Monday, October 22, 2012

Procrastination (Deliberando saepe perit occasio #157)



1. "Nothing is so fatiguing as the eternal hanging on of an uncompleted task." ~William James
2. "Procrastination is the art of keeping up with yesterday." ~Don Marquis
3. "Only Robinson Crusoe had everything done by Friday." ~Author Unknown
4. "Every duty which is bidden to wait returns with seven fresh duties at its back." ~Charles Kingsley
5. "Until you value yourself, you will not value your time.
Until you value your time, you will not do anything with it." ~ M. Scott Peck
6."Be wise today; 'tis madness to defer. Next day the fatal precedent will plead; thus on, til wisdom is pushed our of life." ~Edward Young
7. "If you want to make an easy job seem mighty hard, just keep putting off doing it." ~Olin Miller
8. "There are a million ways to lose a work day, but not even a single way to get one back." ~Tom DeMarco and Timothy Lister
9. "It is an undoubted truth, that the less one has to do, the less time one finds to do it in." ~Earl of Chesterfield
10. "The two rules of procrastination: 1) Do it today. 2) Tomorrow will be today tomorrow." ~Author Unknown
11. "One of the greatest labor-saving inventions of today is tomorrow." ~Vincent T. Foss
12. "You may delay, but time will not." ~Benjamin Franklin
13. "Someday is not a day of the week." ~Author Unknown
14. "To think too long about doing a thing often becomes its undoing." ~Eva Young
15. "Don't fool yourself that important things can be put off till tomorrow; they can be put off forever, or not at all." ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Neurotic's Notebook, 1960
16. "Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion." ~C. Northcote Parkinson, 1958
17. "Procrastination is opportunity's natural assassin." ~Victor Kiam
18. "If you want to make an easy job seem mighty hard, just keep putting off doing it." ~Olin Miller
19. "What may be done at any time will be done at no time." ~Scottish Proverb
20. "There's nothing to match curling up with a good book when there's a repair job to be done around the house." ~Joe Ryan
21. "Procrastination is something best put off until tomorrow." ~Gerald Vaughan
22. "The best way to get something done is to begin." ~Author Unknown
23. "You know you are getting old when it takes too much effort to procrastinate." ~Author Unknown
24. "I do my work at the same time each day - the last minute." ~Author Unknown
25. "Tomorrow is often the busiest day of the week." ~Spanish Proverb
26. "The time to begin most things is ten years ago." ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Second Neurotic's Notebook, 1966
27. "Putting off an easy thing makes it hard. Putting off a hard thing makes it impossible." ~George Claude Lorimer
28. "Tomorrow is the day when idlers work, and fools reform and mortal men lay hold on heaven." ~Edward Young
29. "Never put off until tomorrow what you can do the day after tomorrow." ~Mark Twain
30. "Tomorrow is the only day in the year that appeals to a lazy man." ~Jimmy Lyons
31. "A year from now you may wish you had started today." ~Karen Lamb
32. "Procrastination shackles you to yesterday & you become a slave to the past." ~Soutenus
33. "One of these days is none of these days." ~Attributed to both Henri Tubach and H.G. Bohn
34. "Procrastination is the thief of time; year after year it steals, till all are fled, and to the mercies of a moment leaves the vast concerns of an eternal state. At thirty, man suspects himself a fool; knows it at forty, and reforms his plan; at fifty chides his infamous delay, pushes his prudent purpose to resolve; in all the magnanimity of thought, resolves, and re-resolves, then dies the same." ~Edward Young
35. "How soon “not now” become “never”." ~Martin Luther King Jr.
36. "Indulge in procrastination, and in time yon will come to this, that because a thing ought to be done, therefore you can't do it." ~ Charles Buxton
37. "Procrastination is the bad habit of putting off until the day after tomorrow what should have been done the day before yesterday." ~Napoleon Hill
38. "Don’t wait. The time will never be just right". ~Napoleon Hill
39. "Procrastination is, hands down, our favorite form of self-sabotage." ~Alyce P. Cornyn-Selby
40. "Procrastination is the grave in which opportunity is buried." ~unknow author
41. "Procrastination is suicide on the installment plan." ~unknown author
42. We shall never have more time. We have, and have always had, all the time there is. No object is served in waiting until next week or even until tomorrow. Keep going day in and day out. Concentrate on something useful. Having decided to achieve a task, achieve it at all costs. -Arnold Bennett.
43. "Procrastination is one of the most common and deadliest of diseases and its toll on success and happiness is heavy." ~Wayne Dyer
44. "Procrastination usually results in sorrowful regret. Today’s duties put off tomorrow give us a double burden to bear; the best way is to do them in their proper time." ~Ida Scott Taylor
45. "Procrastination is a sin of lawyers, trial judges, reporters, appellate judges, in brief, everyone connected with the machinery of criminal law." ~Macklin Fleming
46. "If and When were planted, and Nothing grew." ~Proverb
47. "In a moment of decision, the best thing you can do is the right thing to do. The worst thing you can do is nothing." ~Theodore Roosevelt
48. "The greatest amount of wasted time is the time not getting started." ~Dawson Trotman
49. "If you wait until all the lights are "green" before you leave home, you'll never get started on your trip to the top." -Zig Ziglar.
50. "Even if you’re on the right track-you’ll get run over if you just sit there." ~Will Rogers
51. "Doing just a little bit during the time we have available puts you that much further ahead than if you took no action at all." ~Byron Pulsifer
52. "Don’t wait for someone to take you under their wing. Find a good wing and climb up underneath it." ~Frank C. Bucaro
53. "Do you know what happens when you give a procrastinator a good idea? Nothing!" ~Donald Gardner
54. "Procrastination is the fear of success. People procrastinate because they are afraid of the success that they know will result if they move ahead now. Because success is heavy, carries responsibility with it, it is much easier to procrastinate and live on the “someday I’ll” philosophy". ~Denis Waitley
55. "In delay there lies no plenty." ~William Shakespeare
56. "Stop talking. Start walking." ~L.M. Heroux
57. "Don’t wait for extraordinary circumstance to do good; try to use ordinary situations." ~Charles Richter
58. " To be always intending to make a new and better life but never find time to set about it is as…to put off eating and drinking and sleeping from one day to next until you’re dead." ~Oq Mandino
59. "Waiting is a trap. There will always be reason to wait. The truth is, there are only two things in life, reasons and results, and reasons simply don’t count." ~Dr. Robert Anthony
60. "He who hesitates is last." ~Mae West
61. "Procrastination is like a credit card: it’s a lot fun until you get the bill." ~ Christopher Parker
62. "The secret of getting ahead is getting started." ~Sally Berger
63. "We must be diligent today. To wait until tomorrow is too late. Death comes unexpectedly. How can we bargain with it?" ~The Buddha
64. " Procrastination is the art of keeping up with yesterday and avoiding today." ~Wayne Dyer
65. "When there is a hill to climb, don’t think that waiting will make it smaller." ~Author Unknown
66. "Know the true value of time; snatch, seize, and enjoy every moment of it. No idleness; no laziness; no procrastination; never put off till tomorrow what you can do today." ~Lord Chesterfield
67. "Begin while other are procrastinating. Work while others are wishing." ~William Arthur Ward
68. "How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world." ~ Anne Frank
69. "Don’t procrastination. Putting off an unpleasant task until tomorrow simply give you more time for your imagination to make a mountain out a possible molehill. More time for anxiety to sap your self-confidence. Do it now, brother, do it now." ~Author Unknown
70. " Initiative – take it, rather than procrastinate." ~Catherine Pulsifer
71. "I don’t wait for moods. You accomplish nothing if you do that. Your mind must know it has got to get down to work." ~Pearl S. Buck
72. "Things may come to those who wait, but only the things left by those who hustle." ~ Abraham Lincoln
73. "Procrastination is a way for us to be satisfied with second-rate results; we can always tell ourselves we'd have done a better job if only we'd had more time. If you're good at rationaliziing, you can keep yourself feeling rather satisfied this way, but it's a cheap happy. You're whittling your expectations of yourself down lower and lower." ~ Richard O'Conner
74. "You can't get much done in life if you only work on the days when you feel good." ~Jerry West (LA Lakers).
75. "Yesterday is a cancelled cheque. Tomorrow is a promissory note. Today is the only cash you have, so spend it wisely." ~Kim Lyons.
76. "Don't wait for your "ship to come in," and feel angry and cheated when it doesn't. Get going with something small." ~Irene Kassorla.
77. "Yes, you can be a dreamer and a doer too, if you will remove one word from your vocabulary: impossible." ~Robert Schuller.
78. "Work is the greatest thing in the world, so we should always save some of it for tomorrow!" ~Don Herold.
79. "I like work: it fascinates me. I can sit and look at it for hours." ~Jerome K. Jerome (Three Men in a Boat, 1889).
80. "I'm going to stop putting things off, starting tomorrow!" ~Sam Levenson.
81. "Procrastination is my sin. It brings me naught but sorrow. I know that I should stop it. In fact, I will - tomorrow!" ~Gloria Pitzer
82. "Much of the stress that people feel doesn't come from having too much to do. It comes from not finishing what they started." ~David Allen.
83. "The really happy people are those who have broken the chains of procrastination, those who find satisfaction in doing the job at hand. They're full of eagerness, zest, productivity. You can be, too." ~Norman Vincent Peale.
84. "Do the hard jobs first. The easy jobs will take care of themselves." ~Dale Carnegie. 
85. "Delay always breeds danger; and to protract a great design is often to ruin it." ~Miguel De Cervantes.

86. "When you have to make a choice and don't make it, that in itself is a choice." ~William James.
87. "What can be done at any time is never done at all." ~English Proverb
88. "Postpone not a good action." ~ Irish Proverb
89. "Anger is the only thing to put off till tomorrow." ~ Slovakian proverb
90. "Every thing in human character goes to wreck, under the reign of procrastination, while prompt action gives to all things a corresponding and proportional life and energy." ~ William A. Alcott
91. " "No task is a long one but the task on which one dare not start. It becomes a nightmare." ~ Charles Baudelaire
92. "This is as true in everyday life as it is in battle: we are given one life and the decision is ours whether to wait for circumstances to make up our mind, or whether to act, and in acting, to live." ~ General Omar Bradley
93. "Procrastination has robbed us of too many opportunities." ~ Sarah Ban Breathnach
94. "Those who make the worst use of their time are the first to complain of its brevity." ~ Jean de La Bruyère
95. "Procrastination is the seed of self destruction." ~ Matthew Burton
96. "You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step." ~Martin Luther King Jr.
97. "One of the most tragic things I know about human nature is that all of us tend to put off living. We are all dreaming of some magical rose garden over the horizon – instead of enjoying the roses blooming outside our windows today." ~ Dale Carnegie
98. "By the streets of 'by and by,' one arrives at the house of 'never'." ~ Miguel De Cervantes
99. "Faith in to-morrow, instead of Christ, is Satan's nurse for man's perdition." ~George B. Cheever
100. "The era of procrastination, of half-measures, of soothing and baffling expedients, of delays, is coming to a close. In its place we are entering a period of consequences." ~Winston Churchill
101. "My evil genius Procrastination has whispered me to tarry 'til a more convenient season." ~Mary Todd Lincoln
102. "Speech is conveniently located midway between thought and action, where it often substitutes for both." ~ John Andrew Holms
103. "How does a project get to be a year behind schedule? One day at a time." ~Fred Brooks
104. "I love deadlines. Especially the whooshing sound they make as they pass by." ~ Douglas Adams
105. "The leading rule for the lawyer, as for the man of every other calling, is diligence. Leave nothing for to-morrow which can be done to-day." ~Abraham Lincoln
106. "Time wasted is existence; used is life." ~ Edward Young
107. "If we accept and internalize the fact of our own mortality, then, by definition, we have to deal with the essential questions of how we live and spend our allotted time. We have to stop procrastinating, pretending that we have forever to do what we want to do and be what we long to be." ~ Surya Das
108. "The way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing." ~Walt Disney
109. "Watching for things to appreciate and expressing that appreciation immediately benefits both our relationships and us. It is taking care of business on a daily basis so that we have a better chance of not having a lot of unfinished business when we least expect it." ~ Gail Pursell Elliott
110. "Work while it is called today, for you know not how much you may be hindered tomorrow. One today is worth two tomorrows; never leave that till tomorrow which you can do today." ~ Benjamin Franklin
111. "Delay is as hateful as it is dangerous." ~Thomas Holcroft
112. "So what do we do? Anything. Something. So long as we just don't sit there. If we screw it up, start over. Try something else. If we wait until we've satisfied all the uncertainties, it may be too late." ~Lee Iacocca
113. "You must not procrastinate. Rather, you should make preparations so that even if you did die tonight, you would have no regrets. If you develop an appreciation for the uncertainty and imminence of death, your sense of the importance of using your time wisely will get stronger and stronger." ~Dalai Lama
114. "Those who are late will be punished by life itself." ~ Mikhail Gorbachev
115. "Perhaps the most valuable result of al education is the ability to make yourself do the thing you have to do, when it ought to be done, whether you like it or not." ~ Thomas Huxley
116. "To procrastinate seems inherent in man, for if you do to-day that you may enjoy to-morrow it is but deferring the enjoyment; so that to be idle or industrious, vicious or virtuous, is but with a view of procrastinating the one or the other." ~ Benjamin Robert Haydon
117. "The dread of doing a task uses up more time and energy than doing the task itself." ~Rita Emmett
118. "Regret for the things we did can be tempered by time; it is regret for the things we did not do that is inconsolable." ~Sydney Harris
119. "The trouble is that you think you have time." ~ Jack Kornfield
120. "Procrastination is the kidnapper of souls and the recruiting-officer of hell." ~ Edward Irving
121."...who waits until circumstances completely favor his undertaking, will never accomplish anything." ~ Martin Luther
122. "By one delay after another they spin out their whole lives, till there's no more future left for them." ~ Robert L'Estrange
123. "He who awaits much can expect little." ~ Gabriel Garcia Marquez
124. "The secret of getting ahead is getting started. The secret of getting started is breaking your complex overwhelming tasks into small manageable tasks, and then starting on the first one." ~ Mark Twain
125. "There is no dallying with God ." ~ James Usher
126. "Do or do not do. There is no try." ~ Master Yoda
127. "If you have goals and procrastination you have nothing. If you have goals and you take action, you will have anything you want." ~Thomas J. Vilord
128. "Perception is strong and sight weak. In strategy it is important to see distant things as if they were close and to take a distanced view of close things. ~ "Miyamoto Musashi
129. "Procrastination has been called a thief,--the thief of time. I wish it were no worse than a thief. It is a murderer; and that which it kills is not time merely, but the immortal soul." ~William Nevins
130. "Slaying the dragon of delay is no sport for the short-winded." ~ Sandra Day O'Connor
131. "The next day is never so good as the day before." ~Syrus
132. "He who postpones the hour of living is like the rustic who waits for the river to run out before he crosses." ~ Horace
133. "Avoid delays: procrastination always does harm." ~Lucanus
134. "Unhappy he who does this work adjourn, And to to morrow would the search delay: His lazy morrow will be like to day. But is one day of ease too much to borrow ? Yes, sure: for yesterday was once to morrow." ~Perseus
135. "Nothing so perilous as procrastination" ~John Lyly
136. "In putting off what one has to do, one runs the risk of never being able to do it." ~Charles Baudelaire
137. "Dost thou love life? Then do not squander time, for that is the stuff life is made of." ~Benjamin Franklin
138. "Lose this day loitering; t'will be the same old story tomorrow, and the next day more dilatory … Each indecision brings its own delays and days are lost lamenting o'er lost days." ~Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
139. "Never put off till tomorrow what you can do today." ~Thomas Jefferson
140. "If I had to sum up in a word what makes a good manager, I'd say decisiveness. You can use the fanciest computers to gather the numbers, but in the end you have to set a timetable and act." ~Lee Iacocca
141. "It is only when we truly know and understand that we have a limited time on earth - and that we have no way of knowing when our time is up - that we will begin to live each day to the fullest, as if it was the only one we had." ~Elizabeth Kǔbler-Ross
142. "Time destroyed Is suicide, where more than blood is spilt." ~Edward Young
143. "He who begun has half done. Dare to be wise; begin." ~Horace
144. "If I am not for myself, who is for me? When I am for myself, what am I? If not now, when?" ~Rabbi Hillel
145. "He who puts off nothing till tomorrow has done a great deal." ~Baltasar Graci
146. "Do not put your work off till to-morrow and the day after; for a sluggish worker does not fill his barn, nor one who puts off his work: industry makes work go well, but a man who puts off work is always at hand-grips with ruin." ~Hesiod
147. "The procrastinator is not only indolent and weak, but commonly, false, too; most of the weak are false." ~ Johann Kaspar Lavater
148. "Anyone can do any amount of work, provided it isn't the work he is supposed to be doing at that moment." ~Robert Benchley
149. "Delaying gratification is a process of scheduling the pain and pleasure of life in such way as to enhance the pleasure by meeting and experiencing the pain first and getting it over with. It is the only decent way to live." ~M. Scott Peck
150. "Delay is the deadliest form of denial." ~C. Northcote Parkinson
151. "Well arranged time is the surest mark of a well arranged mind" ~Sir Isaac Pitman
152. "Often just by taking action, by doing something about the situation can relieve the stress and help correct the situation." ~Catherine Pulsifer
153. "Don't put off for tomorrow what you can do today because if you enjoy it today, you can do it again tomorrow." ~James A. Michener
154. "There are so many things that we wish we had done yesterday, so few that we feel like doing today." ~Mignon McLaughlin
155. "Nothing is so exhausting as indecision, and nothing so futile." ~Bertrand Russell
156. "Time flies, death urges, knells call, Heav'n invites, Hell threatens" ~Edward Young
157. "Deliberando saepe perit occasio [The opportunity often slips away while we deliberate on it]." ~Syrus
158. "Time drinketh up the essence of every great and noble action, which ought to be performed, and is delayed in the execution." ~Vishnu Sarma
159. "Whilst we deliberate how to begin a thing, it grows too late to begin it." ~Quintillain
160. "It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare, it is because we do not dare that they are difficult." ~Seneca
161. "Defer no time; delays have dangerous ends." ~William Shakespeare
162. "Our greatest actions, or of good or evil, The hero's and the murderer's spring at once From their conception: O! how many deeds Of deathless virtue and immortal crime The world had wanted, had the actor said, I will do this to-morrow." ~John Russell
163. "Depression turned my body, mind and soul into concrete; procrastination turned my heart into a block of dirty ice." ~Dolly Sen
164. "Lingering labors come to naught." ~Robert Southwell
165. "The greatest thief this world has ever produced is procrastination, and he is still at large." ~Henry Wheelter Shaw
166. "Delay not till tomorrow to be wise; tomorrow's sun to thee may neve rise." ~William Congreve
167. "It's a job that's never started that takes the longest to finish." ~J. R. R. Tolkien
168. "When you say, "Wait a moment," you are bound by your karma; when you say "Yes I will," you are free." ~Shunryu Suzuki
169. "The habit of always putting off an experience until you can afford it, or until the time is right, or until you know how to do it is one of the greatest burglars of joy. Be deliberate, but once you've made up your mind--jump in." ~Charles R. Swindoll
170. "Kabeer, that which you have to do tomorrow - do it today instead; and that which you have to do now - do it immediately! Later on, you will not be able to do anything, when death hangs over your head." ~ Bhagat Kabeer Ji
171. "In the conduct of almost every affair slowness and procrastination are hateful" ~Marcus Tullius Cicero
172. "If we wait for the moment when everything, absolutely everything is ready, we shall never begin." ~Ivan Sergeyevich Turgenev
173. "To be always intending to live a new life, but never to find time to set about it; this is as if a man should put off eating and drinking and sleeping from one day and night to another, till he is starved and destroyed." ~Archbishop John Tillotson
174. "I have spent my days stringing and unstringing my instrument, while the song I came to sing remains unsung." ~Rabindranath Tagore
175. "During a very busy life I have often been asked, "How did you manage to do it all?" The answer is very simple. It is because I did everything promptly." ~Richard Tangye
176. "Delay leads impotent and snail-paced beggary." ~William Shakespeare
177. "Think of all the years passed by in which you said to yourself "I'll do it tomorrow," and how the gods have again and again granted you periods of grace of which you have not availed yourself. It is time to realize that you are a member of the Universe, that you are born of Nature itself, and to know that a limit has been set to your time. Use every moment wisely, to perceive your inner refulgence, or 'twill be gone and nevermore within your reach." ~Marcus Aurelius (Meditations, 2.4)
178. "There's nothing to match curling up with a good book when there's a repair job to be done around the house." ~Joe Ryan
179. "The sooner I fall behind, the more time I have to catch up." ~Author Unknown
180. "If it weren't for the last minute, I wouldn't get anything done." ~Author Unknown
181. "Eat That Frog!"  ~Brian Tracy

Sunday, September 9, 2012

The First 50

It takes the average adult 50 attempts at learning a new skill before they can truly decide whether or not they can or cannot master it. The same study found that most adults give up by the 10th attempt.

In short, by setting our failure threshold too low, we’re setting ourselves up for failure!

It’s unrealistic to think that we can master every task we encounter on the first try (or even the 10th try). However, if we don’t see some immediate gain, we often stop trying well before we start getting the hang of it and making larger strides.

The key is to plan on getting through those first 50 steps.

Monday, July 9, 2012

Six Interview Mistakes



It's tough to avoid typical interview traps if you're unsure what they are. Here are six to watch out for.


1. Confusing an Interview with an Interrogation


Most candidates expect to be interrogated. An interrogation occurs when one person asks all the questions and the other gives the answers. An interview is a business conversation in which both people ask and respond to questions. Candidates who expect to be interrogated avoid asking questions, leaving the interviewer in the role of reluctant interrogator.

2. Making a So-Called Weakness Seem Positive
Interviewers frequently ask candidates, "What are your weaknesses?" Conventional interview wisdom dictates that you highlight a weakness like "I'm a perfectionist," and turn it into a positive. Interviewers are not impressed, because they've probably heard the same answer a hundred times. If you are asked this question, highlight a skill that you wish to improve upon and describe what you are doing to enhance your skill in this area. Interviewers don't care what your weaknesses are. They want to see how you handle the question and what your answer indicates about you.

3. Failing to Ask Questions
Every interview concludes with the interviewer asking if you have any questions. The worst thing to say is that you have no questions. Having no questions prepared indicates you are not interested and not prepared. Interviewers are more impressed by the questions you ask than the selling points you try to make. Before each interview, make a list of five questions you will ask. "I think a good question is, ‘Can you tell me about your career?'" says Kent Kirch, director of global recruiting at Deloitte. "Everybody likes to talk about themselves, so you're probably pretty safe asking that question."

4. Researching the Company But Not Yourself
Candidates intellectually prepare by researching the company. Most job seekers do not research themselves by taking inventory of their experience, knowledge and skills. Formulating a list of accomplishments prepares you to immediately respond to any question about your experience. You must be prepared to discuss any part of your background. Creating your talent inventory refreshes your memory and helps you immediately remember experiences you would otherwise have forgotten during the interview.

5. Leaving Your Cellphone On
We may live in a wired, always-available society, but a ringing cellphone is not appropriate for an interview. Turn it off before you enter the company.

6. Waiting for a Call
Time is your enemy after the interview. After you send a thank-you letter to every interviewer, follow up a couple of days later with either a question or additional information. Try to contact the person who can hire you, and assume that everyone you met with has some say in the process. Additional information can be details about your talents, a recent competitor's press release or industry trends. Your intention is to keep everyone's memory of you fresh.