Done?. . .Done!

“Now I know what a ghost is. Unfinished business, that’s what.”~ Salman Rushdie

Pending stuff. Unfinished business. Incomplete. Not yet done.

According to the Merriam-Webster online dictionary, unfinished business is something that a person needs to deal with or work on; something that has not yet been done, dealt with, or completed. And it can be a nag to your brain. Reminders keep popping up at the most inappropriate time; the thought of it sucks your energy and keeps you tired. Sometimes it’s just a nagging feeling of unhappiness about something you can’t really put your finger on. This is called the Zeigarnik effect - we remember better that which is unfinished or incomplete. And we worry about those things in which we have not achieved closure.

I’m reminded of several trails that were just difficult to conquer and for two in particular, I finally got to summit on the third attempt. Oh what peace! Finished business! Finally! But fast forward to now, my unfinished business is not quite that exciting. It’s that book that I’ve been reading for months. That project I started some time back and got stuck at some difficult task. It’s that course that I started and have never finished. That bucket list item that I’ve really wanted to tick off but. . .anyone remember Morgan Freeman and Jack Nicholson in The Bucket List (2007 movie)? Chogyam Trungpa wrote “If you must begin then go all the way, because if you begin and quit, the unfinished business you have left behind begins to haunt you all the time.” Very true, from experience.

The mind wants us to get done what needs to be done. So it keeps us unsettled. We have no peace. Something’s not right, right? But it doesn’t have to stay that way. And this month I decided I’d had enough of wasted energy and scattered efforts. So I got a notebook, listed all the pending projects I could think of (and they are not few!). I then did an audit of what is still relevant and doable. A few items got tossed and I’m finally at peace about them. Of those that remained, I had work to do.

My battle plan started with writing it down. I then, planned out the steps. What needed to be done, how often, taking how long? Then, setting focused blocks of time to work on it, with milestones to achieve at each block. Lastly, celebrating every step as I inch towards my summit. I’m glad to say I’m on course to completing 3 projects that have been pending for a while and I feel so much better knowing I am chipping at them every day. Soon, it will be time for the big celebration.

Only put off until tomorrow what you are willing to die having left undone. ~ Pablo Picasso

 

If you're a reader, you might want to check out Eat That Frog by Brian Tracy and Atomic Habits by James Clear.

 


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