What stops you from following through?

We all have good intentions but often fail at following through. The concept of procrastination is so ingrained in us that there are people whose career is based on helping others.

FlyLady (Marla Cilley is The FlyLady. Since 1999, she has been a mentor to over half a million women teaching them how to organize their homes and how to love themselves.) proclaims every Wednesday as Anti-Procrastination Day.

Are you good at following through?

We have things we need to do to daily. In addition, there are other tasks we should complete to get things off our list.

For me, the daily list includes showering, eating breakfast, and getting my bed made. Most days those are easy. There are things that belong on the daily list like using the hydrofloss machine I bought from the dentist. He recommended it to replace regular flossing because it does it for you.

I don’t know about you but I have things I move forward from one day to another. For example, I need to talk to Frontier since they  published the number I no longer use in the phone book. This would take more effort and a little more courage.

Job seekers face the same problems with their job search. If you use the analysis below, you can move forward when you are stuck.

Admit what stops you from following through

First step to solving any problem is to admit you have one. There are multiple causes to not following through:

• Fear – you don’t know what will happen if you do something so you are afraid to start.
• Over-analyzing – you make a job too big so you put it off.
• Too much on the list – when you give yourself too much to do, it is easy to do nothing.
• Lack of skills – you don’t know how.

How to overcome the stall pattern and start following through

• Worst case scenario – If fear is the problem, make yourself look at the worst case scenario. Fear of rejection is a common problem for both job seekers and others. If you are afraid to make a call, let yourself be OK with a no answer. Once you accept that you could and might get a “no,” it becomes less frightening. If you get a no, you move on to the next call.
• Over-analyzing – break it into little chunks. Instead of working on the whole project, do step one.
• Too Much to Do – Make a back-up list. Allow yourself only a short list for your daily list. Set up a back-up list for the things you must not forget but would overwhelm you if you put it on today’s list.
• Lack of skills – Seriously, when you don’t know how to do something, it is time to do one of two things. Either you can learn how to do it, that’s why there is Google. Or perhaps you need to hire an expert.
• Bonus – Do what you are procrastinating and time the task. Hydroflossing takes 2 minutes! You find things you put off don’t take long at all.

My follow through assignment?

1. Find the number for Frontier.
2. Call.
3. Don’t stop at the first “I can’t help you.” and persevere until I find someone with authority.

By publishing that number repeatedly without verifying it, they give the impression to phone book users I went out of business. My clients and potential clients who use Google know better. My solution, they should activate the number and forward it to my cell phone with no charge to me.

Now, what do you have to follow through on and what steps will you take?

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