Accomplish your New Year's Resolutions while Eating Pasta
Making significant breakthroughs doesn't necessarily require a drastic change. A single tiny switch can do wonders.
Hello, Hypers!
This is the last Under the Hype issue of the year. I’ll be getting some well-deserved vacations to spend these special days with my family and friends in my home country. This will inspire me to write many more articles in 2024 for sure.
As the end of another year is approaching, we tend to think about what we have done in the past and what we want to achieve in the future. No matter if you are the kind of person who writes New Year goal lists or not. The question of what to achieve next year is likely floating on your mind. And sometimes, it becomes a little scary.
Sometimes we avoid writing goals because we see them too far. We don’t want to disappoint ourselves. We think achieving those goals requires too much effort and lifestyle changes. It is certainly overwhelming.
But there is one trick hidden in your kitchen. A secret that has been transmitted from one generation to the next. It was discovered in a wonderful land on the shores of the Mediterranean Sea, and now, I’m revealing it to you.
With this trick, you’ll be able to write your goal list with confidence and also achieve those goals.
The Trick is in the Pasta
I love cooking. I do it every day and I’m not tired of it. I love experimenting with new ingredients and learning new recipes. Also, cooking is a moment to forget about life problems and focus on a simple target. It’s like meditating.
A few months ago, I was viewing a video of a chef explaining how to improve the taste of pasta. After more than ten tips, the chef said:
All of those tips will surely improve the quality of your pasta. But there is a single trick that will automatically improve your pasta by 80%. If you're going to take away something from this video, let it be this: finish your pasta in the skillet.
This single trick does 80% of the work! You can forget about the quality of the pasta or the ingredients. You can neglect some tiny details and measures. Just by finishing pasta in the skillet, you’ll get 80% better results.
Two minutes before the pasta is done, put it in the skillet, integrate it with the sauce and some cooking water, and stir it until it is completely done. This will allow a perfect mix between the pasta and the sauce. Also, the cooking water has a lot of starch from the pasta and will provide a delicious texture.
If you are Italian, I’m sorry for telling you things that you know since your infancy. But please, keep going. Things will get interesting, I promise.
Before watching this video, I cooked pasta that way. I liked to integrate it with the sauce right before it was completely done. But I didn’t know this was such a big deal. This 80% improvement was the fact that surprised me. The fact that sometimes there is just one thing, a single detail that makes almost all the difference. Since learning this little secret, I started to look for the “finish pasta in the skillet“ equivalent in other aspects of life.
My search has been fruitful. Finding these equivalents has allowed me to be better at many different things and accomplish a lot of goals. The best part is that it looks like an effortless process and sometimes you see the fruits in no time.
The rest of this article is a list of my discoveries in many areas of my life. I must say that the “finish the pasta in the skillet“ equivalent for me might not be the same for you. If you think it won’t work for you, that’s totally normal. Just try to find your own equivalent. And if you already discovered it, please let me know by replying. Your experience can be very helpful for other people too.
Accomplishing Goals
Getting to the goal line is problematic. Sometimes we feel the line is getting farther from us. We don’t know if we are running in the wrong direction, or if external things have changed, or both. We just know we are not getting there.
That’s why it is important to measure our goals and our steps toward them. For example, losing weight is not a good goal. Instead, try “losing X kilograms by the end of the year”, or “losing X kilograms per month”. Here we are setting a very specific goal with a deadline.
Now we can periodically check if we are compliant with the plan and objectively judge if we are making the progress we expect to make. After these revisions, we can act accordingly. For example, we can change our diet if we see we are not getting good enough results.
Of course, just measuring goals won’t accomplish those goals for you. In the same way, just finishing your pasta in the skillet doesn’t mean you will get good pasta. But adding this single change should improve your accomplishing goal rate significantly.
Productivity
This is not the first time I say this in this newsletter: I’m lazy. Still, this year I wrote a book, started working in a big company, started this weekly newsletter, mentored some people to make them find the job they want, launched a product with a partner, started working on another product idea, etc.
I did all those things while being lazy at the same time. Not working more than eight hours a day. Not working on weekends…
Well, I write this newsletter on weekends so support me with a premium subscription (yearly plan 50% off) or sharing it with your friends :)
I spend a lot of time doing what I like (like cooking). So, don’t buy that BS of having to sacrifice your lifestyle to get things done. Maybe for some specific goals, you would need to sacrifice your lifestyle a little bit for a limited time. But in general, you can get things done just by doing the right things at the right moment.
In my case, the change that makes me really productive is the “Eat the frog method”. In my opinion, this will work for people who:
Don’t like too much planning and structure in their lives.
Are more productive in the mornings
It is a two-step method. The first step is what I call identifying the frog, and the second is eating the frog. But, what the heck is the frog? The frog is that task that is very important but that you don’t feel too motivated to do it. It can be writing a new chapter of a book, exercising, or fixing the TV remote.
Usually, I identify the frog the day before. I try to add a priority to my tasks and also a motivation rate. The frog is a task that has a high priority but a low motivation rate. Once the frog is identified, it becomes the first thing I do in the next morning. That’s the second step: eating the frog.
And that’s it. Just by eating the frog, I remove the burden of an important but boring task. Now my day only can get better. This does wonders for my productivity.
Managing Time
Time management has a lot to do with productivity but also with the rest of our life. If we focus too much on productivity we start to spend less time with our families, or doing all those things that make life worth living. We need to manage our time cautiously so we can achieve all of our goals, not just those related to our jobs or businesses.
This one will be short. The “finish the pasta in the skillet“ equivalent is blocking time in your calendar. Whether it is a periodic task like exercising or going out with your wife, or it is a one-time task like doing your taxes just block the time for it in your calendar.
This creates a sacred space for these tasks and gives you a sense of how much free time you have and how much time you are spending on important things. You don’t have to take this to the extreme point of having everything perfectly organized and planned. I don't like it at all. But a little bit of organization will make you happier.
Productivity + Managing Time Bonus
I know I said there would be just one secret per section but this one is very important to me and I don’t know exactly what specific aspect of my life it improves. I think it is a mixture of productivity and time management. But it also improves my mental health. It is quite simple:
Make “no“ your default answer
We tend to always answer “yes”. Can you help me with X? Yes. Can you go to Y? Yes. Would you, please, participate in Z? Yes. I’m not getting into what is the cause for this but our default answer is “yes“.
But after answering three or four “yes” during the week, we realize we can’t get along with everyone, or that we can’t do something important to us because we need to do something important to others.
Time is scarce, but important things are scarce too. So make sure to dedicate your time to those few important things. Of course, one of those important things might be helping other people. But if you are not careful enough, you’ll soon find yourself dedicating more time to others than to you.
That being said, don’t hesitate to ask me for a favor. I might answer I can’t do it right now. But I’m sure I’ll find a way to help you. Setting boundaries is not being selfish. It is just protecting our scarce time and preventing others from making abusive use of it.
Human Interactions
Want to be appreciated by others? Just listen.
That’s it. That’s the secret. This is not a change I had to make. I have a natural inclination to listen instead of talking. But I have appreciated how much this can help other people and how much it has helped me.
I don’t really understand why some people feel the urge to talk. There is almost nothing you can get from talking compared with all the things you can learn from listening. I like to listen to people. Of course, sometimes I don’t care what they’re talking about, in those cases I just find a way to finish the conversation.
But when it comes to people you care about, like your friend or your boss, consciously listening to them can do wonders. It will allow you to learn more about them, to make them feel you are a person they can count on, and to find the best way to talk to them when it is necessary.
That’s it, just listen.
Conclusions
I also love to play the guitar. I have been playing it for more than 10 years. Now I can say I’m a decent player (at least when it comes to the genres I like). I never went to a music school but I had one or two teachers I learned a lot from. They taught me what I wanted to learn and thanks to them, I’m the guitar player I always wanted to be. Not a rockstar, just a guy who can play and write some songs.
But there is a big lesson I learned from the guitar. If I wanted to master one technique or one rhythm, I had to practice it for weeks or months. I played for several hours each day. I practiced a lot to get to the point where the fingers started to do the thing on their own, without me having to consciously command them.
The lesson here is that there are no shortcuts to achieving some things in life. There is no “finish the pasta in the skillet“ when learning to play the guitar. There is no such equivalent when learning computer programming either. We just need to put hours and hours and be constant.
But other things in life don’t have to be so difficult. Maybe we don’t want to be the most productive person in the world, we just want to improve our productivity a little bit. I don’t want to cook the best pasta ever, I just want it to be delicious. In this case, we often can find one little change that makes us achieve the goal way faster.
In this article, I mentioned a few of those changes that worked for me:
Measuring goals
Eat the frog method
Blocking time
Making “no“ the default answer
Listen first
These little details have deeply changed my life. I hope they can also help you or at least that this article allows you to find your own little changes.
This is the last email you’ll receive from me this 2023. I hope you have wonderful holidays, and to have you back in 2024. There is a lot I want to tell you next year and I would love you to tell me how you accomplished your New Year Resolutions.
Remember not to be afraid of writing down those goals and please, finish your pasta in the skillet.
See you in 2024!
I agree with your idea that cooking is a relaxing time, also while eating what has been cooked.
Add this tip to your one.
When water boils, salt water if you like, put the pasta, wait until water comes back to boiling, at that point switch off the gas. Let pasta complete to cook, the time is about the time indicated by the pasta producer, however it can change depending on how much water is in the pot, more water less time. Pay attention in case of electric stoves thar remain hot worl long tone after switch off. To gain your expertise, test the pasta time by time and decide yourself when it is al dente as you like. Then proceed with your 80 % way.
This waybof cooking save energy and less starch and other substances are lost in the water.
Enjoy.
Dude, if you're coming back for holidays, let's meet one day at the uni? Has to be before the 22nd, tho. When are you coming?