Cleaning the Garage!
March 19, 2009
The ability to focus on what is important gives us the opportunity to accomplish a great deal in a relatively short period of time.
The ability to focus on what is important gives us the opportunity to accomplish a great deal in a relatively short period of time. Unfortunately when you focus your effort on the wrong tasks, it can sometimes lead you into trouble.
A few years ago my wife asked me to clean the garage. I said, “No problem!” It only takes about an hour, and it really wasn’t a big deal. Well, one week went by. Then two. Finally three or four weeks had passed, and I still hadn’t cleaned the garage.
As I pulled the car into the garage one Saturday afternoon, I noticed my wife blocking the entrance into the garage. In fact, her arms were crossed and she looked as if she was ready to enter the ring of a professional wrestling match (my son happens to be a great fan so the analogy seemed appropriate).
“Something wrong?” I asked timidly.
“Yes,” she responded, “I thought you were going to clean the garage!!!”
“I am.”
“I thought you were going to do it soon…”
I quickly reminded her about my very hectic travel schedule, rattling off that in the course of two weeks, I had traveled from Raleigh to Sacramento, from Sacramento to Nashville, from Nashville to San Jose, then to Dallas, and finally back to Raleigh. The bottom line was that I really hadn’t been home very much during that period. When I was, I had been packing or unpacking.
I thought I was all set. But then my wife got this very quizzical look on her face, and in a very serious tone pointed at my hand and asked, “What’s that in your hand?”
“This thing?”
“Yes”
“In my hand?”
“Uh huh.”
“You mean this thing I’m carrying?”
“YES, WHAT IS IT?”
“Well, I’m no expert, but it looks a lot like a tennis racquet…”
I’ll let you fill in the rest of the conversation. The point should be clear: fitness is very important to me; cleaning the garage is not. I had time to play a few hours of tennis on a Saturday afternoon; I didn’t set aside an hour to clean the garage.
In business, as in life, you usually find time to do the things you feel are important. You are able to focus your attention and efforts to achieve your objectives. What may be even more important to remember is that you need to be able to select the most appropriate areas to address at any given time. And those may not always be your top priority, as with the case of cleaning the garage.
When you can expend your energy and effort in the right areas, you will be able to make progress towards the important goals in your business and in your life.
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