“Let’s have dinner tonight.”
“Ok, what time?”
“I’ll call you.”
*waiting* …. it’s past my dinner time and still waiting.
….
“Ok I’m here”
“Oh I need another 10 minutes.”
*slaps forehead*
Sometime people just don’t realize how they inconvenience others.
~ Collected
Sometimes I’ll be fretting over something and wondering how on earth I will get out of a situation. Because I get so worked up, I out of doing anything about it. And then… out of no where things just have a way working themselves out. Then I realize not taking any action was probably the best thing I could do.
The way of the bow is the way of joy and enthusiasm, of perfection and error, of technique and instinct. But you will only learn this if you keep shooting your arrows
~ Paulo Coelho “The Way of the Bow”
The difference between successful people and very successful is that very successful people say “no” to almost everything ~ Warren Buffet
It’s no secret that among the first lessons of managing your time in the workplace is learning to say “no” to projects or work, if it will mean stretching yourself thin. It makes sense to focus on what you have in hand and do it well rather than take on too many projects and then fail at all of them. Ok, that may be an extreme case and may you succeed with some but then you’re left with no time for yourself and being constantly stressed out.
The truth is it’s easier said than done. I know there are books, articles and countless numbers of gurus out there who lecture us on this. In practice, the situation is not always that simple.
Sometimes it’s very hard to say “no” without being rude or sounding rude. These days organizations are complex and we often don’t have one single boss. We work in matrix of senior staff. When someone senior in the organization comes up to you and says, “would you kindly pretty please do this for me?”… what are you supposed to say… “No, I don’t have the time?”. I realize that there may be a better way of saying it but the truth is no matter how you sugarcoat it, the answer is still no and they will go back with some ill-feeling. Or they will think you’re trying to shirk responsibilities. (What’s keeping him / her so busy anyway?) Worse still… what if someday, you need this guy. People can bear a grudge.
I have known no way of handling such situations without either being passive-aggressive (say yes and do it when I can) or feeling some annoyance from the person asking. May be it’s my problem and I hope I can find a better way.
I looked at my stats from last year. In the entire year, I posted 9 times. That’s so shameful. I’ve posted double that number in January alone this year. I’m so happy to be writing again.
I’ve always been a pen and paper person. So I always put down my ideas, my thoughts, my to-do lists and my notes on paper. I know it’s not a novel idea but I think when we write things down on paper, our ideas flow better. I have even written blog posts on paper and then typed them up. I know it may make me sound like somewhat of a luddite but I seriously feel that I think better and remember better when I write things down by hand.
The other good thing about putting things down on paper (and this could be done on the computer as well) is to list out all this things you want to do. I’m starting a new venture and so this has me doing a lot of new stuff. I also have to strategize as to how I want to put my plans into practice. I haven’t written it out completely but I’m starting to. I think when we write things it’s out there in the world. Ideas seem to take shape and I feel they’re more likely to come alive and take shape.
