The 6 Critical Mistakes Done After A Mistake Was Done

Guest Post

This the first guest post on my site. I read this article during random surfing and after going through it, could not resist to ask the site owner for permission to post it on my site to share with my readers. So please read. I hope you’d like it too.

“Banji.. have you put on your belt?”
“Yes, mother.”
“Banji.. are you sure?”
“Yes, mother.. you can see it for yourself”, I said while showing the belt I was wearing.
“HAHAHAHAHA.. I was referring to the seatbelt”.
And all passengers in the car laughed at me. Guess what, it’s been 20 over years, and my mother still bring up that incident once in a while.
/end memory

Nobody likes making mistakes. However our life today can only be better if we learn from the mistake we did yesterday. There is also no way we can be 100% free from making mistakes. So we might as well just accept the fact that we will make mistake and keep learning from it throughout our life.

I believe that there is however another set of mistakes that we need to avoid at all cost - The mistakes we do after making mistakes. Enlisted below are some of the most common mistakes we usually do after making mistakes.

1) Refuse to admit that mistakes had been done Some people are so egoistic that they will never accept the fact that they had made a mistake. For this type of people, mistakes are signs of weakness and being the egoist that they are, they will never admit to that.
Another type of people who fall into this category is those who were always in denial after a mistake has been made. They are so afraid of making mistakes that they deny the mistake ever happened. These are not the kind of people you want to be around with.
How can we learn from our mistakes if we never actually admit there was one?

2) Try to forget the mistakes Some mistakes are embarassingly painful. These will usually be buried deep down in our memory with the hope that it will be forgotten. Personally, trying to forget our mistake is a very stupid move. If we forget it, it will be like buying a hideous van and burn it down right away. People will never notice the van but your money spent to buy the van is loss forever. Don’t you value your money?

3) Blame self or others. This habit has become sort of a built-in habit to everyone. Once a mistake was done, the first thing people will do is to find whose fault it is. It will never serve any function except the illusion that the mistake has been solved. It can be important however to do this if finding the fault will solve the problem.
The worst case scenario is when we are blaming ourselves for the mistake. Once we do this, believe me, there’s no way out. Our mind will use all of its resource to further punish ourselves for the mistake. It will be like a black hole with no way out. Don’t go there.

4) No room for forgiveness. This is sort of related to point 3. But it is very significant that it deserve its own number. Forgiveness is always the hardest thing to do. We can say anything, read all the books but when your life was screwed up by a person, it will be very hard to forgive him.
That is why, we need to have that room in our heart for forgiveness. Set up this room in our heart. We don’t necessarily need to forgive him right away, but knowing that there’s a room in there for forgiveness will definitely help later on.

5) Justify mistakes Very similar to point number 1, the person who make this mistake will come up with justification as to why a mistake was made. Remember the girl who cried wolf? She might made a mistake the first time thinking that she saw a wolf. And when the villagers came she made excuses that she was just fooling around. You know how it ended.
Justifying mistakes does not make the mistake go away. It will not help you learn from it either.

6) Refuse to analyze your mistake Being an engineer, when a problem / mistake occurs in an operation, the first step is always “redefining the problem”. Let say an operator forgot to switch on a pump and ruined the whole operation. I can straight away scold him or give him a warning letter. But this will not solve the problem. If he can forget the first time, the chances are he will forget it again later.

I should study if there were any possibility the pump can be run automatically and thus removing the problem altogether. Or maybe put up a checklist to help the operator remember.
Analyzing mistake is the most important things to do right after a mistake has been made. If not the mistake made will serve no purpose and you will find that your life is just one big boring loop where the same mistake is being repeated everyday
- I wonder -What’s your biggest shareable mistake in your life?

———– Personal Note ————–My biggest shareable mistake in life is when I was in my final year. I literally spent all my time chatting on IRC. I failed a subject and did poorly on others. That for me is my most expensive lesson in life.


Thanks Banji

If you liked this post, please visit Banji at http://lessoninlife.com/

How to Increase Productivity by Planning a Focused Day

In my article Achieving Life Goals Daily Through Weekly Planning I have explained in detail how I follow a weekly plan for working each day towards my life long goals. Occasionally, because of different reasons, some tasks (generally the small rocks) cannot be accommodated in following days and remain unfinished.

For these LEFT OVER TASKS, I follow a JUST DO IT approach, following 1st generation time management technique. I prepare a TO DO list and find a less loaded day. I interleave all pending tasks with planned tasks for that day. Normally, the list is quite long and requires about 1.5 times the time I work in a day. However, I don't stretch my day. I find the extra time from focusing.

I start the day with the list, indicating priority of each task and approximate time to complete it.
I start of with completing the task in the sequence within the allocated time. I don’t bother about anything else. Don’t allow distractions. I just focus on that task, remain within the TIME BOX that I have reserved for this task. I know that my big rocks have been taken care of and this moment, I have only to manage the very task at hand. This intense focus enables me to finish the task, mostly, before allocated time.

In case I am unable to complete the task, I just stop working on it, unless I am very close to completion, after expiry of time.

If I have to delegate part of task (collection of data, reference etc) to my staff, I do it at the very onset. After delegation, I move on to next task and come back to this task once I have been provided with the required information.

The moment I finish the task, or as the TIME BOX expires, I move on to next task.

I have observed it to be a great way to overcome procrastination. The real gain comes from FOCUS.

Follwoing this approach, even if I complete about 65-70% tasks, I am 100% productive.

Look at the list of my TO DO list for Friday. Time mentioned against each is based on my experience and is correct with 10% variation.

1. Complete review report (1 hr)
2. Respond to 5 memos (45 min)
3. Write 3 letters to 3 companies (45 min)
4. Discuss under repair machinery with our subcontractor and take decisions ( 30 min). I sent an e-mail (5 min).
5. Rent an apartment at Barcelona for my vacation (30 min).
6. Collect required data and make an outline/first draft for my presentation for next meeting (1 hr)
7. Lunch (1hr)
8. Declutter (30 min)
9. 4 Telephone calls to business contacts (45 min)
10. Write an outline for next article (30 min).
11. Read/review report from Supply department (30 min).
12. Go through all e-mails/paper mails (45 min).
13. Attend one briefing and one meeting (1 hr)
14. Different chores (1 hr)
15. 2x 15 minutes breaks (30 min)

Total time required for all tasks: 11:00
Time available (0900 - 1700): 8 Hours (including lunch time and breaks)

I completed tasks amounting to 9-1/2 hours PLUS some emergent tasks that surfaced during the day. This is 120% productivity.

Personal Development Tips - The Lighter Side

This site is all about Personal Development. In last few weeks, you had plenty of serious Personal Development posts. Now is the time to have some Practical Tips. So read on and enjoy:

1. Borrow money from pessimists — they don’t expect it back.
2. The sooner you fall behind, the more time you’ll have to catch up.
3. Hard work pays off in the future, laziness pays off now.
4. Eagles may soar, but weasels don’t get sucked into jet engines.
5. Teamwork is essential - it allows you to blame someone else.
6. The early bird may get the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese.
7. Laugh at your problems; everybody else does
8. There are no short cuts to any place worth going
9. Remember to always be yourself. Unless you suck.
10.If at first you don’t succeed, destroy all evidence that you tried.

And Finally, Always Remember

So Avoid Trying !!!!!

Boosting Metabolism – Facts and Myths

(word count: 700)

In my article Fat Loss and Weight Management – Learn the Basics (Part I) and Part II, I have discussed the important role your metabolism rate plays in your weight management. Your metabolism is the rate at which you burn calories every day. So higher the metabolism rate, more calories you are burning and it is easier for you to lose/manage weight. It is like passive income or an autopilot. You do the hard work one and then capitalize on it with little further effort. Great, isn’t it. However, the problem is that metabolic rate declines with age (especially with a sedentary life style) and one finds it more difficult to burn body fat with workouts and diet alone.

The awareness of link between metabolism and fat loss/weight management among masses has given birth to large industry to provide shortcut / quick fix solutions for boosting the metabolism. These include, but not limited to, powders, potions, pills, drinks and secret techniques that are promised to raise metabolic rate and help burn fat. The fact is, very few of these metabolism boosters actually work.

I’ve examined the claims about popular metabolism boosters, from exercise to nutrition, to show which actually work and which don’t merit your attention and time.

1. Fat-burner pills boost your metabolism greatly. Most fat burners are simply caffeine pills with a few other ingredients, such as green tea, Hoodia etc. Independent research hasn’t proven the effectiveness of these pills. One may get an increase in mental energy through use of these pills, but that is all; one doesn't get a boost in metabolism or burn fat. So my advice would be “avoid fat burner pills”.

2. Breakfast boosts metabolism. My answer would be “Breakfast boosts metabolism indirectly, not directly”. Research shows that eating breakfast is associated with successful weight loss. I always advocate a rich breakfast, comprising of protein, fiber, fruit and vegetables. It keeps you satisfied and your appetite in check till your next meal. Consequently, you don’t indulge is junk food eating. Try having an rich omelet containing broccoli, mushrooms and onions.

3. Ice-cold water with lemon juice. The theory is that body will burn calories to warm up the water, while lemon juice is a natural fat burner. The fact is, it is not correct.

4. Green tea. The claim is that green tea burns an extra 80 calories per day. The fact is that studies have shown burning of 80 calories in young men on the first day of supplementation. But it is not a lasting effect as the body gets used to green tea. I personally take green tea for its proven health results, especially for heart. Otherwise, green tea will help you lose weight only if you replace your high calorie caffeine mug with unsweetened green tea cup.

5. Eating small frequent meals. This has been proven to be a good metabolism boosting strategy wityh additional benefit of helping in cholesterol control. It is simple and effective. Start the day with breakfast and then take small meals/snack/salads/fruit and vegetable servings every four hours. This will give you mental alertness as well as make body to burn more fat.

6. High Intensity Interval training. Definitely YES. In comparison to cardio exercises, high intensity interval training results in a greater increase in post-exercise metabolism. Interval training is simply a short bout of hard exercise followed by a short bout of easy exercise, repeated 5-10 times. The article A 10-Minute Exercise Routine You Can Do Anywhere provides a good start for high intensity interval training.

7. Strength training. Definitely YES and probably the best. A recent study from the Journal of Applied Physiology has showed that strength training doubled post-exercise fat burning. So strength training must be a part of any individual’s fat loss/weight management workout routine. I personally do strength training three days per week, on alternate days and work out all major muscle groups.

The conclusion is that magic pills and potions just don't work. The good news is that you can increase your metabolism through regular exercise and improved diet and eating habits.

In a nutshell, exercising, building muscles and eating the right foods in the right amounts help you keep your metabolism stoked.

Exercise – The Lighter Side

In my last post, Fat Loss and Weight Management – Learn the Basics (Part II), I have discussed the benefits of exercising. One of my visitors has sent me the “other side” or “lighter side” of the exercising. I have found it quite funny, so I am sharing it with you.

1. I joined a health club last year, spent about 400 bucks. Haven't lost a pound. Apparently you have to show up.

2. I have to exercise early in the morning before my brain figures out what I'm doing.

3. I don't exercise at all. If God meant us to touch our toes, he would have put them further up on our body.

4. I have flabby thighs, but fortunately my stomach covers them.

5. The advantage of exercising every day is that you die healthier.

6. If you are going to try cross-country skiing, start with a small country.

7. The only reason I would take up jogging is so that I could hear heavy breathing again.

8. And last but not least “ for every mile that you jog, you add one minute to your life. This enables you at 85 years old to spend an additional 5 months in a nursing home at $5000 per month”.

Fat Loss and Weight Management – Learn the Basics (Part II)

I finished part I of this article with the following diagram, describing the fundamentals of fat loss and weight management (click to enlarge).



If you analyze the diagram, you’ll find that there are basically 7 practical actions (top line) that you need to do to lose fat or maintain weight. These are:

a. Perform cardiovascular exercises
b. Perform resistance exercise
c. Stay Hydrated
d. Optimize meal quality
e. Eat frequent meals
f. Eat small portions
g. Avoid alcohol/soft drinks

Let us assume that you want to lose fat. This requires creating calorie deficit. So you need to keep calorie expenditure high and calorie intake low.

Now as soon as we are asked to keep calorie intake low, we think of dieting. Personally, I am a strong opponent of dieting. I did dieting only once when I brought my weight down from 104 kg to 82 kg. During the process, I realized that dieting may be a one-time option, but it is impracticable in the long run. Also, dieting has adverse effects on health.

So how to reduce calorie intake?

This can be done by optimizing food quality, staying hydrated, avoiding soda/alcohol and eating small portions.

Many people believe that optimizing food quality means deprivation; letting go all the foods one enjoys and switching to the tasteless ones. It is far from truth. I have not surrendered any of my favourite foods. I still take ice cream, desserts, cream rich cakes, chocolates, French fries, meat etc. The trick is, however, that I treat calorie rich foods as a treat. I take a couple of servings of these every week, really savoring and enjoying every bite. However, that is occasional indulgence and I don’t become addicted. The feeling that I can have my favourite foods is important to maintain a healthy diet without feeling of deprivation.

You can work out your own food optimization plan; at your own or in consultation with a dietitian. It is not a rocket science, just good (food) common sense and some knowledge of balanced diet. Just start on a conversion plan towards good food and make adjustments along the way.

Here is how I optimized my food quality and eating habits, I have gradually increased my intake of vegetables, nuts and fruits. I have cut down (cut down, not eliminated) red meat, oils, fats, desserts/sweets, soda drinks and alcohol etc. I now take 4 meals in a day; two regular meals in the form of breakfast and dinner. For me breakfast is something not to be missed at any cost. It is a proven fact that those who eat breakfast every morning are a third less likely to be obese. The reason is simple; eating first thing in the morning helps stabilize blood sugar, which in turn regulates appetites. And what constitute a good breakfast? A well-balanced breakfast includes fruits, breads, cereals, eggs, yogurt, nuts and milk etc. My breakfast includes all these. Well not all of these daily; I do keep varying my breakfast menu.

I take 2 comparatively small servings of fresh fruits/vegetables/salads/light snacks/nuts or combination of these as my mid day and afternoon meals. These two small meals keep my energy levels high and curb the urge to go for junk food. Dinner is another main meal for me. It is not very heavy, but has plenty of proteins. I normally have my dinner 3-4 hours before I go to bed.

I avoid soft drinks and prefer to drink lot of water. In my office and on my study table at home, there is always a bottle of water. I substitute soft drinks by fresh juices. Coffee is almost out. I take tea, with no compromise on taste. So my tea contains sugar, but by limiting the number of cups of tea to 1-2 per day, my sugar intake from hot drinks is minimal.

So just by changing my eating habits and careful selection of foods and drinks over the period of time gradually, I have reduced my calorie intake to my calorie expenditure without any feeling of deprivation. In case I am unable to carry out my exercise routines, mostly because of business trips, I slightly amend my eating routine and without even noticing the difference that I have given away any food, I am able to avoid fat accumulations.

Coming back to losing fat. One needs to go a little further to reduce the calorie intake. I recommend a slight change and reduction in each of your meals to reduce daily calorie intake by 200-400 calories only. This may look difficult, but if you just

substitute your soda/alcohol drinks by plain water

reduce number of coffee/tea cups by 1-2 per day

swap one of your high fat main meal with vegetable based low calorie meal and

skip every alternate convenient food/chocolate bar

You would have reduced the calorie intake by 200-500 without even noticing any change. Drink plenty of water and make sure you don’t feel starved. If you don’t take your planned low calorie but tasty meal, you’ll feel hungry, and there is all the possibility that you will succumb to some high calorie readily available convenient, but, junk food.

Second part of the calorie deficit equation is to increase calorie expenditure. The simplest and most direct way is to do cardiovascular exercises. However, there are some legal shortcuts; Maintain a high resting metabolism rate. This is done mainly through resistance training and is supplemented by avoiding alcohol & starvation and staying hydrated.

I personally like resistance training and high intensity short duration exercises for my exercise routines. These types of exercises are fun to perform, expand calories rapidly, shape the physique and put body on autopilot for burning calories while you are resting. Depending upon your fitness level, available time and access to local gym, you can make your own resistance as well high intensity short duration exercises routines. The simplest form is to do squats, push ups and alternate 1 minute sprint and walk for 5 to 10 times (each). Please see A 10-minute exercise you can do any where.

Resistance training is a must to maintain weight for following reasons
a. It burns calorie while you are exercising.
b. It maintains a high metabolism rate, so your body burns fat even when your are not exercising.
c. It programmes body to maintain muscle, so when your body has to lose weight because of calorie deficit, it is the fat that burns and not the muscles.

If you exercise the seven basic steps I listed above, these will help your body to lose fat/ maintain weight in other ways that may not be known to you. It is just like passive income; passive calorie expenditure. For example, if you take frequent meals and optimize your meal quality, you’ll avoid starvation. This will, on one hand, programme the body to retain muscles and on the other hand, will make your intelligent body to be comfortable with lower fat stores. The end results of these two is that whenever your body will lose weight because of calorie deficit, it will start with fats, not muscles.

To summarize this article, I’ll say take small and consistent steps daily in the seven areas that I have listed above and your fat loss/weight management will be put on auto pilot. You’ll have to make only small adjustments occasionally.

Enjoy a great looking, well toned and healthy body. Your health is your best resource.

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Great!!!!!.

But frankly, blogging is my means of communication and expression. Money has not entered the equation so far. Site’s value calculation is jus for fun.

So join the fun and find out your site's value by clicking the link below:

My site is worth $722.7.
How much is yours worth?

Fat Loss and Weight Management – Learn the Basics (Part I)

“Fat loss is easy once you understand how hard it is... and it's hard if you think it is easy”.

About a decade ago, I was pursuing my Masters degree. We were 30 students in the class with diverse nationalities and professional & academic backgrounds. On the frist day, our course sponsor welcomed us with the news that in the last session, only 40% students qualified. Then he casually advised us to work hard so that we are among the 40%, not in the other 60%.

Having had an excellent academic background, I was very positive of earning my Masters degree with flying colours. However, the 40-60 equation as quite depressing. I resolved to live to my reputation and that is exactly what I did. I used to study for 18 hours a day; put in about 100 hours of work for course works/assignments carrying just 2-4% of weightage and so on. End of the day, I finished first class first; Masters with distinction with an offer to continue for university sponsored Ph .D (which I had to decline due to my job commitments).

I gained my objective.

But in the process, I gained something else as well: about 20 kg of fats.

Yes, long hours on the chair, lack of exercise and plenty of fat rich fast food had increased my weight from 84 kg to over 104 kg.

That was a shock.

I resumed my job with my company. First three months were busy and demanding and I could find little time for exercise. But one day I thought it was enough. If I’ll keep on waiting for the easy time to start exercising and control my diet, it is never going to happen. I’ll have to create time for myself. I’ll have to improve my diet. I made the decision and embarked upon an ambitious diet plus exercise regime. I alternated swimming, jogging, walk, gym in the daily morning and evening sessions and restricted my calorie intake to the minimum for about two months ….. and bingo. I achieved another goal. My weight came down to 82 kilo. It was great but I concluded that I couldn’t let my weight to cycle between extremes, forcing me to follow rigorous exercise and diet routines every couple of months.

So I decided to set my weight management basics in order; just like my academic and professional life. Step one was to define ideal weight for myself. With a height of 6 feet (180 cm), I must weigh 82 kg.

Next, I worked out the basics. In extreme simplicity, fat loss and weight management is essentially creating calorie deficit for fat loss (less consumption, more expenditure) or calorie balance (intake = consumption) for maintaining weight. The main advantage of working out the basics is that:

a. It is equally effective for both weight management as well as for fat loss.
b. It is extremely flexible. One can define his own routines, eating habits etc suiting to his/her very specific likes, life style and routine etc.
c. It is permanent, practical, wholesome and natural. There are no short cuts, no gimmicks, no starvation, and no magic pills. It is all about you, your life style and your self-discipline (I am intentionally not using the term will power as it apparently seems too demanding, whereas my concept of weight management is easy and enjoyable).

After going through hundreds of articles, books and programmes on weight management, fat loss, exercises, diets, life style etc, I concluded that the entire process of weight management/fat loss can be summarized in some basic steps. For the sake of simplicity, I have converted this information in a flow diagram given below (click to enlarge):