Last Monday, I had the cleanest inbox I have had in years. I hesitate to confess this on a public forum that could be viewed by my colleagues, but my inbox, which usually hovers around 300+ emails, with hundreds added daily, got down to 47!
A friend, surprised by my instantaneous reply to an email about a distant future event sent me a thank you note. My email back to her was as follows:
“Are you kidding?! You are so welcome! I am avoiding 3 very important projects, so any other mindless emails that desperately need no attention have a great shot at being in the spot light tonight.”
It made her laugh… but only because we both know it was TRUE!
When I am avoiding creation, there are 2 clusters of questions I go to.
#1– Is now the time?
Sometimes I think I have to do something now because, well, I have to. (Some of you clever linguists may notice… that’s not exactly a question!)
Not every idea you have is ready to be instituted. Sometimes you are sitting in the future, waiting for information and people to align. And sometimes you are just doing things out of order.
Have you ever thought you were procrastinating only to find out later that you were missing a crucial piece of information? Or had an idea and by the time you got around to doing it, the project looked completely different?
Forcing a project into existence that is not ready to be born is typically around the enjoyment level of eating charcoal. So that’s why I start there. Save yourself the self flagellation if the answer is “not now.”
BUT… If now IS the time… I’m on to my next cluster of questions:
•What am I avoiding that completing this project will create? (often I get very strange awareness from this question—like ease, my own potency, my business, everything I’ve been asking for. Might be a good moment to follow up with a good ole POD/POC)
• Am I missing information?
• What would it take for this to be easy?
• Am I desiring to get it right, good, perfect or correct?
• If I weren’t avoiding this, how quickly could I do it?
Turns out of the 3 projects I was most avoiding last week, one needed to wait till the weekend to get the info I required, one required the assistance of someone else, and one I just had to POD/POC myself and then choose!
What have you been avoiding that is taking a great deal of energy? If now is not the time, be kind to yourself and move on.
If now is the time… what can you be or do different today to choose for you rather than against you?
In the end, annoying as it may be… it’s really choice.
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