How To Prioritize: One Tip That Does It All

Hey there, it’s Marie Forleo and you are here watching MarieTV, thank you so much, because this is the place to be if you want to create a business and a life that you love, I’m hoping you do. This is Q&A Tuesday, we do Q’s, we do A’s. Today’s Q is from a woman named Angela and Angela writes:

“Hi Marie, I love your videos so much and always get so inspired. Here’s my Q: I have work that pays my bills and then there’s all this other work I wanna do that never seems to get done. When my clients need me I drop everything to get that work done because it’s my job, but then everything else suffers. For example, I have a blog but I’m not consistent. I wanna write a novel and I want to volunteer, but at the end of the day I never have enough energy to get to the things that I dream about. Every night when I go to bed I always think, ‘Tomorrow will be the day that I start blank,’ but it never happens. Any ideas to help? Thanks, Angela.”

Angela, you are so not alone. Millions of people have a secret or not so secret unlived creative life that feels just out of their grasp. Now, the good news here is that you can break this pattern and make all of your dreams come true. So there’s a lot to say on this topic, but today I wanna focus on one simple strategy that will crack this whole thing wide open for you. And I think my friend Stephen Pressfield said it best when he said:

“I’m keenly aware of the Principle of Priority, which states (a) you must know the difference between what is urgent and what is important, and (b) you must do what’s important first. What’s important is the work.”

This is the whole damn thing, Ange. This is the thing that so many people miss and it kills them. So many things in life can feel urgent, but they’re not. So a few examples: checking email, answering calls or texts, even from clients, and social media.

Urgent things demand our attention now, and they can get really addictive because we all want to feel wanted. Now, many of us also like a little hit of drama and adrenaline, which email and social and texts and things like that happily deliver. And, finally, things that are urgent often relate to other people’s goals, not our own.

But important things are different. Important things are quiet. There’s no alarms, there’s no drama. Important things often relate to our own goals and dreams, not other people. And, unfortunately, it requires us to be self starters and important things are often easy to blow off.

Now, Angela, I know you’ve got clients to attend to and work that pays the bills, and sometimes, yes, that is urgent. However, you do have enough time to create your art and reach your goals as long you work on what’s important first and save what’s urgent for a little bit later.

Here’s how to do this now. Before you get going each day I want you to take a look at your to do list and you’re gonna mark each task with either an I or a U. I is for important and U is for urgent.

And then work on all the I stuff first and save the U stuff till later. Now, you’ve gotta remember, the urgent stuff is always gonna get done because it has to, but this method ensures that your important tasks don’t fall to the wayside.

And unless somebody is seriously hurt or your house is on fire, if something urgent tries to take your attention, ignore it until your important work is done for the day.

That was my A to your Q Ange, I really hope it helps. Now I would love to hear from you. Have any favorite methods to make sure you focus on what’s important when so many things can feel urgent?

As always, the best discussions happen after the episode over at MarieForleo.com, so get over there and tell me all about it now.

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Stay on your game and keep going for your dreams because the world needs that special gift that only you have. Thank you so much for watching and I’ll catch you next time on MarieTV.