An apple A Day
“If it's your job to eat a frog, it's best to do it first thing in the morning. And if it's your job to eat two frogs, it's best to eat the biggest one first.” - Mark Twain
Recently, I was invited to address a group of working women. During the course of the interaction, I asked them what they considered the biggest obstacles to productivity. While several voices rang out, the most common refrain seemed to be procrastination.
That reminded me of one of my favorite books on productivity - Eat That Frog by Brian Tracy. The core idea of the book is that if you do your most important task (MIT) first thing in the morning, the rest of the day is going to be easy in comparison.
In the book, Brian Tracy refers to it as “eating your frog” – a phrase he borrowed from the unforgettable Mark Twain quote that you read at the start of this article.
Your ‘frog’ is the most thankless, boring, and unpleasant task you must finish in order to accomplish whatever goal of target you have set for yourself for the day. Often, it is also the most important.
Most of the time, we tend to put it aside for ‘later’ when we are in a better ‘mood’. And guess what? More often than not, we let it slide till that ‘later’ becomes ‘too late’ – and then we have a proper crisis on our hands. By the time we get ourselves around to dealing with it, that task has snowballed out of proportion, adding anxiety, stress, and unnecessary pressure to our already high pressure lives.
Sounds familiar?
I can’t imagine anyone who enjoys that sort of pressure – yet most of us manage to do it to ourselves with remarkable regularity.
So do yourself a favor and ease some of that stress and pressure from yourself – eat your frog. Make sure it's the very first thing you do in the morning – and, as Mark Twain said, if you have two frogs, eat the bigger one first.
Once you get that thankless, boring, unpleasant task out of the way, everything else will seem so much easier. And, by having gotten off to a great start, you’ll find yourself accomplishing so much more than you thought possible.
Sounds simple, doesn't it? But don't kid yourself! Eating your frog isn’t something you’ll enjoy – but if you do succeed in making it a habit, you’ll realize how powerful it is. By taking on your biggest challenge first, every single day, you will find yourself being more productive than ever before. If you can commit your focus and energy on your most important tasks, you will get success a lot faster than you might imagine. This is a habit that a lot of successful people have, and a common theme among people we consider successful.
To ensure you make the most of it, start by making a list the tasks you are going to do tomorrow that will get you closer to your goals. Ask yourself:
1) What are the most important tasks I need to get done?
2) What are the tasks that will make a real difference if I do them well?
3) What is it that I should be doing right now?
The answer to the last question is your biggest frog - that should be the first task you tackle. Preferably, you should tackle it first thing tomorrow morning.
Once you’ve identified your frog, work out your plan to deal with it – what do you need to do to ensure that it gets completed? Try getting up a bit earlier than usual. Waking up just one hour earlier than usual can make a world of difference to your productivity. Make it a habit, and you’ll find that achieving even your biggest goals isn’t all that hard after all.
