Tips to avoid the excuses

Yesterday I was dealing with the challenge of a child who decided to pretend to be sick in order to avoid school. This is a ridiculous challenge to have to deal with in our case.  I school my 6 year old child at home and our school day is no longer than 2 hours.

As adults how often do we come up with some kind of lame excuse to avoid doing something that we don't want to do?  How often is that thing that we don't want to do simple with very little time involved, but we just don't want to do it?

Here are some tips on how I get over my excuses that keep me from doing things I need to do, but find myself avoiding.

1.  Write down all of the tasks that need to get done.  If it is written down where I have to look at it then it will nag at me until I do it.

2.  Do the things that I seem to want to avoid first.  If I tackle them first then the fun things will take up the balance of my day.

3.  Recognize the importance of doing that task I want to avoid.  If I focus on why the task must be done then it tends to overcome not wanting to do it.

4.  Look at the consequences for not completing the task.  Ask yourself are the results of not doing it worth the avoidance.

5.  Grit your teeth and just get it done.  The sooner you do it the sooner you will be finished with it.

I am certainly not perfect and these don't always work, but for the most part these 5 simple tips help me to get things done and manage my time better.