Last week, I offered some perspective on a new way to spend your free time.  I suggested that instead of “consuming,” we should all move toward “producing.”  But after reading through the comments and discussing my concept with a few colleagues, I realized there was a problem with my advice.

The content was sound, but the context had not been established.

The two main arguments that came up were:

  1. “What good is ‘producing’ if I don’t know what to produce?,” and
  2. “I’m working all the time as it is.  I don’t have time to produce any more!”

Both are extremely valid, and the answer to both can be summarized by a story I heard a while ago.

Like much of the information I retain these days, I can’t remember if I read the following example in a book, saw it on TV, heard it on a podcast, read it on a website, etc.  But even though I may mess up some of the details, the moral of the story is key:

An American janitor is at work one day and spots a puddle in the middle of a long hallway.  Armed with a bucket and his mop, the janitor wipes up the mess, rinses his mop, and moves on to his next task.  The next day, the janitor walks down the same stretch of hallway and finds another similar-sized puddle in the same exact spot.  With a few quick motions, the puddle is wiped clean and the janitor continues down the hall.  This same exercise goes on for a week until the janitor brings up the issue to his manager.

“Hey boss, every day when I come in there’s a big puddle in the middle of that hallway.  What should I do about it?”

“Well, what’s causing the puddle?”

“There’s a wet spot in the ceiling that’s dripping onto the floor.” says the janitor,

“Well, I’ll have the ceiling fixed, but in the meantime clean up the floor,” says the boss.  ”We can’t have people falling and hurting themselves!”

- – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - -

A Japanese janitor is working at a corporate headquarters in Tokyo and comes across an unusual puddle in the middle of a long hallway.  The janitor takes out his mop, wipes up the mess, and rinses his mop.  Then (using a technique developed by a man named Sakichi Toyoda), the janitor asks the simple question: WHY.

“Why is there a puddle in the middle of this hallway?” he mumbles to himself.  He looks around and notices a small wet spot on the ceiling above the puddle.  Again, he asks the question: WHY?

“Why is there a wet spot on the ceiling?”  The janitor decides to access the crawl space above the hallway and finds there is a small leak in the roof of the building that is dripping directly onto the ceiling above the puddle.

“Why is there a leak in the roof?” he asks himself.  The janitor takes the stairwell to the roof to see what is going on.  Once outside, the janitor realizes one of the gutters is blocked and is causing all of the rain to flow to the exact spot of the leak in the roof.

“But why is the gutter blocked?” the janitor wonders.  He follows the gutter along the edge of the roof to find that a group of birds have decided to build their nests in the middle of the gutter, which is causing all of the rain to overflow and stream down the roof, inside the building, onto the ceiling, and eventually onto the floor of the hallway.

As a result, the janitor removes the bird nest, fixes the gutter, patches the hole in the roof, patches the hole in the ceiling, and doesn’t have to mop the floor day after day.

No – Japanese janitors aren’t smarter than American janitors.  The moral of the story is that asking “why” (at least) five times can help identify the core issue behind any problem.

Why Produce Content?

I’m a big believer that busying yourself creates new opportunities.  It takes a serious commitment to take consistent action, but the payoff is always worth it.  The act of consistently “producing” also improves your strengths and weaknesses.  But there’s a difference between just being busy and achieving results, and that difference depends on your “BIG WHY.”

Your BIG WHY is the main reason you do what you do. It’s your ultimate goal, your end game.

Everything I do focuses on leaving the world a better place than I found it. Pretty simple.  While that may seem enormous and vague to some, it motivates everything I do (and don’t do).  If I can’t prove that a task will improve my life, my community, or the lives of those around me – I turn it down.

Rome Wasn’t Built in a Day, and Neither Was My “Big Why”

If you don’t have your Big Why figured out yet, you still have time.  I didn’t wake up one morning and know that I wanted to make the world a better place.  There were many events that have shaped who I am and who I want to become.  But none of them were as important as looking inside and asking myself “why?”  Once I had my Big Why, breaking my life down into smaller actionable goals became much easier to visualize and achieve.

My internal dialog went something like this:

  • I want to be financially independent. (Why? What does “financially independent” mean?)
  • It means all of my bills are taken care of and I don’t have to work to generate income. (Why? What will you do if you don’t have to work?)
  • I can spend my time on things I like to do, or jobs I think are important. (What kind of important jobs would you work on?)
  • Things that make the world beautiful (art and music), businesses that improve the lives of others, helping people less fortunate than myself, spending time with family and friends, etc. (What will completing these items achieve?)
  • Make people smile and inspire them to live a better life. (Why do you want people to smile and live better lives?)

If you aren’t spending time on things that excite you and/or move you closer to your Big Why, then why are you doing them?  Life is too short to do things you don’t love.  You are the only one who can determine what makes you happy and what you want to accomplish during your lifetime.  So start here…

  1. What do you want to do?
  2. Why do you want to do it?
  3. Keep asking yourself “why?” until you get to your Big Why.
  4. Make the commitment to only doing things that bring you closer to the life you want.

I’d love to know where this exercise leads you.   So take a minute, jot down some notes, post your results as a comment, and let me know where you end up.