The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing

Life is complicated. So many demands on our time and attention, and it’s too easy to get lost and forget what it is you were trying to do. Have you ever gone out to the kitchen, and once there, you can’t remember what you came out there for? Life can be like that at times. Only bigger. And more important.

Productivity experts have lots of advice about how to get things done. They also have advice about how to decide what’s the main thing, what’s the most important thing for you to be focused on.

But I think the biggest challenge is this: once you’ve decided, then you need to keep your focus on the main thing and not be distracted. You need to keep the main thing the main thing.

How can you do that? Here are 8 tips:

  1. Print out some colourful, relevant posters and hang them strategically around your home of office.
  2. Every day, the first thing, do something related to your main thing.
  3. Every week, determine what actions you need to take on your main thing. Add these actions to your diary , so that you have the time scheduled to do them.
  4. Ask a friend to remind you once in awhile. They can email, or IM you: Hey Debs! Hows that project going to get the ooompha off the ground? (I’d shared that my main thing at the moment is to get my ooompha off the ground.)
  5. Every night, just as you turn off the light to go to sleep, ask yourself, “What was the best thing you accomplished today with regard to the main thing?”
  6. Every morning, while you shower or shave or brush your teeth, ask yourself “What’s the most important thing for me to do today about my main thing?” (That colourful poster on the mirror should help remind you.)
  7. Think of some object that’s related (in your mind’s eye) to the main thing. Set up a search for it in ebay. (When ebay finds it, ebay will email you! How brilliant is that?!)
  8. List the top 7 things you do as distraction activities. Here are some examples: play solitaire, play sodoku, read Facebook, BBC news, watch TV, read DebbyHallet.com, read something in my pile of ‘things to be read’, answer un-urgent emails. You get the drift. Anything that you spend significant time doing when you really should be doing something else, is a distraction activity. Postpone them! Those dishes certainly need to be washed, but is is more important right now than the main thing?

Good luck. Let me know some of the things you do to keep the main thing the main thing.

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