"I am now officially behind the eight ball."
As I think through May, in the context of this year's ever increasing momentum, my thoughts can't help but survey all of the things I didn't get done this month.
I love being busy, especially if I'm doing something that I'm convinced is important or has a positive impact on someone else or the world at large. It is hard for me to do anything that I'm not passionate about, and it's hard to stop me or hold me back if the passion for accomplishing something is there.
As much as I love being busy, I absolutely detest busywork. And most everything I do can be looked at as busywork form a certain point of view. Generally, I just don't look at that perspective, and stay passionate and productive. But when I get behind and my world seems full of things I just didn't get done, my defense mechanism kicks in and I tell myself that those things aren't very important anyway.
So I tend to set up the following 'no win' situation: Either I failed to get my important stuff done and let people down in the process. Or my life is full of meaningless busywork that I shouldn't have to do anyway. Neither of these options are good. Both lead to burn out and depression if allowed to flourish and grow.
So...what to do?
I can work more hours. Saturdays, early mornings, later at night, etc. I've tried that before. It just prolongs the real answer whatever that is. 'Working longer' (for me) does not translate to 'more productive', at at some point I'm working all the time and I'm still behind. Find a better answer.
I can manage time better. Clear off my desk by only touching each thing once and either finish it, file it, delegate it or throw it away. I can forget about making my day productive, and work to make each five minutes productive. Accomplish some task or resolve some issue every five minutes. I have a lot of five minute tasks to do. Maybe just clearing out all of those will make the pile of unfinished stuff seem smaller and less intimidating. I think I'll try this today.
I can learn to say 'no'. "Sorry, Ghost Rider, the pattern is full." Everybody else on the planet has a list of things that are important for me to do, and it should be me, not them, that fills up my day and the top of my desk. I've been doing this a little, but I think I need to make "NO" the default answer for a while.
I think that in the near term, all of the answers above are good ideas for now.
And I think it's good to be busy, and I should stop complaining and get to work.