Evoke Development

Important activities are those that have outcomes that lead to the achievement of your goals.

Urgent activities are those that demand immediate attention, and are often associated with the achievement of someone else’s goals.

Urgent activities are often the ones we concentrate on. These are the “squeaky wheels.” They demand attention because the consequences of not dealing with them are immediate. And, if we are not careful, we can spend the majority of time focusing only on these.

Now, let’s take a moment to relate this to your life. Think about 3-5 urgent requests that you have received in the past month (work or personal) that have caused you to lose focus, making it more difficult to work on things that are important to you or to complete a work objective that was a must. Later today, find someone to discuss these with and then strategize one or two things that you could do to deal with these unexpected, urgent requests from your boss, coworkers, customers, family, or friends more effectively.

Along with these urgent items, we also find ourselves bombarded with a plethora of unimportant tasks. These tasks steal moments of our day and cause us to become stressed, anxious, unfocused, and frustrated. Unfortunately, we have been taught to be “nice” and all too often waste our time on these to-dos rather than focusing on what is really important.

The best way to begin managing our time more effectively is to focus on our own personal big picture. If we want to rise above the chaos of our daily activities and figure out what is really important, we must be willing to take some time to identify what our true purpose is. It can be a daunting question and one that may take much thought to determine. But, knowing and embracing our purpose will cause everything else in our lives to start falling into place and help ensure that we are not losing our perspective. Knowing what your personal Big Picture is gives you direction to your life. And, it provides a measuring stick against which to gauge competing demands as they come along.

Before you go to bed tonight, write down one or two personal or professional big picture objectives that you have. Don’t worry about making them perfect - just write down something. By having a clearer focus you will experience more joy and less stress. But before this can happen, there are two things that you must do.

1. Realize that you have choices about how you spend your time.
2. Stop making everything in your life a “MUST.” Remember, there are always at least three options for every situation. And with options come choices.

Check in next week to learn more about Focusing on the Big Picture. And don’t forget to do your homework!