You know those days when you have a million things to do so you start rushing around then spill your breakfast on your shirt so have to rush to change and in the rush you snag your stockings or kick your toe and have to deal with that. It’s a rush, a panic, it’s the go fast to get more done method and it hardly EVER works.
You see you have to go slow in order to go fast.
Everyone loves a speedy efficiency, me especially, but when you are running around arms waving in the air, panic all over your face, well you are not going to be very efficient at all. Things are not going to work out because you become a walking, talking disaster zone. It doesn’t work. Unless what you’re trying to do is be an extra slated for death in a disaster movie, because then you’ve got the look nailed.
You see when you are running around like a chook with your head cut off, you may look busy. And you certainly FEEL busy. But you aren’t actually getting that much stuff done. So how do you go slow, be more efficient and get things done quicker in the long run? You make a plan of attack, then you systematically tick item after item off your list like a little methodical machine. Slowly.
This is how…
- Calm the farm folks. Take a breath and chill for a second. Stop what you are doing.
- Make a list of everything to be done.
- Now order that list into some form of run sheet style order {ordering by importance or proximity to each other helps}
- Start the first task. Focus on it. Finish it. Move on to the second.
- If something happens and you remember something else you wanted to do, add it to the list. Don’t get distracted.
- Remind yourself you are doing all you can.
- Remind OTHERS that you are doing all you can if they need to be reminded.
- Stop for breaks to recharge your brain cells.
- And like those annoying posters that are everywhere say, Keep Calm & Carrying On.
Without the rushing, the carelessness, the inattention you can focus and think clearly about what needs to be done. You see it on the cooking shows and things like that all the time. The clear-headed people working their way through the steps always come out better in the end. While those who fling themselves from corner to corner in the kitchen thinking, oh dessert, whoops, entrée, oh shopping, whoa shiny thing are a disaster.
The go-slow method is something we apply in our house often. Hubby has a tendency to try to hard to go fast when things are building up around him. Then while changing the oil {and rushing} he’ll forget to put the catch tray under the machine and holy heck mess. Add clean mess to his list and he bustles around swearing and cursing as the mess gets dragged through the house and beyond…
Slow down. Make sure everything is where it needs to be in the first place and do things once.
That is go slow, to go fast. Do you use this method when life gets busy? Share your hot tip with us.
Hi! I’m Melissa Walker Horn. Around here, they call me Suger. I’m the Chief Blogger and doer of all the things here at Suger Coat It. Blogging since 1901; I love a casual ootd, taking photos, and writing about things that irk or inspire me. I love wine and cheese, long days at the beach and spending time with my family. I make stuff for the internet over at Chalkboard Digital. You know, living the sweet life.
Good words of advice, Melissa. I am a bit of a ‘headless chook’ at times but coming back to my to-do list and being sensible about my ‘top 3’ to achieve in any given day always helps. x
Love that. Have it reduced to three key items would be excellent for focus. And it’s not so many that you freak yourself out. Haha.
I’m very highly strung and also a recovering perfectionist, so Mr Wright is always telling me to calm down. He’s usually right, too, which makes it worse!
The only thing I can reliably do calmly is cook(*). I used to get too enthusiastic and undercook things, or overcook them, or put way too much spice in. Now I take a few minutes before I start cooking to make sure I know what I’m cooking and I have everything I need – ingredients of course, but also utensils and mixing bowls and cookware. I used to make up little timetables so I knew exactly when I had to do each thing in relation to everything else, but now I can do that in my head unless it’s a very complicated meal. And I measure out my spices beforehand so I can’t get excited and add too much.
(*) And take photos, but that’s more a zen artsy thing and I can’t explain that as easily.
Ahhh, it’s like I could have written it myself. Seriously. Thanks for sharing Shelby!
I was thinking the same thing at work the other day! I had some drink orders to fill (which means removing the bottle top and setting them on the bench to be taken out) and I was trying to go super fast because of the line of customers waiting to be served. And I ended up knocking one over trying to get the top off too fast lol. I just went “Sarah, calm the eff down!”. And all was well. Haha.
Uh huh. THAT is it exactly. You always go faster when you slow down. Magic.
This is a good one. Sometimes I can be the waving arms in panic type, a good reminder to just relaaaaax.
Thank you lovely. We all are the arm waving type sometimes. Me especially. Actually, scratch that, Kel especially!
Calm the farm. I love it.
SSG xxx
Haha. Thanks! I can’t take credit for that though, I picked it up goodness knows where and ran with it.
I believe it was started by previous season MKR contestants Jake & Elle from QLD (where else?). Jake used to say it and it seemed to get picked up by popular culture then. At least that was the first time I heard it. Aaaanyway…*hides from the shame of her MKR knowledge* haha
Baaahaha. Embarrassing MKR knowledge indeed. Thanks Sheri!