Losers are busy. The winners are effective.
“The world doesn’t reward busy.
Busy is for losers.
The world rewards effectiveness.
This requires learning to become a great steward of time.
You need to work your ass off.
But remember, while winers have full plates, their success is always a byproduct of effectiveness.”
-Ray Zingler on X
The unique thing about the most successful people I know is that while their plates are (very) full..
They never come off as busy.
It’s always the people who really aren’t that busy (or intentionally fill their calendars with random, often useless stuff) who love to tell you how busy they are.
“Omg, we’re just so busy these days!”
That sucks.
Are you busy?
Or
Are you effective?
Because busy is for losers.
And effective is for winners.
What are you teaching your kids every time they hear you talk about how busy you are or that you can’t do something of value because you have “too much going on” (much of which is often far less valuable than what you’re forced to say no to)?
They aren’t associating “doing a lot of shit” with “being overwhelmingly effective”.
They just see cluttered calendars and rarely have anything tangible to point to that made the busy-ness fruitful in the long-term.
“I can’t exercise because I’m too busy!”
What the hell are you doing?
Said differently, “I am going to make decisions and commit to things that are less important than my health & wellbeing that are going to have direct negative implications on the length and quality of time I get to spend with my children & grandchildren on earth.”
All the sudden, your “busy flex” isn’t the flex that you thought it was.
Work hard.
Work unreasonably hard.
But do so in a focused, intentional manner.
I look back at my busy days of 12-16 hour work days and I learned a lot from them.
There were undoubtedly days I had to put all 14 hours in, miss meals, give up sleep, all that good stuff.
But there were many of them I stayed busy just because I thought being busier than you held merit.
Thank God that I learned that it doesn’t.
Now, instead of “working the most hours” I compete with myself trying to be as effective as I possibly can in the least number of hours.
This forced growth and intentionality in my life.
And I’m damn certain it will do the same for you.
Cut out the fluff.
Be a killer with the essential.
You’ll find it’s all the world cares about.
