Are you in this losing battle?

Photo by Letizia Bordoni on Unsplash

Recently I was in a session with a client and she was reading me something she had written about what she wanted from her time.  

And it included the line “time to do everything”.

And I stopped her there to reflect on that a little.

Because she won’t do everything.  

Neither will I.

And neither will you.

No one, I repeat, no one, can do everything.

(Well, until someone figures out the secret to immortality.)

And because you can’t do everything, that means you need to prioritize.

But if you’re anything like my clients (and even me sometimes!), prioritization is HARD.

One reason it’s so hard is because not only do you want to do “everything”, you're operating from the false premise that it’s even possible.

We tend to think about prioritization in terms of the “when”.  As in, the “high priority” items come first, and the “low priority” items come last.

And while there’s truth in that, it’s not a complete framework.

And that’s because prioritization isn’t simply about ordering the things that you’ll do, it’s also about deciding what you will NOT do.

And that’s a hard pill to swallow.

But once you do, you feel a lot more empowered.

You will not get to everything.  

And imagining that somehow you will is a lie you’re telling yourself.

And it’s a lie that keeps you overwhelmed, stressed and feeling down on yourself.

Once you admit that you aren’t going to do everything, then you can start making intentional choices.

And I think you’ll find that your time actually starts having more value to you when you admit that it’s not unlimited and that you’ll have to make choices.  

Because inherent in choice is agency and power.

When you say yes to something, the flip side is that you’re saying no to something else, even if you’re not yet admitting it to yourself.

When you’re clear on the fact that you’re not going to do everything, you start making much better, much more satisfying choices about how you WILL spend your time, what you WILL do.

And that is something you won’t regret.