The world can be one mean, scary, and downright cruel place for the lost and unprepared. It can also be one utterly boring stage for the passive, “someday” day dreamers who follow the same routines day after day, too afraid to break out of the template lifestyle. While there is no guaranteed, flop-free recipe for success, if you can learn how to set agendas and priorities you’ll already be ahead of the game.
Average Joe’s are lazy and like to procrastinate. Plain Jane’s lack focus and motivation. To be successful in business, sports, the arts, or whatever your passion is, you have to push yourself to take action and stop making excuses. Life is short! Don’t put off what you can do today. Rewards are also so much sweeter when they earned. Sure you can buy yourself a gift right now if you have cash in your wallet, or give yourself the afternoon off and play hookie, but stop and ask yourself if you took any actions to deserve it.
AGENDAS
Time has a sneaky way of escaping us when we don’t have clear agendas. If you don’t have things written down, it’s easy to lose track of what you should be accomplishing and how your goals are progressing. If you want to get ahead and reach a high level of success, you need to identify all the steps you need to climb to get there. Here are some basic principles:
- Use bullet points or numbered lists
- Keep each item succinct, no paragraphs or long sentences
- Break broad topics and goals into smaller subsets
- Organize the list in the order you need to get things done
- Include deadlines, time frames, key contact info
- Keep a copy with you all the time (Google docs work well so you can edit on the go)
- Look at the list every day and have fun!
PRIORITIES
We all wish we could slow down time and get more things done each day. Personally, I’d love to be able to function on 3 hours of sleep a day but that’s just not gonna happen. Life likes to throw curve balls at us when we least expect them, and we all get crunched for time even when we’re working around the clock. If you can learn how to prioritize though you’ll come out on top!
- No matter how busy you are, pay your bills on time!!
- Turn off the TV, log out of Facebook, stop surfing the web
- Identify your key objectives and list them in order of importance on your agenda
- Attack the hardest, most important tasks first
- Don’t just sit still spinning your wheels, ask for help if you have q’s
- Keep track of upcoming deadlines with calendar reminders
- Reassess priorities regularly as your goals and project scope change
I’m obsessed with keeping agendas for my own projects. It feels so good to cross things off and get the hard stuff out of the way first. I find I’m much less stressed the more I prioritize. I used to always attack the easier things first just so I could get several things crossed off quickly, but that just led to dread and a lot of pressure looming overhead. Break up your hardest tasks into small steps to make them manageable and less intimidating. You’re much more likely to get them done sooner that way.
Untemplaters, how do you like to prioritize? What are some items you’re tackling on your agenda this week?
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Back when I was in the corporate world, I found the “Getting Things Done” system by David Allen to be helpful in not only keeping track of what I needed to get done, but in prioritizing stuff and keeping myself moving forward. I still carry some of the lessons from this program in my head and apply them when I have big workloads to deal with. They have some free podcasts that might be useful at:
http://www.davidco.com/individuals/podcasts
Awesome tips. I’m using Outlook for bill reminders and it’s working out. I used to tackle easy tasks first, but dreaded the harder ones. I’m turning the tables and I seem to be more effective. Thanks!
I love Outlook reminders! The snooze feature is nice too if I can’t get to the task right that second or if I’m just reminding myself of something coming up. Glad things are working out for you attacking the harder items on your agendas first!
Sidney, I’m an agenda and prioritizing freak! Every night before I go to bed I create and prioritize a list for the next day! I create sublists based on professional, personal tasks, and blogging. Without my lists I’d never get anything done (or be able to fall asleep!).
That’s awesome Geoff! I have separate lists for work, blogging, and personal stuff myself too. I sleep much better myself knowing I have all my to-dos written down and know what to prioritize for the next day. Glad to hear agendas and priorities are working well for you!
I found breaking up a larger or unpleasant task into smaller ones is really effective. That is indeed a good tip!
If it is a small but unpleasant task (like making a phone call you don’t wish to make), take the first step and write the number down on a post-it note and keep it next to the phone – you’ll usually end up making the call as well just to get rid of that reminder!!
That’s a good one. I try not to use paper memos, but when I do I always want to do the task as fast as I can just to get rid of the piece of paper! 🙂 I can’t focus when I have loose papers lying around so I’m always trying to put my papers away.
I’m like you, a mad list maker. As well as professional projects, I find lists and priorities a great way to plan social time. I find that if I don’t plan the time, then you end up going with someone elses plan, and that railroads your weekends. I like to decide how I spend my time…it’s just a little thing.
Excellent point Hunter about using lists for fun social things too! I do that for vacations when I’m going to a new country or city so that I can make sure I remember to see the best places and get lots of good pictures.
I have always said, a goal without a plan is just a wish! Taking a huge goal and breaking it down to daily tasks makes it possible to achieve. I use lists, agendas and other things to remind or inspire me to achieve them. Monitoring my progress and adjusting my effort is the other part to help achieve my goals.
That is so true! There are a couple items on my New Years resolutions list that I lost interest in and haven’t created an agenda for and they are exactly that – wishes. The resolutions that I have planned out and have set deadlines for on the other hand are making great progress. Glad to hear you like making lists and agendas too! It feels so good crossing things off.
If I ever really need to get something done, then I have to write it down. There is something about the act of putting tasks to paper that increase my focus and resolve to accomplish the task.
It really really makes a difference. I’ve learned to love writing things down. I used to use post-its but then my desk and side table ended up looking like that scene in Bruce Almighty where there were yellow post-its all over everything. I make it a habit now to keep my digital agenda files open on my computer and phone all the time so I feel them staring at me. 🙂