Whole ass

One of my favorite shows on television is NBC’s Parks and Recreation. My favorite character among the mix is Ron Swanson. Other than Ron looking exactly like my uncle, Ron's quick wit, slow delivery and dry humor make me excited all week long for Thursday nights. Recently, when I was watching through last season episodes again on Netflix, one of Ron’s quotes really resonated with me again.

“Never half ass two things, whole ass one thing” –Ron Swanson

No matter how talented a person is at multitasking  work, training, social life, finances, personal time, things will slip through the cracks. The more things that come on to a person’s plate the greater the chance for a half ass job of completion. Until recently I was balancing 3 part time jobs and finishing my masters degree. Needless to say there were times where I had forgotten something or missed out on an opportunity for fun, even with countless sticky notes all over my desk and computer reminding me to do my work. The jobs ended up being half assed.

I have had the luxury of being able to start whole assing jobs due to my new position. I have also made it my top priority. To help ensure that a task is being done whole assed total focus must be done for that task until it reaches a stage of completion. For example when I am lifting, I am lifting. I’m not working, cleaning house or talking on the phone. My undivided attention is at the task at hand. When I truly study I shut down the distractions around me (turn my phone off and don’t have facebook open on the computer) so I can whole ass the material in front of me.

A person may have a billion things to do on their to do list and if they all try to get done at the same time they might not turn out as well as hoped. But if those tasked were checked of singularly with full attention to them they would be done completely and well.

A few options to whole ass life.

• Make a list of big projects and complete one item entirely before going on to the next
• Shut yourself out from the outside world for the duration of time for a task (the world will keep spinning if you aren’t connected to your twitter, promise).
• Get away from your normal surroundings to get a task done (go to a coffee shop or park or library or where you can focus on the task fully).
•  Don’t take your cell phone into the gym to lift (or in any area of the gym for that matter)
• Stick to a plan of getting stronger in the gym instead of trying to bulk/cut weight/ gain running endurance at the same time
• If you have multiple jobs devote certain days and times to one of them and don’t allow the other to interfere.

Whole ass jobs of one item provide much better results than half ass jobs of multiple things at once.

So does trying to be awesome like Ron Swanson.