Don't Leap Before You Look

In an earlier post, I talked about my preferred methods of "Not Getting Things Done", and listed my top six. My first was my tendency to pick the easiest (or most fun) part of the project, and dive right into that. This gives the impression of action, since I'm immediately doing things - sometimes working very hard - but it's not effective.

To attack my tendency to leap before I look, I'm working on stopping and visualizing the success of the goal that I'm working on. That's a pleasant activity, and just visualizing the success gives some immediate positive feedback to thinking before leaping.

And I find that broadening this line of thinking flows naturally. Once I've started thinking about the success of the goal, it's easy to think about all the aspects of that success. This allows me to gradually, and pleasantly work through defining the goal, and in the process defining the steps that I need to do to achieve it.

All of this is pleasant, so I don't have to force myself, and it feels very natural.