The only way to make progress when you don’t know how: make your work ‘un-icky’.
Happy Monday!
When you are starting the week and the day, if you are feeling overwhelmed, just remember the # 1 rule of beating procrastination: Define the undefined (or as Tim Urban calls it, ‘Make it un-icky’. Icky is vague, undefined).
How to define the undefined? Effective planning. Project plan -> Weekly / Daily plan -> Immediate next step -> Action -> Recalibration.
- Project plan: Even if you have no idea how to progress in the project, just start with a deadline and then work backwards. It is ok if you don’t have all the elements. Creating the plan will reduce the fog, and the broad blocks of work will emerge.
- Weekly / Daily plan: Within the project plan, now build out the weekly plan. From the weekly plan for this week, create a daily plan.
- INS: Identify the immediate next step and the stakeholders.
- Action: Just start. You will figure it out.
- Recalibration: Make adjustments in the plan based on the feedback you get on the actions.
Create the bite-size or atom-sized action that is here and now and visible. That will drive away the ambiguity.
Once you make it un-icky, keep going. Don’t hesitate, don’t overthink, don’t doubt. Just trust the soup and keep going. When you hit a wall, take a break. Stare out of the window, do anything; but come back to the work and keep at it until the time you have allocated to this task runs out.
Repeat every day.