10 Signs You Need to Learn to Prioritize

A short while back I wrote a blog with some of my best time management tips, which has become the third most read blog I’ve ever written, so it appears blog readers are finding some value in it.  If you haven’t seen it yet, here it is, check it out!

Let’s look at the world through a different lens today.  It’s not really about time management.  If someone says time management what do you think of?  For most of us, we intuitively know what they are talking about but breaking it down, the fact remains, we cannot manage or change time.  It’s simply how we spend or (as I prefer) invest our time.  A more accurate definition of what I’m looking to discuss today is learning to prioritize tasks better. Then get you to think about investing your time in only the most important projects.

Do you often find that you don’t have enough time to do important things in your life?    Why do you think that is?  Do you keep track of what you’re getting done?  Are you working on the most important things or the easiest ones to get done?

“Things that matter most must never be at the mercy of things that matter least.” Goethe

What I’d suggest we all do is improve our skills and techniques to manage our activities. What we really need to get better at is self-management and discipline, not time management.   Learning to be positively selfish and saying “NO” is an extremely important thing to learn.  If you say “YES” to everything you will have a never ending to-do list and an equally long list of people you’ve disappointed.    Value your time and other people will too.

The ability to select the most important task at each moment, and then to get started on that task and to get it done both quickly and well, will probably have more of an impact on your success in an undertaking than any other quality or skill you can develop.

This is an important question to ask yourself: “What are the potential consequences of doing or not doing this task?”

For those of you who are convinced of the powers of affirmations here is a good affirmation (self-talk) to tell yourself over and over.  The goal is when you get to a courage point use the affirmation to command your body into the appropriate action:  “I get important jobs done quickly”

Here are 10 signs you need to learn to prioritize your task more efficiently:

1. You often have to cancel or reschedule on people at the last minute
2. You work really hard all day, every day but the work doesn’t seem to be letting up
3. Pulling out a calendar and making plans farther than a week out isn’t something you can do
4. You find yourself consistently showing up late
5. You always feel like you’re running late
6. People have come to accept you operate on your own time – which means 10 minutes late
7. Ending the day leaves you wondering what exactly you did today
8. You instantly respond to text messages and emails as though you had nothing else going on
9. You fail to block off uninterrupted work time to be working at your highest productivity level
10. You’re reading my blog instead of doing higher priority items in your day
11. You have to speed or rush to get places on time, which often leads to forgetting important items.
12. You often find yourself saying, “There’s never enough time”
13. You have a lot on your wish list, if only there were more hours in the day
14. You create a top 10 list but actually have 14 items on the list (did you catch this??)

It’s almost 10pm and I just finished my blog for the day – how do you think I did with prioritizing my tasks today?   How did you do today?  Let’s make tomorrow a better day!

For further learning check out these three books.  #s 2 and 3 are two of my all-time favorite books on success, being more effective and are a must for anyone looking to build a personal development library!

1. David Allen’s, “Getting Things Done”
2. The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
3. Eat That Frog!: 21 Great Ways to Stop Procrastinating and Get More Done in Less Time

Motivational Quote:  “Don’t wait until everything is just right. It will never be perfect. There will always be challenges, obstacles and less than perfect conditions. So what? Get started now. With each step you take, you will grow stronger and stronger, more and more skilled, more and more self-confident and more and more successful.”

- Mark Victor Hansen

Thanks for stopping by – live inspired!!

Need a little pick me up, check out these motivational quotes

Tagged as: Motivation, motivational quotes, prioritize, Self-improvement, stress, time management