If you’re going on a day-long hike and, right at the outset, you find a pebble in your shoe, what do you do? You don’t say, “I have to do the hardest task first—I’m going to finish this hike and remove the pebble after”. No, you take off your shoe, give it a good shake until the pebble drops to the ground, you put your shoe back on, and you continue walking. When it comes to completing our biggest, most important tasks, we’re told to eat that frog, to fill our jar with big rocks first, to identify our Most Important Thing, and so on. Willpower your way through stuff!!! Here’s a different approach: Remove all the pebbles from your shoe first. I hereby give you permission to put the “most important thing” on hold for today and to reply to that important email from 30 days ago. To file your tax return. To clip your nails, stock up on pet food, fill out your time sheet, and send those invoices. If this takes a few hours, so be it. In fact, treat yourself to an entire day of blasting through all of those irritating tasks that you’ve been ignoring. Turn it into a game: how many can you check off by sunset? I like to go through my to-do lists and to assign every single pebble to “today”. Then I love watching that “today” list shrink, shrink, and shrink some more as the day passes. Can I finish every single task on the list? Usually not! But I almost always feel very satisfied with my productivity by the end of the day. Remember this: when you ignore a pebble in your shoe for too long, it starts to feel like a huge rock, hurting you with every single step. But it isn’t a huge rock. Once you shake out your shoe, you see that the pebble is tiny. You’ll be surprised by how many “pebbles in your shoe” you can take care of when you allow yourself to focus on them. And you’ll find that they’re not nearly as daunting or time-consuming to deal with as you were afraid of. Take care of the little things, enjoy the feeling of being more-or-less on top of things again, and get back to tackling the hard stuff tomorrow with a fresh mind—and comfortable, friction-free shoes. Watch: How I Use Things 3 to Get Stuff DoneThings 3 has the best UI and design of any to-do list app out there. It’s a joy to use its intuitive scheduling and organization systems. If you’re looking for an almost frictionless way to get organized and be more productive, Things 3 is for you. Here’s how I use it to get stuff done. (Note: Things is only available on Apple devices. And another note: I am not affiliated with Things and do not receive a commission for recommending the app. I wish I would get a commission… 😉) |
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Tomorrow it’s Labor Day in the United States, a federal holiday. It’s the unofficial end of summer. School holidays are over and people are getting back to work. Even if you don’t live in the States, statistically speaking you probably live in the northern hemisphere. A new season is starting. A season of more work and less play. That makes this a good time to refresh some work skills. Why? Let me illustrate with one of my favorite activities: skydiving. Skydiving is an expensive sport that...
You might not want to hear this. I debated whether to tell you. But I’ve never shied away from saying it like it is. Perhaps that’s because I’m Dutch—we’re famous for being direct. Or perhaps it’s that I secretly enjoying needling people a little. Either way, I’m going to tell you. Recently, I sent out a little survey, asking people what they struggle with the most. Here’s one guy’s answer: I am so busy that whatever I do, I am still unable to do the minimum. This makes me so overwhelmed. So...
Do you badly need to organize and prioritize your very long to-do lists? Now’s the time. Why? Two reasons. First, every day that you continue to be disorganized and overwhelmed is costing you. Without prioritization and focus, you’re not moving forward. Second, the solution to this problem is about to get more expensive: I’m increasing the price of my task management courses by $50. At the new prices, it’s still a no-brainer investment. The peace of mind you’ll have from organizing your...