So Much To Do, Read, Learn, Share, Etc....

Stop for a minute.

No, I mean it. STOP.

It seems everything around us is moving way too fast.

We are living in a time when there is seemingly very little downtime. The amount of information that is coming at us is unlike anything in history. Bombarded with important and useless tid-bits at every turn. It makes me want to scream.

In the 1970s when my father left his office everyday for his hour-long commute home from downtown Los Angeles to the suburb where we lived (it was only 17 miles, but with traffic it was a long commute) - he really was away from work. There were no cell-phone calls from his boss or clients, there was no blackberry buzzing with alerts, and there were no texts coming to his iPhone. He had peace (if one can consider Los Angeles traffic peaceful!).

I believe that people had some time to just "Be". I never think any of the people I know just get to "Be". We are all to busy looking at our watch to make sure we get to our next appointment.

When I was a kid and we went on vacation, Dad was not getting up early to keep up with emails or other correspondence. He was on vacation. There were no phone calls being made to "check in". Long distance calls were very expensive and were simply not made if there was not an urgent matter or an emergency. If I do not keep up while on vacation then I would be buried when I got home. When I am on vacation I am not on vacation.

I could not sleep last night (I was actually thinking about my 95-year-old dad!). At five o'clock I decided to get out of bed. I sat down at the computer and began going through old emails, catching up on minor projects that had been ignored, and working on "Some Assembly Required: How to Make, Grow and Keep Your Business Relationships -- 3rd Edition".

Suddenly it was 9:00. I had worked for nearly four hours, and did not feel that I had made any real progress. However every task I had given my attention was important to my career, my family or my life. On top of all the distractions from inbound information, it seems like there is a never ending "To Do List". I believe I could work for 100 straight hours and never get caught up. Plus all the new things that would be rolling in that needed my attention. Grrrrrrrr.

Then there is the media. The amount of things I feel obligated to read, videos to watch, etc... makes me crazy. I worry if I am not keeping up with news, blogs, industry information, and the rest of the stuff out there that I will become obsolete.

I know I cannot be the only person who feels this way. I bet many of you who read this post are thinking "ME TOO!".

How do we get hold of it all?

Have A Great Day.

thom