Stop saying yes to everything
Did you agree to have lunch this week with your aunt again? Maybe your “best friend” just bought tickets to see the next EDM concert going on, begging you to go with. Something about this post made you click on it. Maybe something had created too much of a “Yes Man” in you and may be saying yes to doing too many things.
The optimist and the procrastinator
We have two kinds of people who chronically finish things late. One of these people are selfish with their time. They think that they have the time to put playful things in front of getting work done. Procrastinators are those who think that they would “rather be doing other things” and putting an emphasis on getting to the important tasks later instead of now.
The other person is under-evaluating their time. They believe that they have the time to do all of their tasks before their deadlines, or before work starts. They underestimate exactly how long a drive over 35 miles longto have coffee with their friend actually takes. It’s not with selfish intent that they are adding things to their schedule, they just want to be able to do more.
I am the optimist; someone who wanted to do more with my time. It was hard to say “no” to people when opportunities came up and people would ask for something to be done. After a long while I found myself standing before an insurmountable mountain of tasks that needed done that I agreed to do. Why was everything still piling up?
I was afraid to tell people no
I had talked about expectational debt before and still have had a hard time handling it. As we grow older our responsibilities stack on top of the previous ones. Our word doesn’t carry the same weight like it used to, especially around having “enough time.”
As for me, once I had decided to become a designer I knew there were things I would have to put on the back burner. I saw a career actually worth pursuing but soon realized there wasn’t enough time in my day for things that weren’t propelling me forward. I had to do an audit of my own time.
The time audit
The list of tasks that we’re piling up were closely related to the things that were holding me back from progress. I quickly had to learn to audit my time and say no to things I just wouldn’t have time for. As much as I loved a lot of the people who were asking things of me, they don’t pay my bills nor have the same goals I do.
Everything takes more time than you think it will. Brushing your teeth takes time; time to walk over there, grab the brush, find the tooth paste floss, rinse, mouthwash… etc. There are pieces to tasks that people just don’t plan for. And this inefficiency in my planning was exactly what kept making my list take longer to get through.
Maybe it’s time to start saying no to more things. And yes, I get it. Saying no can be one of the most difficult things to do. You don’t want to seem like the person who doesn’t do anything cool or helpful. But remember that “yes” mountain? Will going out for drinks after work for the second time help you knock things off that list?
I think doing an audit of your time and your schedule will be an important advance of that personal mountain of things-to-do that you carry around. Go over the deadlines, go over their importance, go over the path they lead to and see if that aligns with your goals. See if there are anythings you may have to reschedule or just go back and decline the request.
Having a good habit of this will ultimately help you avoid more expectational debt in the future, making you much more efficient at doing the things you find important.
Darian Rosebrook is the Design Lead over at keyspark.io His creative eye is driving us forward as an ever-growing, ever-improving brand.
You can follow our articles here on medium or join us on twitter!
@keyspark_io
