Decide

I read many time-management and life-management books, as I am always looking for new insights into how to become more effective with my time and life. I found some helpful ones in Decide.

I genuinely connected with the distinction McClatchy makes between Gain and Pain Prevention as motivators. I believe we spend way more of our time on the latter than on the former, which is probably why so many people don’t make the kind of progress they desire. The Gain items in our lives aren’t urgent, don’t require our attention, and are easily put off; however, they make a huge difference in the quality of our lives. Just thinking about my personal Gain goals stirred me to pursue them afresh.

I also appreciated the balance between planning different items either monthly, weekly, or daily. Most time-management approaches seem to emphasize just one of those planning approaches, and I think they are less effective as a result. Some things require a longer planning time, and others less so. I have probably planned that way intuitively, but it is helpful to have it laid out.

My next step is to review my next month and look at how much time I am devoting to moving forward-and then try to add more time to that.

So those are my questions for you: How much of your time and energy is devoted to Pain Prevention versus moving forward on your Gain goals? What are you going to do about it? Share your next steps here and let’s move forward together.