So there is this bucket of crap. Maybe in a work situation or in a personal relationship or just in your life in general. You know it’s there. It’s starting to smell a little. You could deal with it. Or you could just walk away and leave it until tomorrow.
You start work. All is good with the world. You login. There it is. The bucket of crap. It’s kind of saucer-sized right now. You even know what you need to do to tip out the saucer of crap and have a clean plate, so to speak. But you don’t. You go on your coffee break. You try to distract yourself with good coffee and scones. Scones always help, that’s for sure.
For those few minutes the saucer is in another hemisphere. Aahh. You go back to your desk. You take a deep breath. You are now much more able to deal. Then, all of a sudden you check you inbox and you realise people have added to the load. The saucer is now overflowing. Its filling and filling and you do everything to distract yourself from it. By the late afternoon you are completely overwhelmed by the speed at which the saucer is filling and it’s time to go home. The saucer has actually become a bucket full. It’s way too big to deal with now and you are wondering who is at fault here. How did this happen? There’s no way they can expect you to deal with such a heavy bucket.
You procrastinate and wonder when is this crap going to stop flowing your way. Your mind is numb, so you log out and go home. The evening passes at a forgettable pace and it’s time for bed. But the weight of the bucket is still with you. It has seeped under your finger nails and your eyelids are heavy with it. You try to nod off but the real estate of your mind is consumed with the smell from this bucket. Your mind is still racing and the size of the bucket gets real. You try to tune out but the weight of the bucket has you tossing and turning. By now, you actually don’t know what the solution is. You can’t believe that earlier in the day, emptying the saucer seemed doable. But now it’s such an uphill battle.
A few blinks later and its morning. The beautiful sunlight in the room and the sound of the birds are not the first thing to wake you, but the stench of the bucket which has sat there all night.
The small tasks of the morning seem impossible and it feels like the world is against you. Even that hot shower hasn’t helped. You head off to work in a fluster, knowing that if you don’t get there soon, the bucket will spill over.
Mark Twain famously said that if you were to eat a live frog, first thing in the morning, you can go through the rest of the day knowing the worst is behind you. In other words, get the horrible task out of the way first thing in the morning. Don’t push it out for later in the day. Face it head on and go at it with gusto. It is the best work habit you can get into. Do the worst job first. Then you don’t allow your brain to over think it. So if it’s a proposal to write or slides to complete or an awkward phone call that has to be made, go for it. In parenting maybe it’s the first no you have to give of the day when it comes to sugar.
If its dealt with early in the morning, the boss (or your kids) haven’t had time to pull you in ten different directions yet. The phone hasn’t starting ringing and the email hasn’t started pinging.
This will train your brain to accomplish things out of habit. Imagine going on the coffee break with no bucket of crap to return to?
Go for it! Eat the frog, like its caviar !
