If only you'd checked the fridge!

What do you do when you have a brilliant strategy or idea that you’d love to bring to life? Do you plan it all out, or jump right in?

This topic came up during a virtual cuppa recently, when the person I was chatting with realised one of the reasons she was getting in a pickle was because she kept skipping the ‘middle bit’ of planning. She'd get excited about the strategy she'd come up, put everything on her to-do list and then try and get it all done before the end of the week. Needless to say, that often ended in frustration and overwhelm.

We had such a juicy conversation, and it got me thinking.

We don’t want to spend all our time in planning mode, waiting for our ducks to be in a perfect row before we take any action.

But diving straight into the doing is like deciding to cook a delicious meal – let’s say a veggie lasagne - without first checking the fridge.

You tell your partner you've got dinner covered, put the oven on, open a bottle of wine and pour yourself a glass. You find a dish that's big enough to hold the feast you're about to create, dig around in the cupboard for lasagne sheets, tins of tomatoes and dried herbs. You start frying the onion. So far so good.

And then you open the fridge. 

You pull out the salad crisper thingy and – oh, the horror – all you have are three browning mushrooms and a shrivelled-up green pepper.

And goodness me, what happened to all the milk? If you use the last of it for the cheese sauce, you’ll have none left for your coffee and crunchy nut cornflakes in the morning.

You could turn the oven off and head to the shops. But it’s dark and rainy outside so you abandon the operation entirely and rustle up beans on toast.

If only you’d checked the veg situation before heating up the oven and frying the onion.

If only you’d noticed sooner that today’s lasagne would bugger up tomorrow’s breakfast.

If only you’d thought about what to have for dinner before you walked straight past the Co-op at lunchtime, darnit!

You’d be tucking into a big ol’ plate of cheesy, vegetably goodness right now.

Here’s the thing:

The middle bit of planning – the bit where you get clear about what needs to happen, think about what order to do things in, and make sure you're able to deliver on your promises without stressing yourself out – is key to getting things done with more ease.

And yet it’s the bit so many folks miss out, because it feels like a waste of time. When you’ve got loads on your plate and there’s something exciting afoot, why would you pause to plan? You just want to get on with it, right?

But trust me – taking that pause to plan and consciously choose what to do and when, will give you the clarity and focus you need to move forward with so much more ease.

I promise you it's time well spent.