Procrastination.

I'm pretty good at getting tasks on my "to do" list done. But sometimes, the big "P" word creeps in to my life and I've recognized that it typically happens when I'm tired or my list get tooooo long. The big "P" word? Procrastination.

I'm a list maker and it truly helps. And I do try to be realistic. For years, I've practiced something I created to help myself when lift gets to be too much .... I call it "Six Things" and it is just what it says. I'm allowed to write a list each day that has six items that I wish to tackle. Not eight, not two, but a manageable six. And these are not items like "make the bed" or "plan dinner" but items that need attention and need to be schedule. Most of the time, this helps and I can knock six items off the grand list each day. An example .... write a grant or schedule interview times for new employee. Not things I do every day but things that crowd life and need to be done within a period of time. Realistic and achievable.

At times, I find though that even completing six things is too much. Is it procrastination? Or is it I'm just exhausted and can't function? When those times happen, and thankfully, it's not often, but when it does, I am kind to myself ~ okay, realistically, I do beat myself up for a bit ~ then move on to negotiation. Can I move those things I'm not going to get to today to tomorrow? Can I have someone else take on the task? I'm actually getting quite good at delegating now that I can see others are very capable of taking on projects that in the past I felt I had to do on my own in order for them to get done well. Yup, big lesson to learn there. And so freeing! 

And I've learned that all of us have moments of procrastination .... sometimes we have tasks on our list we really don't want to do. The human reaction is to keep moving it further down our list or ignore it. I've found that if I give myself a reasonable due date (BEFORE the actual due date), I can then find a time within that period where I will actually get it done. Always feels good and I often wonder why I was not wanting to do that particular item in the first place. It's usually not  as bad as I envisioned.

Big question of the day: are you a Procrastinator?

How do you handle all the tasks on your list?