Page 249 - Foundations of Learning, 4th Edition (Revised)

Fear of failure

We think that avoiding a task will somehow keep us from running the risk of failure. After all, if
you don’t wear a watch, no one can accuse you of being late, right? It is obvious that this reaction
is not rational, but even otherwise successful people are sometimes afraid of failure. The difference
is that they cut themselves some slack and go ahead and try. If you are afraid to commit to tasks
and projects for fear of failing, there is little hope of managing your time efficiently, because
you’re not only working against the clock (or calendar), you’re also working against yourself.

• Once you become aware of these tendencies, remind yourself that “failure” is very often
just an early stage of success and that everyone starts somewhere (i.e., even Rembrandt
colored outside the lines as a child).

• Refuse to judge yourself and instead assess your performance, recognizing your strengths
and giving yourself credit for each attempt and bit of progress you make.

Feeling Overwhelmed

Your life is a busy environment where you must juggle multiple requirements and responsi-
bilities. Adding college to that mix virtually guarantees that, at some point, you will feel over-
whelmed. One fairly typical reaction to this feeling is to stop trying to keep up with activities
and projects—rather than trying and failing, we begin failing to even try.

• Consider that you may have truly over-committed yourself, making success impossible.
Are there any high-effort low-impact (or urgent but unimportant) items which you can
drop? Think “slash and burn” with respect to your priority list, actually removing the items
which do not ultimately bring you closer to your life goals.

• It is helpful to break larger projects up into smaller and more manageable tasks; give
yourself the occasional quick win, as a reminder that you’re making progress.

• Take on a single task and get it finished and out of the way. Be sure to reflect on how good
it feels to have removed that item from the list. Action and movement are key here; through
them you will reduce the list of things you need to do and begin to replace procrastination
with positive and proactive habits.

• Don’t take on any additional commitments until you’ve found a way to handle your current
commitments.

Perfectionism

This is actually quite similar to the fear of failure; perfectionism can lead us to believe that
what we do is simply not good enough, unless it is perfect. There is not an infinite amount
of time to devote to each task on your schedule; you must prioritize and decide which tasks
are important enough to receive the bulk of your attention and effort. A perfectly sharpened
pencil, while an interesting idea, would qualify as running in place, and therefore, in 99.9% of
contexts, a waste of time and effort.

• If you find yourself devoting a great deal of time to tasks that do little to advance your
goals, remind yourself that there are bigger and more important projects out there, where
the extra effort, time, and attention will make much greater impact.

• Finally, stop judging your performance and enjoy your accomplishments, especially when
you’re able to keep to a schedule and let a task go once you’ve devoted a reasonable
amount of time and effort to it.

Chapter 9 — Time Management 243