Today!

     I’m sitting in my office thinking over my schedule for the remainder of this month.  Since it is now December and there are about only three weeks left until the 2017 year comes to an end I thought this might be a good time to make sure that all my remaining appointments, assignments and personal commitments don’t get lost in the shuffle.

     Then it dawned on me that when you really book at all your obligations whether they are personal or business nothing ever really gets done until “today!”  We may have it scheduled for next week or our deadline is the second Friday of the month; however, whatever DATE you have an item scheduled to get accomplished you never get it done until it is “today.”

     I’ll see if I can explain my thought so that you understand.  Let’s say we have some BIG plans we’re going to do on Saturday, but today is Wednesday.  We’re not going to do our plan for three more days, right?  Then it becomes Friday.  Now we’re not going to do our plan until tomorrow because then it will be Saturday.  But when Saturday gets here and we can get our plan done we don’t usually refer to it as Saturday anymore: then it will be TODAY!  Do you follow my thinking?

     That being the logic behind our view of the activity we want to accomplished: NOTHING gets done until TODAY!  It may seem a little strange thinking in that fashion because we are always planning an event for a future time.  It’s got to be done this afternoon, tomorrow, next week, next month or some other period of our future time schedule.  However, when we actually get to that period of time it has become TODAY.  So nothing ever gets accomplished until today!

     That being the case my mind begins to wonder:  What are we doing TODAY?  If we really are the masters of our time and we don’t let time control our lives we will have an orderly arrangement as to HOW we are going to get things done.

     We would need to have some priorities in our lives as to how and when activities are done.  Preparing ourselves either by what is most important or what will take the most (or least) amount of time to get accomplished.  In my own case I like to review the day before and schedule those things that I don’t particularly like to do earlier in my day when I am the most rested and receptive to getting things done.  You would need to look at your load of responsibilities and see how you can do the same for your schedule.

DON’T PROCRASTINATE!

     Some have a reverse view of work accomplishments:  Why do today what you can put off until tomorrow?  But remember: Tomorrow NEVER comes!  When that day gets here it’s always today!  And today is the only day you can get things done.  Besides if you let things “pile up” it will only be less likely that you’ll want to take the necessary time to get things done.  Or you may be allocating an ENTIRE day to accomplish what previously could have taken you fifteen or twenty minutes a day to stay caught up!

SEGMENT!

     Another thing that I have found helps me is not looking at a job in its entirety.  What I mean is when you look at the task at hand you’ll probably realize that it actually takes two, three or maybe four separate steps to get it completed.  So why not segment that task into its various portions and you’ll find that the task becomes easier to accomplish and it also makes it possible for you to “break” between segments and not feel like you have let the task incomplete.

     Another thing that I have found helpful in my own case is not to have multiple tasks in various stages of completion.  Even if you have segmented the task into various portions:  get ALL the portions completed BEFORE moving to the next task.  This has really been helpful when I have several tasks that are similar.  By completing one task at a time you know you can move on without that task tugging at your mind.  I don’t care who you are or what you think:  you CAN NOT multitask!  Your mind needs to give its complete attention to the task at hand.  When I was younger taking driver education classes our instructor told us: “If you drive with ONE hand on the wheel and ONE hand on your date:  you’re lacking ONE hand to handle either activity!”

     You must also remember that regardless of how well you plan there WILL be distractions ---especially if you are working out of your home!  Simply understand this and deal with it the best you can.  At times that might require halting your present task, taking care of the interruption, and then returning to your task.

     While we may have warm memories from our past and we may schedule and plan for the future, we can only get things done in the present --- TODAY!  Regardless of your status in life, your best efforts, or your determination, you only have twenty-four hours in today:  Use each moment wisely!

QUOTE TO CONSIDER

THOUGHTFUL GEM

"Eating humble pie today 

could be better than 

eating crow tomorrow."