My word: Mirrors aren’t just for checking your teeth

What scares you? What makes you quiver in your shoes? What is that one thing you think about every morning that makes you want to hit the snooze button just so you can avoid it?

We’ve heard the advice over and over. Anything from, “Do the most challenging task in the first hour of the day” to “Why you should never start with your most difficult task.” It can get quite confusing –- all the advice from the life hackers, the life coaches and ‘highly successful people’ who get quoted (and misquoted) everywhere.

I believe in going with your gut. Knowing what you want. Understanding what you don’t want and why you don’t want it. All these things will give you a rough idea of what you want to do, what you ought to do and why you (don’t) want to do it. Now the order of when to do it depends entirely on you.

Sometimes, you’ve just got to get down to doing things you don’t want to do. Staring at the pile of greasy dishes after a party won’t make them disappear. Grabbing a spoon and scraping the food scraps into the dustbin is more like it. Before you know it, you’ll be wiping off the last plate and flipping the light switch so you can go to bed. 

I once worked as a telemarketer. At the beginning of every shift, I would stare at the list of people I had to call and wonder how I would make it through the day. For an introvert, selling things on the phone has to be the most difficult job in the world. But you know how I made it? I told myself that if I could call just one person, my day would be off to a start. Before I knew it, I was halfway down the list.

Sometimes you just have to look at yourself in the mirror and say, “it’s not as hard as you think, dummy.”