5 Ways to Ensure You Do the Important Instead of the Urgent

Ever have a day when everything seems urgent?

You end up running in circles. And trying to do everything at once.

Yet, when the day ends, you realize that most of what you thought was urgent… really wasn’t that important.

Is that Task Important or Just Urgent?

Not everything that appears urgent is truly important.

Take a look at the tasks you have on your list today and ask yourself, “Are these todos really important? Or are they just urgent?”

Are you doing them merely because they are they ones that “jumped onto” your list today? Or because they will truly will have an impact on your life today?

“Many of the things we tell ourselves are urgent… really aren’t that important in the big picture.”

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The truth is that most tasks we tell ourselves we need to do… don’t need to be done right now.

Here are Ways to 5 Ensure You Do the Important Instead of the Urgent:

1. Set a Priority – Make sure you assign each of your todos a priority. Most people do not take the few moments needed to do this and then everything appears equally importance on their list. But, not everything can be a priority. Mark your highest impact tasks so that they stand out.
2. Add It to Your List – Just because you thought of a task now, doesn’t mean you should do it now. Add it to your list, so that you can deal with it at the appropriate time.
3. Make an Appointment – If a task needs to be done at or by a certain time, then add it to your calendar. Make an appointment with that task so that you know that you will have time to get it done.
4. Deal with Interruptions – Most interruptions “seem” like important things. After all, they stopped you from doing something else, right? Yet, whether it is a ringing phone or someone walking into your office, you need to put interruptions in their place. Avoid them if possible, (you can turn off that phone!), or say no until you are finished with your important work.
5. Urgent vs. Important – The most important question you can always ask yourself when dealing with a task is, “Is this important or just urgent?” It is amazing how few tasks are actually important in a day’s work.

Do the Important First

Urgent items love to masquerade as important ones.

A random interruption becomes your #1 task, or a forgotten task suddenly takes your attention away from what you should be doing.

As you work through your day, make sure to stop and weigh the urgent vs. the important tasks.

And of course, always do the important ones first.

Question: How do you separate the urgent from important tasks in your day? You can leave a comment by clicking here.