This post is just another form of procrastination. Ignore it.
No, don’t ignore it. Learn from it.
What do you do in order to not do what you need to be doing?
Not what you should be doing, because we all know what happens when you ‘should’ on yourself… but what you need to be doing. There’s a difference.
What’s the difference?
The difference is that ‘shoulds’ are tasks that are often being dictated by a plan. A plan you’ve agreed to at one point or another, but a plan nonetheless.
The ‘needs’ are that which have to be done, or else you don’t make it. What ‘it’ is will be different for us all; for some, it’s survival, for others it’s success, and others, signficance.
I’m not saying that just because ‘shoulds’ come from a plan, you shouldn’t do them. Or that needs always trump them. I’m not saying that at all.
I’m just saying that it’s good to notice where your motivation is coming from before leaving one task to move on to another, so don’t end up wasting time, your most precious resource.
That said, I won’t take up any more of yours… or mine. Back to it, now!
Image by dirtyfeet.
The distinction between SHOULD and NEED — brilliant!
I do love the idea of asking myself, not “What should I be doing?”, but “What needs doing now (or today)?”
At the same time, there also must be some space for “What do I want or not want to be or do right now — which may well include procrastination of one form or another. Some of my best work gets done when I’m avoiding doing something else.
Okay, you know, the workday is long over, even for me.
But I had to pop in and remark on the excellence of this photo illustration. It is inspired, Adam, in a way people rarely get right.
And you know your little Virgo bud–she groks this shite.
Well done, young monk. Well done.
I so agree. Should have become a dirty word, and when it connotes an obligation imposed by an external authority (including all those external authorities we’ve internalized), it’s wise to be wary before giving in to the should.
But after years of wrestling with this, swinging from compulsive overachievement to define it slackerdom, I’ve come to distinguish the difference between the external should in the inner mandate. There are things that I must do, if I’m to be honest with myself.
I wish I could say that getting this distinction has brought me to productivity nirvana. It hasn’t. But this distinction plus spending more time reading and responding to folks like you is inching me toward a more peaceful and (paradoxically?) adventurous way of being.
The lesson of the day for me involves another distinction: the difference between surfing/tweeting/blogging for the sake of getting my voice out there and doing the same for the sake of listening to others.
It sounds like you’re still using the Authority model. Am I missing something?
One of my favorite questions is, “What’s the best use of my time right now?” Often the answer is an activity not valued by other people, but it’s something I really want to do. And when I immerse myself in it I lose all sense of time and ego…I call it slipping into sacred space.
PS Could you tell us what’s the best use of your time right now?