Are you a list person? Like do you make up lists in your head of all the things you plan on doing for a certain time frame (this evening, this weekend, this hour)? Lists definitely have their pros and cons – (who is it that says "you hit what you aim for, and if you aim for nothing, you hit it every time"?)
I am a copious list maker. Most of them are in my head, however, I also write many of them down, illegibly, often on little scraps of paper that are lost in the shuffle. The last few years, I have kept 3M in business from the purchase of "super sticky notes" alone. (Super stickies are much more sticky than regular ones, and so these notes do not get lost in the general disarray. They can even withstand the dog hair that wafts gently around my house when the heat comes on – this, despite vacuuming every day!)
Tonight I had semi-ambitious plans, due to a scheduled meeting that got cancelled – all of a sudden I had gained 3 hours in my evening. Hooray! However, within about a half hour of arriving home, my head felt fuzzy and I started getting an ear ache and a tooth ache and my eyes felt puffy. Now, I can push through anything, if I have to, but I didn't really have to, and so I got enormously unmotivated to do anything. My list. The huge, unrelenting list inside my head of all the things I could be doing, should be doing, is indefinitely put off until further notice.
I was reading a book today on entrapanership – the author was talking about qualities of a leader – they are singularly focused and are constantly course correcting, among other things.
I am very singularly focused – until I am not.
I am only barely pre-sick, and there are litterally dozens of things that I could be doing, the least of which is spending time with my family. But instead, I have just spent the last two hours with a google search going thorough about 200 "Wheeled Tote Bags" – A completely separate post should be dedicated to how the entire planet is at our finger tips, yet there are only 12 wheeled tote bags made in the entire world and I don't like any of them.
Sometimes I wonder about people who lived 100 years ago – I don't think they allowed themselves to be so easily derailed. By the same token, they smiled a lot less if American Gothic is any fair representation of folks of yesteryear.
What gets you off your tracks?
Here's my list of derailment:
In addition to feeling sick (where mostly, I watch Netflix endlessly), I have to add such things as feeling sad (I'm very unproductive when I am blue), too many choices (I suffer from option overload), a good book, feeling fat (yes, this is true and don't laugh. Fatness makes me eat bags of crunchy foods or chocolate until I feel UTTERLY unmotivated), other people's crises (I'm good at letting other's stuff take my energy and then I have none left for my tracks to run on).
Looking at the above, I actually marvel that I ever get anything done! It takes an enormous amount of energy to become and then stay focused on my goals. And I bet you feel similarly. So if you managed to stay directed on something today, or yesterday for that matter – give yourself a high five. Against all odds, you managed something worth celebrating!