picture of the other kind of game. In her book, "Year of Yes", she shares how her sister pointed out that she said no to nearly everything. Rather than brushing it off, she sat with it and then challenged herself to spend a year saying yes to the things that scared her. That game had rules and it opened doors she never would have walked through. It also reminded her that every yes costs a no somewhere else.
How do we stop playing ourselves? We get honest. We study our own patterns and correct them before someone else has to point them out. We remove the excuses, do the hard thing first, and we become intentional and decide what truly deserves our yes.
I want you to win. What game are you ready to stop playing this week?
Share this message with someone else who needs it and start the conversation today.
To listen to the full episode, tune in to the KimUnity Soulutions Podcast on Spotify, and Apple Podcasts.
Truly,
Kim the SME
