We All Want More Cake

We tend to view things as being inherently inconvenient or convenient.

Observe the following equations:

Inconvenience = "Pain in the ass"

Convenience = "Piece of cake"

Suffice it to say that most people, given the option, would choose more cake than pain(s) in the ass.

(I don't recommend crossing these equations. There is no pain in the cake and vice ver...).

This is not an astonishing revelation.

However, the problem with thinking this way is that inconvenience and convenience tend to be viewed as being fixed and unchangeable.

BUT... Is this true? I don't think it is.

If you think about it, plenty of people engineer systems to make something that is normally a pain in the ass into something that is not so bad.

Your car, for example, is a system designed specifically to make getting from point A to point B easier. However, plenty of work was front-loaded by eningeers to spare you from doing additional work (walking) later.

I look at convenience in two ways. You can:

• Do more work upfront so that you have to do less work later.
• Shift the burden elsewhere altogether.

The first point applies to fitness. The second point simply doesn't apply here.

I'm going to drop an example from my grade school days to further illustrate my first point.

Whenever I did my homework as a kid, I would fold my completed homework, stick it in my textbook, and put everything in my backpack. I would then leave my backpack by the front door.

Why? So the following morning I wouldn't have to expend any additional mental energy trying to get my ass in gear first.

This was a simple system for reducing the morning scramble.

Now, I'm going to refer to my example from the previous post...

I'm not a morning person. Getting up early feels like work. But, what if I shifted the work to the night before by going to bed earlier and cutting out just one or two hours of Netflix?

It is likely this will reduce the amount of work required to just get up the morning after.

Here's another example - When it comes to the food that you eat, do you know what your next meal is going to look like in advance? Or it is left to chance?

If you leave it to chance, is it likely going to be a healthy meal?

The best thing you can do right now is embrace the mentality that convenience isn't about avoiding work or effort. It's about knowing where to strategically emphasize the work so that less effort is required later.