A great beginning

Several months ago I had a brilliant idea. Brilliant! It began with a minor annoyance.

Every morning I have to leave the house at 7:30 to take the kids to school. Then I turn around and go back home. There’s no time to start a project. My wife has already started her day. I can grab a cup of coffee and sit down but before it’s cooled off enough to drink it’s time to head back out the door again.

So here’s my brilliant idea. I can drop of the kids at school, go straight to work, and have a full hour before anybody gets there. I can read, make an effective plan for my day, and do some of the things that get lost when you get caught up in firefighting and a never-ending task list.

So since August I’ve been coming in at 8 every morning very effectively. I’m always the first person here in the morning. Here’s the problem. I haven’t been using that time in the way I designed it to be. First of all it seems that even at 8 there are always people who need to be helped and they will find me if I am at the church office. Second, the preschool workers begin to come in and they often have issues. Third, and perhaps biggest, is that far too often I face an overwhelming task list that looms over my head. I find myself unable to make myself read or look ahead or plan when I know what needs to be done next and how daunting it is. So I just get started on the work day. Next thing you know, that planning hour in the morning is gone and I am left with just a very long work day that leaves me drained and unenergetic.

But today was different. Today I came in, closed the door, didn’t check my email or the phone messages. I still had a couple of interruptions, but I found that my attention goes where I allow it to go. If I check email first there will invariably be some kind of crisis that needs to be resolved. Same with the voice mail. It wasn’t a crisis until I heard the message, but once I know the situation exists, it takes my mental energy.

So I decided ahead of time to make today different. I reminded myself how behind I was in my reading. On to chapter 4 of Cloud’s “9 Things You Simply Must Do”. The whole chapter is about the thing that is holding you back. The infected tooth. The thing that drains you, that keeps you from your best. It robs you of your focus. His first advice is to deal with it. He spends a large part of the chapter convincing us to deal with and resolve our issues – get them off the plate – so we can focus on what’s important to us. I’m nodding my head in agreement when he gets to the next part, which is to never let them happen in the first place.

A prudent man sees danger and takes refuge, but the simple keep going and suffer for it. - Proverbs 22:3


I have to say it’s been a great morning. I’m on track, on schedule, and at peace.

So the decision is made beforehand. You’ll understand if I don’t get to your email until 9:00.