October 16, 2009 Chautauqua

From the Editor's Computer

I recently read the following: “By one estimate, each of us will have at least 35 hours of unfinished work in front of us our entire life. In short, we’ll never catch up!” (Robert Cooper) Now, I don’t know about you, however I find that a very freeing thought.

If we’ll never catch up, then why stress about it? Why cram our schedules with tasks that we are trying to catch up on? Why let those 35 hours of unfinished work prey on our mind day after day after day after day?

What is all that unfinished work? Is it books we want to read, movies we want to watch, projects we started and think we should finish, classes we want to take, or (fill in the blank)?

If we’re never going to get that unfinished work finished, does it really need done anyway?

Obviously it isn’t hurting us that it is unfinished, otherwise, we’d have finished it and it wouldn’t be hanging over us. So just forget about it. Free yourself from that 35 hours of unfinished work.

Larry Winget, the World’s Only Irritational Speaker, suggests tossing to-do lists and creating “Get it Done” lists. He explains that to-do lists are really lists of what you wish to get done, whereas get-it-done lists are lists of things that have to get done (or else!). The things that have to get done can be anything from daily tasks to perusing your biggest and grandest dreams.

Though, do you really need to create a list? The things that absolutely have to get done will still get done...because they have to!

Beth

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