"Dirty pots, dirty thoughts"
"Dirty pots, dirty thoughts."
That was a saying I first heard from my favourite business and marketing teacher, Dan Kennedy. It's the cruder version of the gem of wisdom I learned (the hard way) from an Australian monk of the Hindu Swami order (which I shared yesterday) where he had said:
"The inner and the outer are reflections of each other. If your outer life is disorganized, then your mind is disorganized."
Sometimes the most spiritually advanced thing you could do doesn't involve levitating or going without air or healing the sick — it comes down to three simple miracles Dan Kennedy lays out on page 86 of his book No BS Time Management for Entrepreneurs:
Show up
Show up on time.
Show up on time, ready to work. Few do.
When we agree to do something, we should do our best to make it happen. It doesn't matter whether the agreement was with an organization (e.g. credit card company), our boss, a client, a family member or a friend. We should follow through on our agreement.
And the worst person to not follow through with is ourselves. If I say I'm going to write every day, and I don't, then I'm double-crossing myself.
As Dan Kennedy says:
"...self-discipline aimed and applied at a particular thing... is quite literally a magic power. When you focus your self-discipline on a single purpose, like sunlight through a magnifying glass on a single object, look out! The whole world will scramble to get out of your way, hold the doors open for you, and salute you as you walk by."
While Dan Kennedy's No BS Time Management for Entrepreneurs isn't considered a spiritual book, maybe it should be. It's certainly about morality, which I believe is the foundation of any real spirituality. It's spirituality 101. Oddly, though, most churches rarely talk about morality from the pulpit (unless they are on a rant about homosexuality). They just go on about how you're saved from your immorality because you believe in Jesus. Even if that is the case, and paradise is waiting for both the saints and sinners when they die, wouldn't a little more moral mojo make our time here on earth a whole lot more fulfilling and meaningful?
As Dan Kennedy sums up in No BS Time Management for Entrepreneurs:
"There's a lot to be said just for showing up on time ready to work (not hungover, not exhausted and not distracted). The meeting of deadlines and commitments alone causes a person to stand out from the crowd like an alien spaceship parked in an Iowa cornfield. The ability to get things done and done right the first time will magnetically attract incredible contacts, opportunities, and resources to you. All of this is a matter of self-discipline."
I've read No BS Time Management for Entrepreneurs several times and I recommend you do too — whether you're a housewife who promised to have a homemade dinner on the table at 6 pm for your husband and children or if you're a CEO scheduled to meet Elon Musk on Zoom tomorrow at 9 am.
You can order a copy of No BS Time Management here: https://blazingpinecone.com/shop/no-bs-time-management/
John C.A. Manley
John C. A. Manley is the author of Much Ado About Corona: A Dystopian Love Story, the forthcoming All The Humans Are Sleeping and other works of speculative fiction. Get free samples of his stories by becoming a Blazing Pine Cone email subscriber at: https://blazingpinecone.com/subscribe/
