The ONE Thing that can help solve your procrastinating #TBT

Today's blog post was originally published last year:

Part three of a three part series. Part 1 was on motivation, and specifically how to motivate your son or grandson...although much of it applies to everyone. Part 2 focused on procrastination. Today we'll learn how to increase motivation and decrease procrastination.

This post is based on the book "The ONE Thing" by Gary Keller. What is the one thing? Keller says in the very beginning of the book that the idea came from this scene in "City Slickers":

Like Mitch asks 'That's great, but what's the "one thing"?' According to the book, the answer is to figure out what you want out of life and ask the following question repeatedly:

"What’s the ONE Thing I can do, such that by doing it everything else will be easier or unnecessary?"

Ask the question so that you'll know what needs to be done in the next five years to get what you want. Then ask it again so you'll know what has to be done this year so you can accomplish the one thing 5 years from now. Then ask it for this month. For today. For right now.

For me right now, my main thing is to retire in four years. I need to figure out the one thing I can do this year to make that goal possible. And then to refine it until I can figure out what I need to do tomorrow to get me closer to that goal.

The book talks a lot about guarding your one thing and making it the highest priority for that day...do not allow anything to steal that thing from you!

One of the best ways to do that is through time blocking. There are a lot of things on Google about time blocking, but here's what I think is interesting:

A webinar from the One Thing website, an article called "Effective Time Blocking Techniques To Boost Your Productivity" and a free sample of The One Thing planner coming out soon.

I highly recommend that you read the book and check out the resources above. I downloaded my planner and I'm waiting for the full version to be released.

I haven't really done much with this since I wrote it last year. I did buy the planner and even though it's pretty cool I haven't used it. Now that it's been brought back to my attention maybe I should begin trying to use it again so by the first of the year I'm really up to speed.

Interesting days

Today - World Tripe Day, Bologna Day and United Nations Day 

Tomorrow - International Artists Day, Sourest Day, World Pasta Day, Punk for a Day Day, Bandana Day and Greasy Food Day

Next Thursday - Halloween, Magic Day and Caramel Apple Day

November 24 - Celebrate Your Unique Talent Day, Sardines Day and Aura Awareness Day

Week long celebrations:

November 18 - 24: Road Safety Week