A number of weeks back, someone prompted me on an issue we’d discussed, wondering whether I’d taken action on the item. When quizzed by this other person regarding how/when I’d followed up, I said I didn’t remember. This puzzled my conversational partner.
I thought about the puzzlement for a few seconds, and said the reason I didn’t take any next step or even remember the issue under consideration, was because, “It was low on my priority list of remembering things.”
When I made that statement, I thought to myself, “That’s so appropriate.”
How often do we forget things? Why do we forget things? What do we CHOOSE to remember?
I highlight the word “choose” because I believe that is what it comes down to when we remember something that could be trivial or not necessarily mean action is necessary or immediate. If we are to remember items of this type, we must commit to them. We must prioritize them in our brains.
Thirty years ago, as a reporter in Washington, D.C., I covered EPA’s Superfund program, which listed the nation’s worst hazardous waste sites under their National Priority List, or NPL. The goal was to identify and cleanup the most contaminated sites in the U.S.
Maybe our brains need to develop an NPL, determining the most important action items in our lives. This would be difficult, particularly because what one person gives priority to is not the same as what you or I might identify as a top priority.
EPA had the advantage of skilled experts finding the bad sites and analyzing them. They used data points, measured, analyzed and ranked the sites to build the most effective NPL.
If we could do that in our daily lives, we’d probably be more efficient, though we might not make our friends and colleagues happy if we used different criteria to prioritize, which, of course, would be the case. “Yo, I thought you committed to meet me for a beer Friday night after work at Bullwinkles.”
“Ah, sorry. I thought we were just considering meeting. I didn’t know we’d set a firm date. Sorry. Let’s try it again sometime.”
Those types of communication breakdowns happen all the time when a date falls low on your priority list. Because it wasn’t a big thing, it fell down in your rankings.
Changing the cat litter, for example, can fall low on your priority list. Similarly, vacuuming up cat hair from your carpet can be a low priority. Putting the dishes from the sink into the dishwasher has a low prioritization for many people. Picking up clothes from the floor and placing them in the laundry hamper can easily become a low priority. And, so on.
These little things can lead to bigger things though, making it important that you properly file away your priorities. You have to put thought into it. This won’t just happen, like saying to yourself, “Tomorrow I’ll mow the grass,” when you know darn well you’re going to play golf and have a few beers afterwards.
You need to be honest with yourself, recognize what’s important and set up mental reminders, which to me often means pasting a yellow sticky note on my forehead. Just kidding. But, seriously, a little written note on the breakfast placemat does wonders for those daily reminders. You just need to put that note high on your personal priority list.
I thought about the puzzlement for a few seconds, and said the reason I didn’t take any next step or even remember the issue under consideration, was because, “It was low on my priority list of remembering things.”
When I made that statement, I thought to myself, “That’s so appropriate.”
How often do we forget things? Why do we forget things? What do we CHOOSE to remember?
I highlight the word “choose” because I believe that is what it comes down to when we remember something that could be trivial or not necessarily mean action is necessary or immediate. If we are to remember items of this type, we must commit to them. We must prioritize them in our brains.
Thirty years ago, as a reporter in Washington, D.C., I covered EPA’s Superfund program, which listed the nation’s worst hazardous waste sites under their National Priority List, or NPL. The goal was to identify and cleanup the most contaminated sites in the U.S.
Maybe our brains need to develop an NPL, determining the most important action items in our lives. This would be difficult, particularly because what one person gives priority to is not the same as what you or I might identify as a top priority.
EPA had the advantage of skilled experts finding the bad sites and analyzing them. They used data points, measured, analyzed and ranked the sites to build the most effective NPL.
If we could do that in our daily lives, we’d probably be more efficient, though we might not make our friends and colleagues happy if we used different criteria to prioritize, which, of course, would be the case. “Yo, I thought you committed to meet me for a beer Friday night after work at Bullwinkles.”
“Ah, sorry. I thought we were just considering meeting. I didn’t know we’d set a firm date. Sorry. Let’s try it again sometime.”
Those types of communication breakdowns happen all the time when a date falls low on your priority list. Because it wasn’t a big thing, it fell down in your rankings.
Changing the cat litter, for example, can fall low on your priority list. Similarly, vacuuming up cat hair from your carpet can be a low priority. Putting the dishes from the sink into the dishwasher has a low prioritization for many people. Picking up clothes from the floor and placing them in the laundry hamper can easily become a low priority. And, so on.
These little things can lead to bigger things though, making it important that you properly file away your priorities. You have to put thought into it. This won’t just happen, like saying to yourself, “Tomorrow I’ll mow the grass,” when you know darn well you’re going to play golf and have a few beers afterwards.
You need to be honest with yourself, recognize what’s important and set up mental reminders, which to me often means pasting a yellow sticky note on my forehead. Just kidding. But, seriously, a little written note on the breakfast placemat does wonders for those daily reminders. You just need to put that note high on your personal priority list.