At a recent party, I was talking with a friend when a guy stepped up to chat with her. An intense conversation about software followed. I interrupted to ask him, “What do you do?”

He glanced at me and said, with no small hint of pride, “I’m a Productivity Evangelist.”

I’ll admit it. I almost laughed. I had to bite my lip so as not to spit out my wine.

In spite of the New Media use of the word “Evangelist” to describe anyone who promotes anything, it’s still a word I associate with, well, evangelists. I could see him clad in white robe and sandals marching along city sidewalks carrying a sign painted with the words, “Get More Done.”

So, here’s something I want you to know about me:

I’m not a Productivity Evangelist.

In fact, I’d like you to think about your To-Do List in a whole new light. Not just as a chronicle of crap to get done.

Think of your To-Do List, instead, as a training ground.

Since many of us have become codependents of drug addicted To-Do lists, then this idea may sound a little unproductive. But hear me out.

Your To-Do List can serve two purposes. The first purpose is to guide your actions. The second purpose also happens to be step #2 in the 12-Steps to a Recovered To-Do List. (Step 1 was in the last post.)

To-Do List Recovery Step #2: Make your list a training ground for success

Many of us literally spend our days failing as we try to keep up with an external idea of “productivity.” Even when we do complete every item on our list, we rarely feel satisfied. There’s always more to do.

When your To-Do List becomes a place where you train yourself how to win, you build momentum, rather than always trying to keep up. You train yourself to succeed by asking yourself what’s important to you. You train yourself to succeed by asking less of yourself and actually getting items done. You train your brain to get used to the feeling of accomplishment, rather than the habitual feeling of never enough. Amazingly, you’ll discover that you’re actually energized. You’ll even generate a feeling of self-trust, perhaps for the first time.

To-Do List Recovery Step #3: Let your intentions guide your To-Do List

An intention is not the same thing as a To-Do. An intention guides your To-Do’s. Intention is the big picture. (Like, the word you chose for this year.)

When you create a To-Do list, the first thing to remember is your intention. This will help you recognize the items that contribute to that intention, and those that don’t.

To-Do List Recovery Step #4: Start a Sunday evening ritual

Now, this is not a “Light candles and chant the Moolah-Mantra” ritual. This is just 10 minutes to ask yourself one question:

What are my three top priorities this week?

Limit it to three. More than three just creates Attention Splatter.

To-Do List Recovery Step #5: Make a Brain-Drain List

Some of us have Chronologic Depth Perception Illness, or CDPI. (Yes, I made this up.) CDPI means that you think of something to do, and even if it doesn’t need to be dealt with until, say, Christmas of 2010, it remains at the forefront of your brain, along with all of your other To-Do’s. There it is, needing to be done. Now. So, you put it on your To-Do list because you don’t trust that you’ll get it done unless it occupies your mind.

Enter the Brain-Drain List. A Brain-Drain List is where you simply write down every To-Do that comes to mind. From the big stuff (Write an eBook) to the little stuff (get my oil changed). A brain drain list is a place where you can put every last To-Do so you can empty your brain. You will then be able to think more clearly about your priorities.

This brings me to the Three P’s of To-Do List Creation:

To-Do List Recovery Step #6: Prioritize

This is so simple that it’s easy to forget. What is your first priority? What is most important on your list? (Important isn’t always “urgent.”) Ask yourself how important each item is to you. Let go of the ones that don’t matter (i.e., most of them).

To-Do List Recovery Step #7: Parameterize

Parameters put borders around any item that’s vague. (i.e., a writing project, an organizing project, any creative endeavor.) Assign start times and end times. Or set a goal of how much (i.e., 3 pages, 2 drawers, one verse). This way you’ll know when you’re done for the day. Otherwise, you’ll convince yourself that you haven’t done anything.

To-Do List Recovery Step #8: Pay-off

The best question to ask yourself about each To-Do Item is this: If this were the only thing I accomplished today, would I be happy with that? What is the pay-off if I do this?

To-Do List Recovery Step #9: Busyness is laziness

The Benzedrine To-Do List looks quite impressive to its creator. It lends itself to an inflated sense of self-importance. “Look at all I have to do!” This is actually lazy thinking. It covers up the fact that you don’t have the presence to sit still and define the most important (not necessarily the most urgent) things that you want to do.

To-Do List Recovery Step #10: Task it Down

The Electric Kool-Aid Acid To-Do List is a fine list of dreams to have. But the part of you that is not hallucinating needs to know how to start. It needs to break those big jobs into small do-able tasks. This is another great way for your To-Do List to become a training ground. You learn how to take a dream and make it into reality. So, if you want to sell your home, the first thing on the To-Do List would be: “Call three Realtors.” Or, “Clean out the crap in the basement for one hour.”

To-Do List Recovery Step #11: Honor your style

Some people can focus on a task and get it done in 3 hours of straight work. Some need more time to putter before they can start a project. Some people need deadlines to propel them into getting something done. Everyone is different. Honoring your style is important. Not everyone can be a Productivity Evangelist. I, for one, am a big proponent of moodling and taking long quiet walks before any act of focused creativity. Everyone has different styles.

To-Do List Recovery Step #12: Know what matters to you

This post was supposed to be up yesterday.

Know why it wasn’t?

Because instead of writing, I spent the day watching the nest by my front door to see if the baby wrens were going to fly away.

I blew off my To-Do list to watch them. I felt a little guilty and overwhelmed at the end of the day. But in the moment, I was completely present and absorbed. (They flew. It was profound.) This kind of thing matters to me more than New Media and yes, more than Productivity Evangelists.

Knowing what matters to you will guide you on those days when Life Happens. Maybe baby birds are taking flight. Maybe your daughter has a cold. Maybe your best friend is having a hard time and you take her to dinner. And maybe your inner Productivity Evangelist is holding up signs that say, “You’re disappointing us all!”

That’s okay. He’s probably on drugs too.

Time management is tricky.

And I don’t think it’s because we lack self-discipline or because we’re unfocused.

I think it’s because of the many types of mindsets it takes to do the varied things in our days.

It’s one mindset, for instance, to write a blog. It’s another to create piece of art - a painting, a song, a poem, or a recipe. It’s still another to make a cold call, approach a gallery, submit our poems, or review our finances. Many of us are constantly walking the line between our creative selves and our business selves. And by the time we get through the high-priority items, it’s hard to determine which of our random leftover to-do’s will take precedence.

It’s true that there are some great time management techniques out there. Lots of them work well. When you discipline yourself - even a little bit - you’ll see results. Like the benefits of organization and de-cluttering, there are many rewards that come from managing your time well.

However, I’ve learned that balance is crucial. It’s possible to go overboard when it comes to Getting Things Done. After all, I’m not a CEO. I’m an artist. I do myself a disservice by ignoring my natural inclinations and creative approaches to Getting Things Done. If I push myself to “stay on task” for too long, I can become bored and uninspired.

So, as an experiment, I created “Sniggly Days.”

What’s a Sniggly Day?

A Sniggly Day is to Getting Things Done what the Junk Drawer is to Personal Organization. It’s a designated catch-all day for batching all the random stuff you have to do - and then doing that stuff in a way that feels fun and good to you. The stuff itself doesn’t matter. It’s how you let yourself do it that matters. (Details on that below.)

What’s a Sniggly?

Just as the contents of your junk drawer probably differ from the contents of my junk drawer, your Snigglies will be different from mine.

A Sniggly is anything random that sits on your virtual to-do list and keeps tapping you on the shoulder to remind you that it needs to get done. Sometimes, it’s an odd thing - like checking the air pressure on your tires - and there’s nothing else to batch with it. In the same way the junk in your junk drawer doesn’t have a “home,” Snigglies are often the activities that we don’t like to do, or we don’t know how to match them with any other activities on our lists, so we put them off.

How to Have a Sniggly Day in 5 (or 6) Easy Steps

#1 - Designate a Sniggly Day in advance.

This is important. You don’t have to schedule it far in advance. But you do have to declare it. Otherwise, it’s tempting to just drift in and out of the day not really committed to anything you’re doing. This is worse than getting nothing done, and wrecks the spirit of the day. Claim your Sniggly Day!

#2(a) - Write a brain-drain list.

Make a list of your Snigglies. Bathing the dog. Doing your nails. Buying bird seed. Getting your new jeans hemmed. Ordering that book from amazon. Looking into the yoga class. Cleaning off your computer desktop. No item is too insignificant for this list. That’s the whole point of a Sniggly Day. In fact, I never allow myself to write songs or blogs on a Sniggly Day. It’s strictly reserved for Snigglies.

#2(b) - DON’T write a Brain-Drain list.

If you really want to have a Sniggly Day in the most decadent way possible, then don’t make a list at all. (This is like adding glitter and old postcards to your junk drawer.) Start wherever you feel like it. Fold the clothes, then write a thank you, and then wash the dog, etc.

#3 - Go at your own pace and revel in your randomness until you’re on a roll.

This is the main thing about Sniggly Day. This is why I love it.

It’s not so much what you do, but how you do it. It’s a full day of unscheduled getting-things-done bliss.

So you begin with cleaning out the refrigerator. In the middle of that, you realize that you need soy milk. You go to the store to get soy milk. While you’re out, you pick up your mail. This reminds you to pay a few bills when you get home. You pay the bills. Then while you’re at the computer, you feel like cleaning up your computer desk top. This makes you hungry for lunch, which reminds you to go back to the refrigerator and finish cleaning it out.

Let your intuition guide you from one thing you feel like doing to the next thing you feel like doing. It’s like having a conversation with your best friend - the kind that drifts all over the place, but eventually returns to the point.

#4 - Make your day a Ridicule-Free Zone.

Those of us who can Get Things Done in this way rarely allow ourselves to do it with abandon. We’re so accustomed to conforming to everyone else’s schedules and figuring out the most efficient way of doing things, that we don’t delight in the wisdom and natural order in our creative approach. Certainly, if you read most of the uber Zen time management blogs out there, you’ll find this random way of doing things is abhorred by many. Don’t play this game. Not on a Sniggly Day!

#5 - Get a sense of accomplishment.

Cross things off your list as you do them. OR, if you didn’t make a To-Do list, create a “Ta-Dah!” List. A “Ta-Dah!” List (a la Julia Cameron) is a list you create after you’ve gotten things done.

#6 - [optional] Save one tough thing for later in the day.

Sometimes I do a Sniggly Day just so I can create the momentum to complete something big I’m resisting. This is purely an optional step, and I don’t recommend that you try it on your first Sniggly Day.

I know this step is counter to all the typical time-management advice that tells you to get the biggest scariest thing done first. However, on a Sniggly Day, there’s a reason for saving the big thing for last. When you’ve set aside a day to do things in the way you intuitively and naturally do them, you’ll generate happiness, rather than fatigue. At some point, you can ask yourself, “Are you ready to head upstairs and pay the bills and reconcile your accounts?” It might take a little discipline, but if you’re anything like me, the self-acceptance will foster a lighter heart, and the challenging activity will most likely become less challenging.

Why Sniggly Days Work

The idea of a Sniggly Day might sound a little stupid. If it does, I certainly understand. Lots of what I write about here is the stuff I’ve invented to teach myself to love the things I used to hate: Business, Marketing, Discipline, Thinking Clearly, etc. Sometimes I think it’s all about tricking the ego into taking action it would ordinarily resist.

However, Sniggly Days work for me for three reasons:

1. A Sniggly Day is a vacation day.

It’s a vacation from your own brain. By defining the day in advance, you give your perfectionist brain a day off. You can then enjoy getting things done in an easy and relaxed manner. You’re delighting in your process, not just in a list of to-do’s. You’re also giving yourself a day just to get things done - not to get things done AND work on your novel, write a song, be a great mother or throw a pot. It’s all about the Snigglies.

2. A Sniggly Day is a permission slip.

Now that we’re adults, it’s up to us to give ourselves permission slips to have a day off or give ourselves a break. In this case, it’s a permission slip for your Taskmaster Productive Self to chill out and let things get done slowly. And it’s a permission slip for your Creative Self to recognize that Getting Things Done doesn’t have to be an awful boring terrible day.

3. A Sniggly Day is about delight.

It’s about loving yourself and how you do things. It also gives you a sense of accomplishment.

Can’t Everyday be a Sniggly Day?

So, why not live like this every day? After all, if you’re naturally like this, wouldn’t it be better to just let your life flow in this way?

Fair question.

In my experience, this is not a fulfilling way to live or work. My creative self does better in the long run with a schedule. Otherwise, I can convince myself that I don’t “feel” like doing anything. And over time, I get very little done and never feel complete.

For instance, I rarely “feel” like working out. But my wise self knows that working out makes me emotionally stronger throughout the day and in the long run. And sometimes I don’t “feel” like writing a blog. But my wise self knows that if I just sit down and write, eventually the flow will begin. Finding the balance between these two places is the reward.

A Sniggly Day keeps my productive self happy. And it also keeps the creative side of me happy. It’s like giving her a Learner’s Permit. She’s not allowed to drive the bus all the time. But when there’s Adult Supervision and lots of space, she can take a spin.

I call them the Hooglie-Booglies.

These are the voices that shout in your head when you have a creative urge or an actual project to begin. The hooglie-booglies are loud. They appear real. You might even become convinced they’re the truth.

However, it’s important to see them for what they are:

Procrastination and fear.

That’s all.

Here are the six most common symptoms that might keep you from taking action on your creative ideas and projects:

1 - “Who do you think you are?”

This is the voice of every cynic who has ever crossed your path.

It’s the mean girls glaring at you through eyes caked with eye-liner as you walk by their lockers.

It’s your older brother laughing at your new hobby.

It’s your former boss, a mean-spirited review, or just your own inner critic.

No matter what images from your past have collided to form this life-like voice in your head, it’s time to talk back.

How do you do that?

Answer the question!

Who do you think you are?

You might be surprised at how quickly that voice diminishes when you come up with an answer.

2 - I’ll wait til I quit my job. Then I’ll have lots more time to…”

Other versions of this voice include, “I’ll wait until I’m more courageous before I…”

And,

“I’ll save up X amount of dollars and then I’ll…”

As my best friend used to say when we were kids: “Bull puckey!”

The problem with waiting for great big empty blocks of time is that most likely you haven’t learned to wisely use the small chunks of time you already have. So when (or, more appropriately, “IF”) those great big blocks ever come, then you’ll most likely have one great big panic attack.

The problem with waiting for a more courageous version of yourself is that courage comes from being courageous. If your game plan involves a larger, more heroic version of yourself to just happen, then it’s time to revise the plan.

The problem with waiting for more money is that this game that can’t be won. There’s never enough money to convince you that you’re finally safe, and it’s okay to begin that new direction or project.

If it’s something worth doing, then do it now. Learn to work within the life you have right now.

3 - “I’ll never be the best so why bother?”

One great reason to begin a creative project is that you’ll always come face to face with your neediness and your ego voices. If you can forge on and keep on creating, you realize how pointless these voices are. This is the beginning of wisdom. And it’s fun to become wise to your own ego.

Besides, there is no best. And if there is, it’s certainly no reason to not begin. There’s always someone who’s making more money, getting better publicity, getting better at her craft. The only person you need to measure up against is you.

An audience member asked Julia Cameron this question: “What do you do with the voice that says, “I’ll never be the best, so why bother?” Julia Cameron paused. Then she said into the microphone, “I get out of bed very quickly.”

4 - “Everyone will discover I’m a fraud.”

You have to be the one to decide that you’re not a fraud. And you have to be the one to decide that this voice is nothing more than an angry relic from the past that doesn’t want you to try something new or create something that might be beautiful. No one is out there waiting for you to fail!

And besides, who is “everyone,” anyway?

5 - “But wait! I’m not perfect yet!”

The gift of getting over this voice is that you might begin to relish how imperfectly you can do something. Giving yourself permission to do things badly is a great gift. Perfectionism is healed by taking action imperfectly, and surviving.

6 - “I need to process all of my feelings of unworthiness and doubt first.”

There will be times when you’ll sit down with every intention to do your work. It will be quiet. You might feel empty. Even lonely.

Furtively, doubt will creep in. Then, a few other shabbily dressed characters will follow. These are the ones that like to tag along with doubt wherever she goes. They’re an insidious bunch. They’ll wait conspicuously, clearing their throats and shuffling their feet. Eventually, they’ll convince you that you need to set everything aside and let them have their say.

Here’s the thing -

If you just keep doing your work - even if you do it badly - the next day, there will be fewer voices. This time, they won’t hang around as long. After several days of doing this, you won’t even think about them. They’ll give up on you once they realize you won’t pay attention. When you focus on them and give them attention, then they grow bigger - especially when they realize they can make you stop in your tracks. You’ve given them all the power.

Always remember this: Energy flows where attention goes. If you stop giving your attention to these voices (and all of these symptoms), your attention will move to your creativity. And that, I assure you, is much more exciting!

p.s. Quick Note: There are two spaces available for the Great Big Dreams retreat (March 14 - 16). Email christine@christinekane.com if you’re a last-minute kind of gal (or a P on the Myers-Briggs!) and you’d like more information!

tags: creativity, productivity, christine kane

“Excellence comes about as a result of habit. We become just by doing just acts, temperate by doing temperate acts, brave by doing brave acts.” - Aristotle

Courage is like a muscle. Just as you wouldn’t go into the gym for your first time and lift a 100-pound dumbbell - you don’t have to begin building courage by running for President. (Though, lots of people would probably vote for you at this point.)

People often think that courage has to be big. Like sky-diving. Or giving a speech to a thousand people.

Those things do require courage, yes. But in some ways, that’s baby courage. It’s obvious courage. I call it Bungee-Jumping Courage. Bungee-Jumping Courage is convenient because it lets us define ourselves as “not courageous.” When you set your stake that high, then you never have to approach it. You simply get to say, “Hmm, I must not have courage.”

I’m not letting you get off that easy.

Why?

Because there’s a deeper level of courage. It makes you stronger with each move you make. It makes you fall in love with yourself. It makes you fall in love with your life.

That’s because, at its core, courage is about strengthening your relationship with yourself.

In the words of Eleanor Roosevelt, “You must do the thing you think you cannot do.” I encourage you to do many things you think you cannot do!

Here are 66 ways - little and big - to build your courage. Some of them seem completely foolish. But they’re not. They’re just uncomfortable. And that’s the whole point!

————–

1 - Paint your nails green and leave them that way for a week. If you’re a guy, you get extra credit for this one.

2 - Look at your life as an experiment. This takes the ego out of new things you try.

3 - If you’re always spontaneous, plan something in advance and stick with it. If you’re a meticulous planner, do something spontaneous.

4 - Quit your job.

5 - Start a blog.

6 - Sign up for a Retreat.

7 - Take a painting class.

8 - Learn a new language.

9 - Join Toastmasters.

10 - Begin yoga.

11 - Do something ridiculously tourist-y in your own town.

12 - Get up in the morning after having a bad day yesterday. Encourage yourself to begin again.

13 - Give money away.

14 - Invite your friends over for dinner and don’t use silverware.

15 - Look into people’s eyes when you’re in public - on the street, buying groceries, etc.

16 - Hire someone to do a regular task you can’t stand doing. (i.e., mowing the lawn.) Use that time to write or draw.

17 - Play music more. Watch TV less.

18 - Get rid of everything in your home that’s not an Absolute Yes. Everything!

19 - Put on a goofy smile and look at other drivers when you stop at lights.

20 - Write a novel in a month.

21 - Think of one thing you’d love to ask one of your heroes, and then call her office - and ask her the question. (The goal is not necessarily to get through - but to let go of the fear of not getting through!)

22 - Ask for what you want - rather than complaining about not getting it.

23 - Go bowling.

24 - If you never host parties or dinners - invite friends over once a month for dinner.

25 - Teach a workshop on something you know how to do.

26 - Start a mastermind group with at least two other people.

27 - Learn to invest your money.

28 - Decide that your desire to be happy is an adequate reason to say no to requests of your time. (I knew someone who had cancer who said, “The best part about cancer is that now I get to say no to things and have a great excuse.” Don’t wait until you have this kind of “excuse.”)

29 - Be bad at something. Do it anyway.

30 - Make requests. Don’t complain.

31 - Join a writer’s group.

32 - Hire a life coach.

33 - In a social situation, sit in one place and allow people to come talk with you instead of running around the room “networking.”

34 - Worry less. Act more.

35 - Take a last-minute trip overseas.

36 - Enter a writing contest.

37 - Start your own business.

38 - Ask someone out on a date.

39 - Start a podcast.

40 - Sign up for my January Great Big Dreams e-Seminar. (Email christine@christinekane.com for details.)

41 - Make a business card for yourself.

42 - Eat at an ethnic restaurant you never considered before.

43 - Respond. Don’t react.

44 - Get some music from another culture. Sit down and listen. Really listen.

45 - Listen more. Talk less. Especially to your kids. (Remember that listening doesn’t mean waiting to say your piece.)

46 - Take a swing dance class.

47 - Hire a physical trainer.

48 - Start a book club.

49 - Test-drive a luxury car. Act as if you could buy it if you wanted it.

50 - End a relationship that drains you or hurts you. You deserve to be happy.

51 - Start a prayer list - and pray every morning.

52 - Go to a nursing home and visit people who need company.

53 - Quit smoking.

54 - Take different routes to work each day.

55 - Get lost on purpose. (When I first moved to my town, this is how I learned my way around. On Sundays, I’d drive into the downtown area and give myself an hour to get lost and then found again.)

56 - Wake up at 5am and write.

57 - Assumptions are the enemy of success. Question them often.

58 - Excuses are the enemy of action. Stop making them.

59 - Admit when you are wrong.

60 - Write a fan letter to someone who’s not famous - a teacher, a grocery store clerk - anyone who delights you or touches you.

61 - Pick one incomplete in your life (cluttered attic, article you want to write, craft you want to begin) and do it for 15 minutes a day. It’s more courageous to do something for a small chunk of time and do it again the very next day - than it is to sit back and say it can’t be done because you don’t have enough time.

62 - Participate in an open-mic night.

63 - Join a spiritual circle - a church, a center, a class. Don’t worry if it’s the “right” one - just try it out.

64 - Go vegan.

65 - Pay the toll of the person behind you. (Or for their coffee!)

66 - Run for President.

Irony: As I started to write this article, I thought to myself, “Hey, I’ll just go do one Sudoku game before I write this.” I caught myself in the act, and marched my ass back here to write this post.

People who say that procrastination is about laziness are probably the same people who think that bulimia is about eating too much. Procrastination isn’t about laziness. It’s about fear. It’s about perfectionism. It’s about overwhelm. We all experience this, and there are some tricks that have helped me. Hopefully, they’ll help you too…

9 solutions to break the procrastination habit:

1 - When you get an idea, do some little thing to begin it

Did you read Stephen King’s book On Writing? Me too. And one thing I noticed about Stephen King is that when he gets an idea, he writes it. That’s it.

Most people - myself included - will get an idea, sit there, wonder if it’s a good idea, and then wonder if it’s a good idea some more.

Got an idea? Begin it. Just start. There’s nothing to lose.

2 - All hail small chunks of time!

Lots of us complain about having no time. My guess is that we all have lots of spare time. It just doesn’t happen to be all at once.

When we begin to make the most of our small chunks of time, we get better at making use of our large chunks of time.

Quit waiting for many hours and days of spare time to begin your idea, your project, your taxes. Start figuring out how to use the spare half hour that comes up in between meetings or phone calls. (I have given myself 45 minutes to write this blog just to take my own advice.)

3 - Make your new goal be this: To do it badly.

If you are a tried and true procrastinator, set a goal to do it badly. Make the goal be just to show up - and let go of doing it ALL, or doing it WELL. Some of my biggest victories have a lot more to do with getting over my perfectionism or fear, than they do about being perfect.

4 - Commit to it on paper and out loud

Write down the goal. Then call a friend and say something to this effect: “I’m going to spend the next half hour working on my Law School Essay for Harvard.” Then go do it. Call the friend after the half hour and make her congratulate you. Rinse and repeat tomorrow.

5 - Give it defined quantities

Nebulous goals make for nebulous results. “I’m gonna get my office organized” is a bit like saying, “We oughtta do something about Global Warming.”

Most procrastinators have a hard time defining quantities. We can only see that everything needs to be done now.

When are you going to do it? For how long? Which part of your office are you going to organize? Are you going to throw old files from the file cabinet into recycling? Or create new labels for the file folders?

6 - Install this System Upgrade into your mental hard drive: Less is More

Have fewer goals. Have no more than three priorities for a week. Begin the week knowing those priorities. If there are more than three major items, let everything else go but the most important ones.

Why?

Because you’re not lazy. You’re just trying to do too much.

Train yourself to grok what it feels like to accomplish one thing instead of not quite getting to everything. Once you get that, you’ll finally understand what it feels like to do something. You’ll want to make it a habit.

7 - Do it first thing

When I was struggling to finish songs, a mentor of mine made me write songs first thing in the morning. He told me to schedule the 2-hour chunk as my first activity upon waking.

Why?

“Because you’re telling the universe that this is your priority. And then the universe lines up everything to align with your priority.” Action grounds your priorities. It makes them real. It also makes your day easier because you’re not wasting your precious energy on “thinking about” this thing you’re supposed to be doing. You’ve already done it.

8 - Define times for nose-bleed activities

Email, text messages, voicemail, web stats - any activity that bleeds itself into your whole day becomes a non-activity. It turns into a nose-bleed. When you do it all the time, you never actually do it. You just let it slowly suck the very life force from you. Get out your calendar and define times you’re going to do these activities. Then, challenge yourself to turn off your email, your cell phone, your web stats, until that time comes.

9 - Don’t ask yourself how you “feel” about doing the activity.

Have you ever committed to going to the gym? And then when the alarm goes off, you lie in bed thinking, “Do I really feel like going to the gym?” [Like you even have to ask?!]

Change this pattern. Decide the night before that you’re doing it. Commit to getting up and going right to the gym, the computer, the blank canvas. Don’t sit and have coffee and sigh and think, “Man, if I wait til noon. I’ll probably feel more like it then.”

If it’s important to you, if it’s a priority, don’t waste time asking yourself how you feel about doing it or if it’s really even a good idea. The voice of the procrastinator will always find a way out of doing it. Feelings are an easy out.

——————————————

There I did it. I wrote this blog. And it only took an hour. And now, I don’t even want to play Sudoku!