Learn The Tools

About a week or so ago, I wrote about knowing the rules. I may have used the basketball analogy and you can definitely read the post. The thing about the rules and playing any game, whether is relationships, work, money, or whatever, a code of conduct must be followed. A complimentary component of the rules are the tools.

Tools allow us to leverage them to make our tasks a bit simpler and less time consuming. Picture a mound of dirt ten feet wide and six feet wide. We could move the dirt 40 feet using only our hands. We could apply a couple of tools, a shovel and a wheelbarrow, and complete the task much faster. We could also use a bulldozer and complete the job in a small fraction of the time. That’s assuming of course, we know how to operate a bulldozer.

With the recent popularization of large language models and artificial intelligence many individuals and organizations are having to learn new tools. It’s a great thing to have access to accelerators. Tools that can help you accomplish your desired outcome in far less time. The challenge is learning the tools. The same with the bulldozer example. If applied improperly, the damage from a bulldozer would be far greater than that of you using your hands to move the dirt. Learning to use the tools effectively and efficiently will reap rewards.

I’m currently doing the same thing. I’ve been writing lists similar to these for several years. I write five days in a typical week with 52 weeks per year and at least four or five years stored in the “cloud”, I’ve easily got several hundred lists. There are lots of tools available today. Some to make audio, some video, some for posting content, some for creating hashtags, and much more. My current challenge is there isn’t one tool that’ll allow me to click a couple of buttons, and deliver hundreds of documents to my audience. After some research this morning, it appears as if about six or seven tools, in the proper order, could accelerate the process, but I don’t know the tools. I have to learn the tools. And therein lies the challenge.

I’ll learn the tools. I’ll invest the time needed. I’ll become competent in each and maybe master a few, but it’ll take some time. Financially things are bleak and it would be folly to continue along this course without some sort of financial return. We reap what we sow, but it’s later and greater.

A buddy here needed some work done on a spreadsheet. He was having some challenges and could only explain his problem. I told him the solution. He asked if I could implement the solution. Several hours later, he was happy with the end result. I’m by no stretch of the imagination an expert with spreadsheets, but I have a working knowledge and explained the fundamentals haven’t changed since I was in high schools and first learned them over thirty years ago. He happily sent me money for his problem being solved, which helped solve part of my financial problem.

If you’re having delays and doubts about learning the tools, about your harvest or your rewards, reread this. It perfectly illustrates how the work you do today can yield benefits years later. I wrote this more for me than you, but it’s provided more insig

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