I have a little story to start us out here - stay with me... Imagine going to a cookout this Memorial Day weekend. Your friends have put out quite the spread, you’re starving, and you know you’re really good at eating. You pick up a large paper plate and start heaping it with all your favorites: potato salad, watermelon, chips, corn on the cob, coleslaw, pasta salad, and oh, wait…there’s a little more room on the side to squeeze some cornbread muffins in before you top it all off with a rack of ribs. And hey, there’s some key lime pie too, and why wait until later to go back? Just add it on there next to the fried green tomatoes. You take your "full plate" to a table, settle in with your napkin and maybe a glass of tea. You resolve to eat the whole thing in one bite. You’re supposed to clean the plate, right, not waste anything, be efficient? Your mouth is not quite up to the task of inhaling it all (much as you would like), so you examine your plate from all angles and try picking everything up with your fork. Recognizing that a fork is an inadequate tool for the task, you think perhaps acquiring a small shovel would do the trick. With the wonders of same-day delivery, a small shovel is procured (at a cost, because it is a holiday weekend after all), and yet still you can’t cram everything down. Maybe you could start with a whole muffin or a handful of chips, but then what about the rest? All the other guests seem to be managing their plates, although admittedly you are not watching too closely since you are extremely preoccupied with the task before you. Maybe getting a friend to help would work, so you glance around. Hey, there’s Bob - over here, Bob! Bob is happy to assist, but even with his own small shovel it still all won’t fit. He could just eat everything for you, but he confesses it would have to be one bite at a time (slacker), and because it turns out he's a vegetarian he'll have to skip the ribs (his plate of choice looks very different from yours). Mission still not accomplished - you are not going to be able to eat this meal in one bite. Even if you broke it down, where should you start? All of it needs to be eaten! No one can help, and it’s all your fault for even coming to this stupid cookout in the first place. Disgusted, discouraged, and still starving, you push the plate away and say, “forget it.” If you can’t eat everything, you won’t eat anything. It’s all or nothing. ![]() The story is ridiculous, of course, but isn’t this kind of what we try to do sometimes with our tasks, responsibilities, and stuff? Every time I hear someone say “I have so much on my plate!” I brace myself for what tends to follow - a recounting of all of the things that need to get done but are impossible to get done because they all have to get done. If you choose to start one thing, then you can’t do the other 14 things - and what about those??! And what about organizing a space? If you start on the file drawer or the top of the desk, you turn around and there’s the pile of books and collectibles that never got arranged on the shelves, and also there’s shredding to be taken, and…and…and… so you just give up and shut down the whole situation. What’s the point? The point is, by employing the all or nothing philosophy, you will never get unstuck. I sometimes call this Putting It Off By Piling It On Procrastination (P Cubed), and it’s an excellent way to starve your productivity. If you mentally scurry from task to task or room to room attempting to somehow figure out a way that it will all magically happen and put you out of your misery, you're doing the exact thing that you so desperately DON'T want to do (which is nothing). So what are some other ways to look at that picnic plate? Well, there’s the obvious idea of taking it a little at a time. I know, that method requires patience and diligence (and those are such boring concepts). But what on earth have you got to lose? You’re less hungry, and there’s less food left to deal with. Isn’t this a step in the right direction? What are the alternatives? Here are a few: * try several large bites on the front end, then take a little break to digest it before a few more (do the big priorities, but pace yourself); * take some of the food back (maybe you didn’t need that obligation in the first place); * or give it to someone else (delegation); * wrap some up and take it home for later (do the minimum until you can finish at a better time or place); and of course * you could (gasp) trash some of it - maybe the coleslaw that seems like it’s been left out just a little too long (irrelevant or stale tasks)? There are always choices concerning the way we go about tackling lots of things on our plates. Will you choose something, or go home empty?
10 Comments
Sara
6/1/2018 06:10:40 pm
Thank you, Mary. I'm glad it resonated!
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Sara
6/11/2018 06:42:16 am
Thanks, Kim (and thank you for the excellent pun, which had not even crossed my mind as I wrote the post!).
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6/11/2018 07:32:16 am
Sara- I LOVE this story and the way you've crafted it to relate to how we manage or don't manage our full plates. For those of us that pile on too much, viewing this in the way you described, helps to see more clearly (and with humor) what we're trying to manage. The idea of pacing and being selective makes so much sense.
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Sara
6/11/2018 07:55:35 am
Thanks Linda - I always appreciate your kind comments. I had fun writing this one, and have to confess I was feeling the full plate syndrome a bit myself until I made a conscious decision to go one "bite" at a time.
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6/11/2018 07:50:47 am
Great post! I find that when people say they have a lot on their plate it’s all excuses and that is their way of getting out of something. It’s ok if they want to do that, this just tells me that they are not ready for the commitment that change involves.
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Sara
6/11/2018 08:03:18 am
That's an interesting perspective, Sabrina, and something I hadn't really considered. I think sometimes it can also be a FOMO (fear of missing out), or committing to lots of things to feel important or productive. Sometimes too, it's just a lack of discernment on the front end of what is realistic (the phrase, "my eyes were bigger than my stomach," comes to mind!). Thanks for the comment!
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6/16/2018 07:07:06 pm
So true! It's about how full the plate is and how we manage it. A full plate often justifies. It's why things don't happen. It's why we are stuck in a rut. I like to think about how we help others think through their portion control.
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Ellen Delap
4/25/2020 02:32:28 pm
I love this analogy. I’m interested how our plates have refilled even now. It’s important to have conscience decisions about what are our priorities.
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AuthorSara Skillen - Certified Professional Organizer®, Certified Organizer Coach®, wife, mom, dog-lover, author. Learning to trust my intuition more every day. Shall we work together? Archives
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