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Business Tips:
Success Tips:
Wendy Mackowski
has earned the Certification as a Professional Co-Active Coach (CPCC)
after completing two years of training from
The Coaches
Training Institute. Wendy has also written many articles on
various life & business coaching topics.
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Seven Steps to Beating the "Someday Syndrome"
by Wendy Mackowski, Inner North Coaching
What are the things in your life that you never get around to? The sentence starts with,
"Someday I'm going to . . . " and fades into sometime in the not-too-immediate future. For me one of those is cooking. By this I mean getting my cookbooks out and actually trying new things from scratch, or whipping up desserts, or having healthy summer salads in the fridge instead of store-bought. I had a friend here visiting a couple of weeks ago. She cooks. While she was here I began to notice the differences between her and I. Some valuable lessons began to emerge for me about procrastination that can apply to many areas of both your personal and business life. I've distilled them into these seven easy steps:
- Identify--what are those things you keep putting off until you have more time? First you have to realize that you never really do get around to them! These could be thing that you honestly want to do, or things that you need to do for your health or business. Things you fully intend to do, but now isn't the right time for whatever reason. (Ex: exercise, create photo albums, call business prospects, organize your office, clean out your closet, volunteer at church, learn to ski, etc.)
- Evaluate--Once you've identified them, you can look at each one and ask your self the following questions:
- Do I really want to do this?
- Are there consequences to me not doing this?
- Will my life be enhanced by adding this?
If the answer is no to the above, then maybe this is an outdated fantasy you need to let go of. If the answer is yes, then it's time to figure out how to fit it in your life!
- Notice Your Attitude--One of the things my friend noticed right away about my desire to cook was my attitude. I held a perspective that it takes a long time. She'd say,
"Let's make up some brownies." I'd say, "Oh, it's already 7:00, and we still want to watch a movie
. . ." She pointed out to me that brownies are simple and fast. So I began to change my perspective of cooking from one of it takes a long time to it's simple and fast. Since she left I've made brownies several times! I work with clients who think of calling prospects as something they need to block hours off to do. In actuality, it takes just about 2 minutes to make that phone call. Two minutes! Begin to notice what you've made up in your head that affects whether you start something or not.
- Stop Waiting for "Someday"--The perfect time will never come. If you are waiting for other, more important things to be completely finished before you start, you will never start. Or if you are waiting till you actually have the block of time to do the entire thing and complete it, that will never come either. Start now with what you do have. Clean out one drawer--and realize how good that feels! Then you can tackle another one tomorrow. Take a 15-minute walk in your neighborhood even if you can't go to the gym for an hour. (If it is a big project that needs a lot of time, then block off time on your calendar now. But most things can be done in smaller chunks.)
- Focus On The Good--Really focus on how great it feels to even do one small thing. It can give you a great sense of accomplishment and relief when you take one small step into something you've been procrastinating. This will give you the motivation to do more.
- Flip The Switch--When your brain wants to go into dread and procrastination, an old habit that you have held for a long time, you need to break the pattern. The minute you notice that old attitude--Stop. Think about how quick or easy or fun or satisfying that last experience was and consciously flip the switch! Say,
"No, that's wrong--it's really not going to take that much
time."
- Don't Get Discouraged--Allow yourself time to mess up. If you find you did great for a week of exercise and realize you missed for three days, don't focus on the missed ones! Instead of wasting energy being disappointed with yourself, go back to flipping the switch and remember how well it worked and how good you felt and move on from there.
Wendy Mackowski, a Certified Professional Co-Active Coach,
lives in Orange County, California and is the owner of Inner North Coaching. For more
information about coaching, sign up for Wendy's free email
newsletter, or permission to reprint this story,
contact Wendy.
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Copyright © 2008 Inner North Coaching.