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BOXING faulty plan DAY
Sunday, December 27, 2020
Friday’s walk, on Christmas Day, mid-afternoon, I expected few people out. To my surprise, the park was amply sprinkled with pairs/couples, dogs, and families. Many appeared to be trying cross-country skis and snowshoes for the first time. It wasn’t pretty, but everyone was having a good time.
Yesterday’s walk, Boxing Day, mid-morning. Expecting a similar crowd; to my surprise, hardly anyone out. Perhaps they were all lined up 6-feet apart, waiting to enter a store somewhere.
Abundant critter tracks, but no critters. Finally, one massive jackrabbit sighting. Vaulting across that snowfield, I was expecting a dog or coyote in hot pursuit. None appeared. Rabbit stopped abruptly, stood as tall as giant rabbits stretch, sniffed, wiggled those rabbit-ears, and then bounded off.
Then brunch, reading papers, sipping coffee ~ a single item on my agenda: touching base with people I’d not connected with recently – my commitment to self, ‘to catch up.’
Don’t we all have ‘not pressing’ needs to reach out, follow up, call or send touch-base notes with people we’ve not talked to lately, the kind of thing we never quite get around to doing?
Yeah, me too.
Best intentions …
Over the last couple of months, I hatched a plan. To finally and cleverly wrestle my persistent procrastination to the ground; to schedule each of these postponed mid-priority plans to call or write as to-do tasks in my database: 3:00 PM, December 26th.
When something came up on my diary recently, or someone crossed my mind I didn’t want to lose track of or forget to call, I scheduled reaching out to them.
You guessed it, 3:00 PM, December 26th.
Seemed like a great idea every time.
I’m not talking about my annual yearend/season’s greetings email to everyone on my mailing lists (watch for that in coming days) but instead planning to reach out with a personal note or call, to check-in, follow up on something specific, to share an exchange with friends, colleagues, and clients I’ve not connected with lately.
Keeping with our Canadian/British Tradition of ‘visiting friends’ as the rationale for Boxing Day, I thought, ‘great timing.’ I pushed each task to when I knew I’d be free, relaxed, and available: 3:00 PM, December 26th.
I was expecting an accumulation of maybe 30-50.
Sure, that would be manageable.
I had no strategy for 139.
Some got calls; some got voice-jail messages; some will find hand-written notes in their mailbox soon.
Most got an email dated December 26th.
By 8:00 PM, exhausted, I’d done only half.
If you got an email from me yesterday, you were one of those.
If you were in the other half, you will hear from me in a day or two.
If you weren’t in the 139 at all, don’t you think it’s time you wrote to me?
C’mon, work with me here …
I don’t yet have a clever strategy for handling 139 replies/conversations in three days, so please, don’t all call me back at once. For 2021, I need a more-sane procrastination plan. I’m thinking, 3:00 PM, last Saturday each month – maybe 30-50 at a time, I think I can handle that.
That’s the plan for now, subject to change.
I blocked off time on my schedule in my database, and I’m telling you so at 3:00 PM on the last Saturday of every month, you’ll know where I’ll be – and I’ll have a fantastic alibi if anything goes wrong in the world – because I couldn’t be there …
Reader feedback:
Merry Christmas Mark. I hope you enjoyed a lovely bubble day, SB, Calgary, AB
Hi Mark, A long time ago I was part of a group that mentored folks on creating monthly goals and tying those into Annual Backward goals. The originator of the program met with us monthly to guide the process. He had us prepare our plans, with minimum, target and extreme levels and said one of the most important aspects of achieving anything was ‘asking for help’. Do what you do best and call upon others to support your efforts in those areas where you fall short. To me an annual backward plan became a highway. You started off on the journey, prepared for some pit stops which included sight-seeing along the way. As you drove on, when re-routing was necessary, you became adept at recalculating (as our GPS so loudly declared) and trying a new road, alternate destination. A detour not on a map. 2020 was a detour. I learned from the journey that even the dark places are worth the visit. As our friend Leonard Cohen said, “There is a crack in everything – that’s how the light gets in.” Take care and may the new year bring you more light than darkness, JR, Calgary, AB
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