Everyday life is always around us. Both in our personal and professional lives. Besides what we need to or committed to do today other things may pop up. Requests by others, follow up or problems. Sometimes we notice things that we need to look into. This all comes at us in person, by email, phone calls, or texts in the course of our daily responsibilities & lives. Some unexpected. Others recurring. Leaving us overwhelmed during many of our days.
Being responsible, we want to find ways to capture all of the things we need to do and complete them. We yearn for order in our day. Finding it difficult to find. So we create to do lists so we don’t forget anything. Discouraged by day’s end as to what little we accomplished.
On top of this we have goals. To lose weight. Learn how to cook. Read a book. Clean the garage. Work goals pile on top of these. Things that our boss wants done. Problems at work that require major changes. Opportunities which require major effort to realize. While we may not get to choose all of these ourselves, wherever the origin of these are – they are intentional. Someone chose to focus on these. Personal goals are important. We chose to focus on these. Especially ones that live far beyond New Year’s eve.
The struggle each of us has is how do we attend to everything. There is much talk about distraction in our lives. When it comes to working on our goals, our everyday lives is a major one. Life always gets in the way of what we hope to accomplish. This type of distraction is much more severe than our phones or social media. We just have a lot to do. Many depend on us. With sunsets coming quickly during our days.
What can we do? I struggle with this tug of war daily. All the way from what should I do next to how should I organize and prioritize this list of many competing items amidst all of my goals. In the professional world, “everyday life” can be viewed as operations. What’s needed to keep the “train running” every day. Very important. As much as all of our personal needs as well as our goals.
While I don’t have a clear solution, I now understand that everyday life or operations are not a distraction. They are just simply a part of our lives. Never to be dismissed but rather embraced. Requiring us to figure out how to push aside daily pressures for an hour or two each day or week or month to work on our goals. For in completing them, we may find both change and improvement. Amidst having “the trains run on time”.