As we approach the New Year it seems everyone starts to panic about everything they want to get done by the end of the year. I have been getting messages on my facebook about people wanting to have a productive last week of the year to bring the year to a power close. Personally, I don’t get that.
Get Your To Do List Accomplished in 2011
Some years ago I met a guy who shared with me how he used the final days of the year. He didn’t spend them scrambling around he spent them planning for the new year. Goals and ideas that he wanted to accomplish in the upcoming year. Not so much resolutions but setting some goals to achieve. I know some of you already do that but there are a lot of you that are trying to squeeze every last ounce out of 2010. The fact that you are running around trying to squeeze the last little bit of production out of the last few days of the year indicates you might not have a good plan to begin with.
This past year was a difficult year for most in the world as the slowing economy has affected almost every corner of the globe. It’s hard to meet goals when things seem to be on a downward spiral.
My year was trying from the beginning as my mother passed on February 4, 2010. My offline business has started to show signs of the slowing economy even though it has some recession resilience. I started two other offline businesses that are showing signs of success but are still struggling to stay above water.
It’s tough but I did accomplish some very positive things in this past year. A few of them have to do with things around the house and personal organization. At the beginning of 2010 I took a look at the amount of “stuff” I have collected over the years and felt like I was buried alive. I decided I needed to purge some of the “stuff” and have done a good bit of it through the year but have to admit I am not done. That is one of my goals for 2011 – to finish the purging and get to a manageable amount of “stuff” that I actually use.
I needed to improve some things around the house. The fence in the back was literally falling over and so I replaced that. The Japanese garden I had built a few years ago had been damaged in the flood we had in Atlanta and I needed to repair and upgrade that space. I accomplished this in 2010. I also needed to build a stone wall to replace a timber retaining wall that was falling apart. I have that about 1/2 completed so that will carry over to 2011.
I want to be more organized and focused on my online business and overall in 2011. To see tasks through to completion. One of the ways I plan on doing that is to dive into the book by Leo Babauta called Zen to Done. Here is the opening line in the book:
This book was written for those who want to get
their lives organized and actually execute the things
on their to-do list.
Need I say more. This is an awesome workbook and I highly recommend it to anyone that is trying to get stuff done. Its under $10 and can revolutionize your life. Here is a Great Page Explaining More about the details of the book.