What's stopping you?

7 August 2008

Most of my clients have a to-do list for organizing tasks. (Some clients can’t figure out where to start, but we take care of that in the first session.) At the end of a hands-on organizing session, we talk about what they plan to do between sessions to further their goals.

When I arrive at the next session and ask for an update, chances are pretty good that they didn’t do the things they thought they would. Why is that?

Of course there are many reasons. Sometimes getting organized, or decluttering, is highly emotional. Some of those clients just can’t do it on their own. But often it’s more mechanical than that.

Take something as simple as sorting the mail as it comes in and getting rid of the junk mail. For some people, the mail is scary. There may be notices from creditors, reminders of past failures, fear that a spouse will see a credit-card expenditure. That pile of mail becomes emotionally charged and it’s easier to just tuck it away or ignore it. Even though the client’s rational mind knows they’re just delaying unpleasantness and undermining their efforts to get organized, her irrational mind wins. Getting past these types of issues can require the help of a therapist or a great life coach or, sometimes, a terrific organizer.

More often, though, there are no emotions involved with the mail. Maybe a little obstacle is getting in the way. I like to work with clients to identify those obstacles. Sometimes it’s surprisingly simple. In the case of the mail, it may be that the client knows that credit-card offers need to be shredded, but the shredder’s in a different room. Or the desk where she’s sorting the mail isn’t near an outlet, so the shredder’s across the room. Rather than walking to the shredder, she’ll put down the pile and say, “I’ll shred this later.” So the piles persist and multiply.

The solution? Move the shredder or move the area where mail is processed (or both), so the two are near one another. Same goes for a trash bin or a recycling bin. Have the necessary tools nearby, to make accomplishing the task as effortless as possible.

This hit home to me recently when I set out to sort and weed the guest-room closet, which typically houses bedding and fancy dresses and shoes that aren’t worn often. I was up for the task when I discovered that the closet’s light bulb, which is way out of reach in a high ceiling, was burned out. That required my getting out the step ladder, finding a light bulb and changing the bulb. By the time I contemplated that, my enthusiasm for the project waned. And guess what? It didn’t happen that day. (It eventually happened and the closet looks great.)

The solution? One option is to muster up a “just do it” attitude and get out the step ladder and light bulb and carry on. Another is to store the stuff where you use them. In our case, we have a big house so we purchased an extra step ladders and more light bulbs so that we’d have them on each floor. That way, we lessen the risk of putting off the job out of a reluctance to run up or down the stairs for the item.

If you’re faced with an item on your to-do list that never seems to get crossed off, ask yourself why. If it’s something that you know would further your goals, see if you can identify the obstacles to your doing it, then address those obstacles.

In his book, Do It Tomorrow and Other Secrets of Time Management (link at right), Mark Forster offers all sorts of tricks to overcome obstacles to productivity. I blogged about his advice for getting started and keeping going on projects. It’s interesting reading.

Tagged with: goals, mark forster, obstacles, productivity