5 reasons to tackle that hard task NOW
You have an item on your to-do list that you do not want to tackle. It is a high-resistance task: you are dreading getting started with it.
We all have them. Maybe it is making a phone call. Maybe it is filling out a form. Maybe it is trying to figure out what you want to do with the rest of your life. Large or small, high resistance tasks are a pain in the backside.
Here is the secret, though: you will only make yourself miserable by putting it off. Here is why you should tackle it straight away.
You only have so much willpower
Willpower is a finite resource. We each only have so much of it. This is why supermarkets traditionally placed chocolate bars near the tills. By the time you have dragged yourself, and possibly some children, round the entire shop, you willpower is shot. You can no longer resist that bar of fat and sugar.
Sleep and relaxation rebuild our willpower. That means that we typically have more of it first thing in a morning and go downhill as the day progresses.
As a result, you have more willpower now than you will have later. If you cannot tackle your hard tasks first thing in a morning you are unlikely to have enough left by the end of the day. The result? The task will not get done and you will have to face it again tomorrow.
You will not feel like doing it later
Sometimes we put a hard task off because we think we will be more in the mood for it later. Of course, this is not the case.
Not only are we losing willpower throughout the day but we are also building up the worry about the task. The longer will leave it the more our mind will tell us it is something to be avoided and we will feel even less like completing it.
You will spend all day worrying about it
The idea of doing the task plays on your mind, right? It is like a cloud hanging over you. Even if I spend time relaxing, I am usually thinking "I cannot relax because when I finish I will need to tackle that task." The act of worrying is draining in itself. It will lower our mood regardless of whether we eventually do complete the task or not.
You will feel great having done it
There are few better feelings in live than being able to cross a hard task off your to-do list. There is a sense of elation when you get through something you have dreaded.
That is a fun feeling to have. It is worth fighting for. And, if you tackle it first thing in the morning, you will be able to start your day off with that feeling. Starting your day this way will set you up to feel like a winner for the rest of it.
You have already waited too long
Perhaps this is the first time that the task has appeared on your to-do list. However, more often than not, these hard tasks are ones that have been on there for a while and keep getting pushed back.
The task is important, right? Otherwise, it would not be on the list.
It is time to stop the procrastination and dive in. You have already pushed it back to tomorrow's to-do list too many times in a row. If you do not do it today, are you ever going to do it?
Summary
We often push a hard task back because we dread the idea of doing it now and somehow think we will feel differently later. Of course, when viewing it in an objective light, we know that we will not.
We only have so much willpower, and it becomes more depleted throughout the day. Therefore, if we want to get the task completed, we need to tackle it now.
Doing so will give us a feeling of achievement to start our day with and put us in a good mood for the rest of it.
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Published 10 July 2017. Written by Chris Worfolk.