Make Life Easier – 5 Ways To Do The Hard Things First
Want to make life easier for yourself? Here’s the secret: do the hard things first and here are 5 ways to do it with EASE.
Let’s chat about how to make life easier for yourself.
I’m guessing this is something we all want for ourselves – a life that isn’t full of the hard stuff.
We’d all much prefer to do the fun, enjoyable things like nap and laze around in the sunshine. Or if we HAVE to do something that isn’t enjoyable we at least want it to be easy.
But here’s the thing – the enjoyable things aren’t always useful and the easy things don’t usually provide a great return for our investment of time.
This is where I share with you the secret to making life easier for yourself: it’s learning to get comfortable with the uncomfortable. It’s this ability to make yourself do the hard things that will be the greatest determiner of how successful you’ll be.
ONCE AGAIN: You need to learn to be comfortable doing the uncomfortable.
For example:
- Running a marathon is hard. Going for a leisurely walk around the block or just THINKING about doing exercise is easy. Guess which is more effective for strengthening your body?
- Cold calling expired listings is hard. Holding an open house is easy. Guess which is more effective for making money as a real estate agent.
- Sweeping a floor is easy. Scrubbing a floor on your hands and knees is hard. You already know which is going to clean your floor more thoroughly, right?
Consider these ideas:
MAKE LIFE EASIER
TIP # 1 – You have more energy and focus early in the day.
If you have to do the hard stuff, it is way easier to tackle the challenging things earlier in the day.
The truth is you’re more effective at 9:00 AM than you are at 3:00 PM.
So, attack the hard thing when you’re fresh and motivated to do so.
Chances are it’s only going to be more challenging later in the day.
Here’s another truth – sometimes hard things take more time and energy to complete it.
That’s why if you wait until later to do the hard thing, you might run out of time to complete it. Or worse you feel like giving up even before you even start because you don’t have the energy to do it.
But sometimes the hard stuff just needs to be done. Since the hard things are often the most important tasks for us to tackle, we need to make sure we have allocated enough time to the task to complete it.
I love the saying: if you eat to eat a sh#t, don’t nibble it! (Rude but true!)
Like eating a frog, you just need to get it done and then the rest of your day is more enjoyable.
Because guess what happens if you avoid doing the important task?
It usually lingers over your head all day and you just can’t enjoy the day as much.
So, get the hard thing off your plate, so you can enjoy the remainder of your day.
- “If it’s your job to eat a frog, it’s best to do it first thing in the morning. And if it’s your job to eat two frogs, it’s best to eat the biggest one first.” – Mark Twain
MAKE LIFE EASIER
TIP # 2 – Tackling the hard tasks also builds self-esteem and confidence.
Everyone else avoids the hard things so why not be the person that attacks them.
You’ll feel great about yourself, build resilience and know that you can do anything that needs to be done.
- Your potential increases greatly when you can reliably get yourself to do unenjoyable tasks on a consistent basis.
MAKE LIFE EASIER
TIP # 3 – It can help your career.
Once you become known as the person that can do the hard things, you’ll become more highly respected by your peers because you show up and get things done when they need to be done.
Most people have excuses for not doing the hard thing.
Don’t be an excuse maker!
MAKE LIFE EASIER
TIP # 4 – Avoid thinking too much about it.
Sometimes it’s best to get started on your hard thing without spending too much time thinking about it.
It’s like eating the frog analogy.
If it needs to be eaten, just eat it.
You don’t want to stare at it all day.
You don’t want that frog task sitting down and following you around all day. The frog only becomes bigger, less enticing and uglier over time.
MAKE LIFE EASIER
TIP # 5 – Decide what your “frog” is for the day.
The night before, I recommend determining what your most awful task is for the next day.
What’s your frog? Do you know what needs to make it on the menu?
What do you know you need to do? What are you actively avoiding doing?
Make sure to schedule it as early in the day as possible. And then when the set time comes, make sure to attack that frog with everything you’ve got.
In the end, some tasks are just unpleasant of the “crappy, not fun, wish you didn’t have to do them” variety.
There are unpleasant tasks which provide little value but must be done. I mean, you know what needs to be done.
What have you been avoiding?
MAKE LIFE EASIER
Whatever makes it onto your list, it’s best to get these important but unpleasant tasks done as soon as possible.
Now if the unpleasant task is high value, it deserves to be accomplished first.
If the unpleasant task is low-value, just get it out of the way as soon as you can (before HEY, YOU NEED TO DO IT and why not get it done sooner rather than later!).
MAKE LIFE EASIER
If you can reliably do the hard things first – time and time again, you’ll find that you’re so much more successful because you will be fueled to do it again and again.
It will also inspire you to be happier, because hey, you don’t have to stress about those hard things any longer than necessary.
It’s done, you have ticked that task off your list, now it is now to go and have some fun!
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Before You Go…
– See my EVERYTHING PAGE and grab a free gift > HERE
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I’m Frances Vidakovic – a mindset & action coach for quietly ambitious women who want to stop overthinking and finally take aligned action. I help women achieve their goals and follow through on what matters, without sacrificing their sanity or soul.