5 Tips to Ensure You are Prioritizing your Priorities

Your work hard to get your work done.

However, sometimes you toil hard only to find that your most important tasks still don’t get done.

You are getting many things done, just not the important ones.

What will it take to get those top to-dos to done?

Putting the Important Things First

It sounds simply, actually. Put your most important tasks first.

Yet, it’s not that easy. You quickly find yourself neck-deep in dozens of lesser tasks. Or the busyness of your day takes over and seems to monopolize your time.

Why is it so hard to get those few, yet extremely important, tasks done?

The main reason is that urgency often overcomes priority. Instead of spending your limited time on what matters, you end up using it to get the busy and mundane done.

“Make sure you prioritize your priorities.”

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Simply put, you have to do what you say is important. If a task is important, make sure you are giving it the priority it deserves.

Here are 5 Tips to Ensure You are Prioritizing Your Priority Tasks:

1. Have a List – Many people say, “I know what I have to get done.” But, they don’t have a list. Until you have written your tasks down and compared them against each other, it is difficult to have a clear picture of what is truly important.
2. Rank Your Priorities – This activity makes people uneasy. However, you need to rank your priorities. Put them in order of importance. When you need to make a tough decision, you will know whether the gym or writing is more important to you. You can always change the order later, so don’t stress this task.
3. Put Work Before Play – Always do the work before you do the fun. It is easy (and enjoyable) to do the small and inconsequential tasks. It requires discipline to do the hard and distasteful ones first.
4. Schedule Time for the Important – Don’t let your priorities get overrun by the busyness of your day. Unless you schedule time on your calendar for your priorities, you won’t get around to them. Whether it is a workout at the gym or writing time for your book, put an appointment with your priority on your calendar. (link)
5. Evaluate Priorities Regularly – What was a priority today, might not be tomorrow. As I mentioned earlier, you can change your mind. Even your life events will shift your priorities.

Putting Your Priorities First

Make a list of your top tasks and goals today, and ask yourself, “Am I putting my priorities first?”

When you do, you will find that much of tasks you were doing were inconsequential. And the smaller, less important work will fade into the background when you are working on what is truly important to you.

Question: Are you putting your priorities ahead of lesser tasks and work? What will it take to make sure you put your priorities first? You can leave a comment by clicking here.