The other day, I had a to do list a mile long.  (so, what else is new?)  I felt overwhelmed and when I feel overwhelmed, I get stuck.  Sound familiar?  One of the things on my to do list was weeding my small vegetable garden.  Other things included: write a blog post, complete a final coaching report for a client, write a marketing piece for my upcoming group coaching program, return some phone calls.  These are things I refer to as ‘work work’ as opposed to non-work chores.    Weeding kept coming up to the top of my mental list.  And, I kept thinking that wasn’t ‘work’.  “I should be doing ‘work, work’.”  But,  I was uninspired by my ‘work work’ tasks at the moment.  So, I decided that doing something was better than continuing to debate with myself about the perfect thing to do and not get started on anything.  So, out to the garden I went.  I pulled and dug and sweat and got really dirty.  And, while I was doing that, my mind wandered.  And suddenly, I had ideas for 3 blog entries and had mentally drafted parts of the coaching report.  Ideas flowed into my head with ease after days of laboring to ‘figure out’ what I might write.  It was great: easy, natural, painless.  And, it was productive.  I looked at my weed free garden with pride and a great sense of accomplishment all afternoon.  Once done with my non-work work and inspired, I sat down at my desk and moved through the rest of my to do list with ease.

I’m not saying that putting off important tasks is always the answer but I am suggesting that taking a mental break, turning down the volume on the ‘shoulds’ and allowing ideas to bubble up can be very helpful and increase both the quantity and quality of what ultimately gets done.

Don’t have a garden to weed?  If you live nearby, you can come do mine… it’s never ending; or, try cleaning out a closet or a messy drawer, taking a dog for a walk, going to the gym for a workout.  Just do something positive and healthy!  It is better than trying to choose the perfect right thing to do but never getting started doing anything!