True story: Once I was forced to go to management training along with all other managers at that company. I say forced because, being the dismissive/sarcastic/know-it-all type, I was utterly convinced that it was going to be a waste of time and he would have nothing to teach me. I was wrong. No, he didn’t have my years of leading tech teams, but he did come from an IT background, he was familiar with Agile/Scrum techniques and was actually a pretty cool guy. Hey, I’ll usually admit that I’m wrong. :)
One of the things that he said has stuck with me, and it has a direct relation to writing, or any other creative pursuit. He said that you have to eat the frog first. If you have something really unpleasant that you have to do, which could be anything from returning a problematic phonecall or sitting down to write at your designated time, you have two choices: the first is to get it over with, and the second is to put it off. You can’t put it off entirely, as this is something that you have to do. What putting it off does is make you stress about it. That frog sits there on your desk getting bigger and uglier, but he doesn’t go away. He ruins your day.
So first thing in the morning? Grab the goddamn frog and choke that baby down. Get it over with, and then you can face the rest of your day with the relief of knowing that you got the hard stuff out of the way first.
Wise words, and I’ll always be thankful for them.
I prefer my frog lightly killed and coated in chocolate.