It's true; there really is a 'possum in my hen house. He's been in there for about a week and, other than worrying about him and being extra diligent about collecting the eggs, I'm not doing anything about it. My chickens are pretty big so I don't think he's a danger to them, but he could be. Mostly he just eats the eggs if he can get to them before I do. He's constantly on my mind. I'm formulating all sorts of plans to eject him but I'm not actually doing anything.
The possum in my henhouse is real but he's also a bit of a metaphor representing all sorts of things I'm currently stewing about but not taking action to resolve. Here are some of the other “'possums in my henhouse”:
- It's been quite awhile since I did any real exercising and I haven't been watching what I eat lately either, with predictable results. I'm unhappy about the few extra pounds but so far, I'm not doing anything to get rid of them;
- My house is a bit of a mess right now and it's making me a little crabby but again, I'm not doing anything about it;
- When I moved to Virginia I got out of the habit of tracking my spending. I had a bunch of receipts to get together for my homeowner and I took that opportunity to finally log most of my expenses. I have a little more to do but haven't picked it back up for a week now;
- I have two more rooms to paint in this house before I leave at the end of March. It’s an easy job but I still haven't picked up my brush
Unfortunately, I could go on but I won't bore you with my whole to-do list. I comfort myself with the surety that I'm not alone in my procrastination and inertia.
Why do we do it? Why do we put off until tomorrow what we can do today? I know I'm going to get everything on my list done but why is it such a struggle to get motivated? We know exercise makes us feel good and yet we put it off. We know we need to stop spending and start paying down our debt but we head back to the mall. Taking any sort of action to resolve our issues makes us feel empowered and we know it; yet we continue to sit on the couch.
There are thousands of motivational speakers out there just waiting for us to hire them to tell us to do what we already know we should be doing. Google “motivational books” and you’ll get 4,780,000 responses; “motivational seminars” returns 967,000 responses.
I think Nike said it best. “Just Do It”. I’m giving that a shot. Wonder if it will work?
What are you putting off? What are your tricks for overcoming inertia?
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3 comments:
My trick? It's similar to just do it. I focus on the here and now. I don't let myself think ahead or behind and then I take note of what my body is doing at this exact moment. (It's typing.) What could it be doing? That question usually gets me up.
Then once I'm up and started on something I try to stay in the here and now. I keep coming back to what is my body doing.
It doesn't work all the time, but if I stay focused it really does make me move.
I put off making cheese, soap, yogurt... I even put off things that are supposed to be fun. We haven't gone snowboarding yet this year. Every weekend we tell ourselves "Next weekend we'll go". And I also put off a lot of stuff at work. Once I'm in the groove and banging out work it's easy, but getting to that point is an uphill battle that usually begins on Monday and doesn't crest the top until sometime Wednesday.
I was under the impression that I procrastinate because I don't have enough leisure time, but maybe that's just a bit of cognitive dissonance at work. I thought if I had more time to spend at home just reading a book then maybe I wouldn't value that time so much that it keeps me from going outside to do things like snowboard. I thought that if I wasn't chained to a cubicle an hour away from home five days a week then I'd be more motivated at work.
But who knows... Maybe I'm just making excuses.
That's a great trick Shirley. I'm going to give it a try!
Everett, it'll be interesting to see if you procrastinate less when you work less. When I worked a regular job I felt like I just needed a little more time and I'd get everything done. Once I semi-retired, life quickly filled up that "free" time.
I now think that I was more productive when I was working because I had to accomplish a lot in so much less time. Going to work also got me out of the house. It was a lot easier to make myself run my errands when I was already out and could do them on the way home. After I left the working world it became much more of an effort. Just running to the grocery store involved showering, dressing, fixing myself up...things that working from home allow me to let slide a bit.
By the way, I got a live trap today and plan to go after my real 'possum tonight!
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