“What matters to me right now?”

A question to ask when you feel overwhelmed.

What matters to me right now? 📷

To follow-up on Monday’s post on gentle productivity: another way to work better is to understand what matters. 

This is like making a list of priorities, but better. The problem with priorities is that we tend to have more than one! So if we simply ask “What’s important?” we might answer our own question with a long list. 

A long list is overwhelming, and ultimately counter-productive. 

This is the challenge of modern life: multiple things we want to do (or need to do), and the need to resolve what feels like competing priorities. 

So instead of thinking about priorities or more things to do, try thinking about what matters to you right now. 

In the midst of a busy day, or when you’re feeling overwhelmed with a bunch of things being thrown at you all at once, simply pause for a moment. 

Take a few deep breaths. 

Then, ask yourself: “What matters to me right now?” 

Your answer should be fairly intuitive (you know it when you think about it), but allow thirty seconds to pass as you fully reflect on the question. 

Whatever your answer is, it may cause you to rethink your to-do list. It may lead you to go off autopilot and into a deeper mode of focused work. It may lead you to step away from work altogether for a few minutes or hours. 

Or, of course, it may not do any of those things. After reflecting on the question, if your answer is “Exactly what I’m doing right now!”—that’s great. Keep doing that. 

What matters to you right now? 

Side note: “Everything Matters!” by Ron Currie is one of my favorite books of all time. Ron and I spoke two nights apart at the same bookstore in Maine many years ago, and the store manager gave me a copy before I left. I read it on the rest of my tour, and then I re-read it again several years later.