In the following video, Productivity Game goes over three questions to help you determine what’s worth saying hell yeah to.
Key Takeaways
- Hey you want to attend this conference? Sure.
- Want to take on this internal project? Absolutely?
- Want to start a podcast? Yeah, let’s do it.
- Hey I’m volunteering this Saturday, you want to join me? Yeah.
All these yeses lead to meeting lots of new people, doing lots of new things, and finding out what type of work you like doing, but eventually you’ll reach a point when you feel over committed and scattered.
Soon all the opportunities you said yes to will feel like obligations and you’ll wake up wondering why do I say yes to this.
If you get to this point it’s time to implement a hell yeah or no policy.
As author Derek Sivers says, if you feel anything less than, “wow that would be amazing, absolutely, hell yeah, then say no.”
When you adopt a hell yeah or no approach to life you create space in life to focus on what really matters and spend time doing things that are really worth doing.
What's Worth Saying Hell Yeah to?
1. What do you hate NOT doing?
Sivers says when we wonder what’s worth doing, we ask ourselves what do I really love or what makes me happy?
That question never really goes well, does it?
Maybe it’s because there’s a long list of things that make us happy and we need to narrow it down further.
So try this question instead: what do you hate NOT doing?
When we don’t sleep for days we realize how badly we need sleep. Think of activities like sleep that you crave if you go too long without them.
When I have a few hectic days of meetings, I crave quiet, creative alone time. I miss being able to close the door, open a book, take notes, and explore different ways of explaining the core message of a book on this channel.
Here are some ways to remember what you hate not doing.
1. First imagine being held captive and forced to dig ditches like a prisoner of war.
What do you most miss being able to do?
2. Second imagine you wake up to learn that you’ve just been fired from your job or you’ve lost your business.
What part of your old job will you miss the most? Whatever it is, that’s your hell yeah work task.
Start training others to complete all your other responsibilities so you can focus on your hell yeah responsibilities.
3. Lastly, imagine waking up tomorrow and everyone you know is mysteriously gone. They’ve turned to dust like in the Avengers movie.
Who do you miss the most?
When you have an opportunity to spend time with them say hell yeah!
2. What scares you most?
Sivers says sometimes people ask me if there’s one motto or rule of thumb I use most often this is it:
Whatever scares you, go do it. Fear is just a form of excitement and you know you should do what excites you.
Legendary psychologist Abraham maslow once said,
"Life is an ongoing process of choosing between safety out of fear and need for defense and risk. For sake of progress and growth, make the growth choice a dozen times a day."
As someone who stuttered badly in his youth I always felt anxious talking in public, so when I heard about a toastmasters meeting in my area–a place where people go to speak in front of a group of strangers–I was both terrified and intrigued.
I had a feeling that if I went to the meeting I would learn a great deal about myself, so the next week I drove to toastmasters, stood up in front of a dozen people and trembled and stammered my way through my introduction.
But after the meeting I felt empowered. I kept going and the more I did what scared me, the more my confidence grew and the more my speaking abilities improved.
If it wasn’t for the confidence I developed amidst the terror I felt at toastmasters, writing and delivering speeches, I would have never started this channel.
If a scary project has been on your mind for a few months—like starting a business that might fail or learning a language with a native speaker over Skype even though you might sound foolish at first–it’s probably worth saying hell yeah to and saying no to almost everything else.
3. What if you are satiated?
Sivers says you know that feeling you have after a big meal when you’re so full that you don’t want any more?
Ever wonder what that would be like in other parts of your life?
What if you had so much attention, so much praise you couldn’t possibly want anymore.
What would you do then? What would you stop doing?
What if you had so much money you couldn’t possibly want anymore.
What would you do then? What would you stop doing?
We humans are hardwired to seek attention, praise, and approval from others and accumulate resources because we evolved to believe resources are scarce.
However if we constantly crave attention and money, we will say yes to every little opportunity to make a buck or get praise from others, which means we are likely to do things we don’t like, with people we don’t like.
If we pause and generate a feeling of abundance, we can blunt the knee-jerk reaction to say yes to every attention-grabbing, money-making opportunity and start playing the long game.
When money and attention are no longer the first thing on your mind, you can focus on work that you find interesting and useful.
But this type of sustained effort often leads to a breakthrough, so paradoxically by not worrying about money or attention, you are more likely to build something remarkable that makes money and garner’s attention.
Now after you ask yourself the three questions, you might have more than one activity you can’t imagine not doing. More than one scary, but intriguing project or more than one project you go all in on if you felt you had enough money and attention.
When faced with many hell yeahs it’s important to not be a donkey.
Sivers says, you may have heard the story of Buriden’s donkey standing halfway between a pile of hay and a bucket of water.
The donkey keeps looking left and right, trying to decide between hay and water. Unable to decide it eventually dies of hunger and thirst.
A donkey can’t think of the future. If he could he’d clearly realize that he could first drink the water, then go eat the hay.
Don’t be a donkey. You can do everything you want to, you just need foresight and patience.
It seems ridiculous to plan to age 90 when you’re 30, but it’s probably coming so you might as well take advantage of it.
In the end, when you feel scattered and over committed, adopt a hell yeah or no strategy.
Say no to almost everything, so you can dedicate more time on this earth to the few things that are worth doing. Namely activities you can’t imagine not doing or scary but intriguing projects or something you’d do if you felt you had enough money and attention.
"Refuse almost everything. Do almost nothing. But the things you do, do them all the way."