At the end of the week do you cringe at all that remains on your to do list?
Do you find certain things get carried over week to week never getting done?
In this post I will share my recent experience of seeing and overcoming this very pattern and increasing my productivity significantly.
It was Friday afternoon and I was sitting down to accountably check in with my past week of work; the successes, the challenges, and the lessons I learned too. I always love to focus on the successes first and give myself a good pat on the back.
Why? Because we all tend to automatically key in on what went wrong and spend all our time there, beating ourself up about it too.
So, successes were met. Yay! Then I went through my challenges and lessons learned but missed the fact that several things I set as important did not get addressed. As I planned for my action steps of the week ahead there they were again.
As I plan I first focus on reconnecting with the key long term goals I have set in each area of business and life I have identified. Then I identify the most important thing(s) that if addressed in the week ahead would make a huge difference in my world. Important but not urgent things as Covey would put it.
The thing is that there were always a large number of goal areas and important tasks that could be added each week. Too many, in fact.
Not completing them left me stressed and overwhelmed. We’re all busy. We all have long to do lists or a great many ideas, goals or projects needing attention.
The lesson I finally learned after repeating the pattern one too many times is that keeping an unreasonable number of important items on the schedule was stressing me out. Not completing them overwhelmed me and triggered deep underlying beliefs just waiting for a chance to trip me up. In the past they did. Now that I saw them I could act differently.
What’d I do?
I quit what was not working!
Sometimes there is a need to close a loop permanently on a task, project, or even business. I’ve been down that path and felt the freeing feeling of taking that step.
This time it was not so drastic. It was seeing what was not a priority right now and shelving it until it became a priority. I quit focusing on it all week by week and instead focused on a smaller number of highly important things that did make a huge difference in my progress in all life areas, including my business.
Under promise to myself, then over deliver on results. I celebrated more and deeper successes each week, experienced fewer challenges and made much greater progress.
Learn from my experience as you plan for your week ahead and experience greater productivity too.
Remember…
“Life is meant to be embraced, enjoyed and fully lived, not merely endured!”
To your success,
Brent
Be an advocate of Entrepreneurial Freedom and the global movement of conscious creators. Please share this with anyone you feel would enjoy the content. I appreciate your support in growing our community of entrepreneurs!
Beginning with a degree in exercise science and kinesiology, Brent Haydey has evolved over thirty years as an entrepreneur; building four businesses, and as a health, executive, and life coach.