What's The Plan?

Last week I wrote about the waiting room and within a few hours of sending that post out, I received an email regarding my waiting room experience and without going into too much detail, it was an invitation to the next room. So begins a new chapter and with it some new challenges and new experiences. My personality is typically, structured and organised, so without a plan or at least a detailed to-do list, I feel completely out of control and as a result have a whirlwind of thoughts spinning around my head. A colleague once asked me if it was normal to feel so over-whelmed with the volume of work to be completed within the specified time-frame, that one ends up actually doing nothing (other than stressing about that work). I now know exactly what he means, as a week has passed and I feel that I have not accomplished nearly enough. In fact I have not even made my list!

Brad's To-do List:
-Make the List !!!

(I feel better already.)

Any project of great success should be prepared for by planning what needs to be done, by when and by whom. If this is done early enough, then priority can be assigned to the items requiring early completion rather than incorrectly focusing on less urgent items and then missing deadlines on the more urgent activities. This, of course, has to be continually reviewed and adjusted, as life is dynamic and this can affect how we have predicted the plan.

What are you planning for? Do you have an organised to-do list that you are working through?
Perhaps you are renovating your house, buying a new car, embarking on a new business venture, or getting married. Each will require some form of plan as a vehicle to get you to your goal. It may be a detailed gantt chart with measured milestones, each with carefully calculated budgets and timings. Maybe your personality type thrives on spur of the moment action and the thought of developing a list would put you into an instant coma; suffocating your creativity, so you work on a loose idea you have in your head and make the necessary adjustments along the way. Both have their appropriate place and work for different people and different scenarios. As mentioned, I am a list-person so nothing happens in my world without a list.

For your plan, try different methods and find what fits and works for you and your particular goals. If it doesn't go strictly to plan, that's ok. Review and adjust. Don't abandon the goal just because the plan didn't work out the way you envisaged. Perhaps the detour will teach you something new...