For many people, one of the biggest stumbling blocks to success in business and life is procrastination. Procrastinators delay doing things that need to be done now. There are many reasons for this – sometimes the job seems too big, too difficult or not enjoyable. The problem is that when tasks are put off they cause unnecessary
stress later – when you have too much to do in a day, miss deadlines and feel pressured by all that you know still needs to be done.
The truth is there never will be enough time to do everything on your To-Do list and the most successful people know this. They don’t even try to do everything – what they do instead is focus on the most important tasks and make sure these get done first.
As a procrastinator myself I have found the concept of “eat that frog” from Brian Tracy invaluable. An extract from his book is below and I hope those procrastinators among you will never forget the image of the frog waiting for you each morning – it really does work to just eat it!
Here’s to living your inspired life,
Anne
“Eat that Frog!”
(extract from the book by Brian Tracy)
Your ability to select your most important task at each moment, and then to start on that task and get it done both quickly and well, will probably have more of an impact on your success than any other quality or skill you can develop. If you develop the habit of setting clear priorities and getting important tasks completed quickly, you will run circles around a genius who talks a lot and makes wonderful plans but gets very little done.
An old saying is that "If the first thing you do each morning is to eat a live frog, you can go
through the day with the satisfaction of knowing that that is probably the worst thing that is going to happen to you all day long!" Your "FROG" is the one you are most likely to procrastinate on if you don't do something about it now. It is also the one task that can have the greatest positive impact on your life and results at the moment.
It has also been said that "If you have to eat two frogs, eat the ugliest one first." This is another way of saying that if you have two important tasks before you, start with the biggest, hardest, and most important task first. Discipline yourself to begin immediately and then to persist until the task is complete before you go on to something else. You must resist the temptation to start with the easier task.
One final assumption is "If you have to eat a live frog, it does not pay to sit and look at it for a very long time."
The key to reaching high levels of performance and productivity is for you to develop the lifelong habit of tackling your major task first thing each morning. You must develop the routine of "eating your frog" before you do anything else and without taking too much time to think about it.
Successful, effective people are those who launch directly into their major tasks
and then discipline themselves to work steadily and single-mindedly until those tasks are complete.
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