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Making Sense

I recently clicked on an article, thinking I was going to get a great productivity piece and instead encountering an explanation for my obsessive impulse to do things now.  Which may sound like a good thing — I don’t wait to take care of tasks that I want or need to do (the same does not extend towards tasks that other people suggest for me) — but usually translates to me feeling anxious because everything has to be done NOW.  This 18-hour project needs to be completed TODAY, not in small chunks over many days.  This vacuum cleaning needs to happen THIS SECOND instead of waiting until it makes sense later in the day.

I get a lot done.  I annoy people sometimes in the process, including myself.  I annoy myself.  I worry a lot — most of it needlessly.  Things usually work out if you just wait for things to unfold instead of trying to nudge it along.

But waiting = worrying.  Doing = controlling.

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On the other hand, I really do love this piece of advice: Make all your resolutions immediate.

Josh and I made a huge goal for ourselves last summer, which we have tried numerous times to begin without much success.  The reality is that it’s goal-focused: Do X so you can be ready for Y down the road.  We don’t do it because it’s so easy to put off anything that doesn’t have to take place now.  I’ve been trying to structure it in my mind in terms of now, in terms of the day-to-day.

And this: “Everything feels urgent and important. Resolve to do something — anything — immediately.”  Sometimes that’s it: just accomplishing one thing per day, making it urgent and checking it off the list, can be the difference between feeling productive and feeling like the day has gone by without note.

Or, maybe it’s this: make all your resolutions do-able.  Make them things you can take action on vs. end goals.  Write five pages per day is an action.  Publish a book is an end goal.  I need to move away from thinking in terms of end goals and realize that I’m missing the here-and-now by worrying so much about what’s far down the road.

4 comments

1 Sharon { 12.11.18 at 12:58 pm }

I used to love to make New Year’s resolutions. Except I noticed that I never kept them, and over time, the failure to keep them started to weigh on me. So I stopped making them.

I have read so many books and articles about habits and how to form them, and yet I still find myself generally unable to accomplish the smallest goals.

I don’t know where I’m going with this. I guess just that I understand the idea that doing = controlling. When my whole life feels out of control, I usually get the urge to declutter or clean out a closet or the garage. (Of course, those are the times in life when I am LEAST likely to realistically have time to accomplish those tasks!)

2 Mali { 12.11.18 at 10:36 pm }

I can relate a little. Not to the “doing everything now” urge, but the end goal thing. I get overwhelmed by it – like my 2018 in 2018 decluttering goal this year. Whereas if I had made it a “Declutter five things a day” project, I could have achieved it. Sigh.

I’m going to read that article in detail now.

3 Lori Lavender Luz { 12.13.18 at 4:12 pm }

OMG, you describe me exactly about the now. Everything has to be done NOW. I’m productive, but also kind of an anxious, hyperfocused mess.

4 Cristy { 12.14.18 at 12:40 pm }

I’m the exact same way, including with annoying people with this behavior. It’s one of the things my last boss and I clashed on (she left everything to the last minute and wasn’t clear about expectations or would change her mind about the final product, preferring to miss deadlines). I’ve been focusing on bite-size more along the lines of deadlines for portions of projects, which tends to help, but I really prefer to get things done.

(c) 2006 Melissa S. Ford
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