You and I have to decide what we try to accomplish in life – at work, at play, for hobbies, in relationships, in matters of more eternal significance… you can think of other categories. We can either slide by with some perceived minimum amount of effort or we can imagine and attempt things that most others would not. I don’t know about you, but I’m not content with the former. I must attempt some things that others might not. I must work toward goals that others might, in fact, think are crazy.
As a side note, I hope to live to be 100 years old – and not just because that would make me currently barely over middle age. Whether I reach that target or not, I want to look back on my days and know that some good was done not just by chance and not only in small things, but in some harder ones as well that took more than my normal daily effort to accomplish. I hasten to add, though, that we should not underestimate the significance of a lifetime of so-called “smaller” things done well. They may well add up more in the long run than a few random large goals.
So how do we accomplish the bigger tasks? By diving in and chewing off a little bit at a time toward them. If the only tasks I tackle on my todo list day by day are the low-hanging fruit, the quick wins, then I perpetually put off the larger dreams. Don’t settle for that. Instead, do a little bit (or a lot) today toward one of the big items on your list. And then do a litle bit more tomorrow and the next day, and the next, and the next…
It won’t all be finished in a day or a week or perhaps even in months or several years. But if it is important, we need to nibble away at it little by little until we reach that moment when we look back and hear (or say) “Well done… it is finished.”
Leap year lesson #10 is tackle hard things.
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