Prioritizing: How to Decide What is Most Important
by Kate McCracken
Prioritizing is always a hot topic. Why? Because the moment we think we have nailed the process, some initiative, change effort, or other life circumstances come knocking down all the dominoes with one small, albeit efficient, swoop. For years I taught time management courses and the headline was always the same: You cannot manage time; you can only manage your priorities.
So that’s what we learn to do. We come up with systems and structures that help us manage all of the tasks that equal the impact we have in our sights. I have my own systems, and they work well for me. I am happy to talk about them sometime, but that’s not what this piece is about.
Instead, I offer you an invitation to a different relationship with your to-do list. What if instead of a more rigorous system of managing the tasks we are faced with every day, we made choices about how to spend our time by being in deep relationship with ourselves and our experiences of energy?
I suggest we approach setting priorities from a different direction. In Elizabeth Gilbert’s Big Magic, she tells stories of the process of creativity. The “how” behind the magic that is created when people make art.
Before you stop reading because you are sure you are not creative – think again. Everyone is creative in different ways. Each word you say, decision you make, and idea you have is a creation. With that in mind, let me introduce you to a specific story Gilbert attributes to the American poet Ruth Stone, who writes about her experience of writing poetry:
“[Stone] told me that when she was a child growing up on a farm in rural Virginia, she would be out working in the fields when she would sometimes hear a poem coming toward her — hear it rushing across the landscape at her, like a galloping horse.
“Whenever this happened, she knew exactly what she had to do next: She would ‘run like hell’ toward the house, trying to stay ahead of the poem, hoping to get to a piece of paper and a pencil fast enough to catch it. That way, when the poem reached her and passed through her, she would be able to grab it and take dictation, letting the words pour forth onto the page.
“Sometimes, however, she was too slow, and she couldn’t get to the paper and pencil in time. At those instances, she could feel the poem rushing right through her body and out the other side. It would be in her for a moment, seeking a response, and then it would be gone before she could grasp it — galloping away across the earth, as she said, ‘searching for another poet.’
“But sometimes (and this is the wildest part) she would nearly miss the poem, but not quite. She would just barely catch it, she explained, ‘by the tail.’ Like grabbing a tiger. Then she would almost physically pull the poem back into her with one hand, even as she was taking dictation with the other. In these instances, the poem would appear on the page from the last word to the first — backward, but otherwise intact.”
Stone’s story suggests that when we are open to creative flow, we are not deciding what to do at all. Instead, when we are aware and willing to listen, we can respond instead of directing. We can borrow from Stone’s idea that there are unseen forces that are available and we can benefit from them – if we are attuned to them.
I used to treat my to-do list like an exercise in fairness. If I had tasks on my list that had not received attention in many days and a new idea struck, that new idea would go to the bottom of the list. I’d think, it’s not fair to the items that have been waiting to let a new idea go first! The problem with this is that by the time I got to the new idea now on the bottom of the list, I had no spark of inspiration to work from and often couldn’t even remember what it was about at all.
Like Stone, I am choosing to notice, to follow the energy and feel what is flowing and what has a spark.
A few weeks ago, I had a full calendar and a full to-do list. This is the kind of week that is hardest for me. I have much I want to accomplish to get the dopamine hit of marking things as done, but no dedicated time to do it all. In order to keep myself satisfied, I have to redefine what success looks like. It’s not about accomplishing tasks; it’s about showing up, being aware, noticing.
On Friday morning, with a quiet afternoon of work time ahead, I had a conversation with my team where a new idea surfaced. While it made no logical sense for me to start with that new idea when I held it up to all of the time-sensitive and now becoming more urgent tasks on my too-long list, I followed the new energy.
I sat down and let the spark of inspiration drive both my choice to do this particular task and flow through me so much so that creating what I built hardly felt like it came from me at all. It seemed to come through me. The ideas happened faster than I could type, and I rigorously focused my attention to prevent losing a single thread until it was all captured on the page… Not unlike catching a poem by the tail. What if we knew it was that simple; we just had to catch our creativity… our own spark by the tail.
What was the result of choosing to do the thing that made no sense?
I was so energized by the wave of inspiration and enthusiasm for creating that it carried me through the rest of the to-do list. I was able to do a week’s worth of things by the end of that quiet Friday afternoon.
Now I still have a to-do list. I take care of the achiever part of me by making realistic promises to myself about what I will accomplish in any given day. I wouldn’t know where to be without my calendar. And I seldom wander through fields waiting for inspiration to strike. But I do, within the mundane reality of my modern life, make space for magic. I open my heart, mind, and body to sense what wants to move now, and I find that when I do, it costs me nothing and gives me everything.
About the Author
Kate McCracken (she/they) is a leadership coach, consultant, and change facilitator who helps leaders see what is happening beneath the surface and move forward with greater clarity, courage, and care. Drawing on more than 20 years of leadership and organizational development experience, Kate brings steadfast gentleness, grounded wisdom, and a loving but firm mirror to individuals, teams, and organizations navigating change. She is also the author of the LinkedIn newsletter Ask Kate, where she answers real leadership questions with practical, soulful guidance. Have a question for Kate? Submit it at bit.ly/askkateform. Read more about Kate.
