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Tuesday 31 January 2012

The delaying tactics so far.....

Well, at the weekend I did realise that one task I was desperate to complete was not actually important, urgent or on my 'to do' list.  It did make my house look nicer, but I did at least recognise it as a procrastination tactic that had crept in unnoticed. 

I did finish the task and was quite pleased with the result.  I was more pleased with myself for noticing that I was wasting time delaying the trickier things on my 'to do' list.  I made sure that the rest of the weekend was spent more wisely.

One of my major coups over the weekend was to book a trip away.  It is just to see friends and I was determind to sort it out in order to keep the friendship alive as well as part of my plan 'to do more'.  Once booked, my friend declared it had 'made their day' to hear we were going to visit.  So, I gave myself a tick for getting another 'to do' crossed off as well as one for making someone's day.  However, it made me realise how the other stuff on the list is not going to make anyone's day and that's probably why I find other things to do to avoid those tasks.

When you're in the office and getting paid to do a job, it's easy enough to find the motivation to do the dreary tasks or the horrible ones.  You do them because that's your job or because your boss will tell you off, etc.  At home, with only myself to motivate me, it can be harder to get to grips with the not so fun stuff.  Whilst writing this, I have just realised about my great plan to clean the bathroom this morning.........somehow the only excuse I can think of is that I was distracted by the snow......What kind of an excuse is that?  Well, we had plans, but they were altered due to the weather, which meant I rearranged the morning, and somehow forgot about the cleaning.  And bathroom cleaning most certainly goes on the 'dreary' task list.

So, I have to find a way to motivate myself to do the un-fun stuff too.  One way would be to do myself a reward chart :)  They work on kids.  Usually the chance to cross stuff off the list is enough, but how do I stop myself adding more stuff I want to do and ignoring the stuff I don't want to do?  Hmmmm.....

My other thoughts for this week are to be careful to check whether I am implementing a delaying tactic or whether I am actually just 'chilling out' and switching off for a bit.  That's a good thing to do, so shouldn't be ignored and I shouldn't feel bad about it.  So, for this week, am trying to designate specific times to relax and other times when I need to tackle the boring, tricky stuff.  Let's see how that goes.....