This is a bit of a follow up to a post from about 9 months ago.
For most of this year, we have collectively had nothing but time. We should all have gotten so much done, but have we?
I don’t know about you, but my list is still pretty substantial. And it's not like it’s big stuff either. Replace an outlet, replace some light switches, do some push-ups, fix the toilet seat. None of these things should take more than 15 minutes to complete
There’s always tomorrow
At least it feels that way.
I know other places in the country are not as closed down as we are here in Minnesota - nowhere to go, nothing to do.
What difference does it make if we push tasks to tomorrow? Tomorrow is going to look an awful lot like today.
But that’s the problem - there is no guarantee of tomorrow.
“You could leave life right now. Let that determine what you do and say and think.”
There is no guarantee of tomorrow. So why put off what you have to do?
find important things to do
What does it matter if the closet doesn’t have knobs? It is easy enough to bend down and pull the door open from the bottom.
The outlet still works, even if it’s not perfect.
Those dishes can wait.
This is just one part of my list.
None of these seem important in and of themselves, but they are all there, hanging over me. How many things are left undone because they don’t feel like they are important? But how long does it take for the sink to smell just a little off after not doing the dishes?
How hard is it to be in a good mental space to work on the things that are important to you if you are not in a good physical space?
I have gotten a number of projects done in the garage recently, but before that was possible, the garage had to be cleaned. Space had to be made.
We can quickly feel overwhelmed by all of the little tasks in front of us. There can be so many that we look at them and feel like accomplishing any individual one will make no difference. And we’re right. It usually won’t.
But what if you make a decision to take care of 3 of those little tasks each day?
How quickly will all of those little tasks go away. If you do 3 each day, you’ll accomplish over 1,000 tasks in a year. That’s not nothing.
But, there has to be more than just small household chores and tasks to do. Find something important that you want to work on. Give yourself a reason to get those little things done - to free yourself up to focus on the important things.
You should always be doing something, but don’t always be doing something
I was looking through some thoughts I’d written in my phone back in May.
The gist of it was that you should always have something that you are working on, but don’t always have to be working on it.
Have a project, something on which you can progress. But you don’t have to spend every waking moment on it.
When the work is done, it is ok to sit back and enjoy a book and a whisky by the fire, if that’s your thing. Sometimes it is good to put it all down and simply be. Rest. Find stillness amidst the chaos.
There is always more work to be done. We will never accomplish it all. It’s a little bit like knowledge - the more you know, the more you realize how little you know. The more you get done, the more you realize how much more there is to do.
One of my favorite terms I use is “directionally right.” Make sure you are progressing, that you are “directionally right.”
You don’t have to fill every available moment with work for your time to be well-spent. Gary Vee’s life is not the life for me, and I know that.
Earn the rest. Earn the stillness. Earn the Netflix on the couch. But don’t make those things your whole life.
But they are easy. It is easy to push little things to tomorrow and big things even further. But we’ve been home for 9 months, and still don’t know when we will get back to a sense of normalcy. How much have you not done in that time?
Get directionally right. You don’t have to do it all today, but do something. Start knocking the little things off of your list and figure out the big things that are important to you. Break those big things down into little things, and get to work.