As I mentioned in the last post, starting your day with making your bed is a small step that can snowball into larger accomplishments. Often starting a project is the hardest part of the project. Completing one small task can get you on track for accomplishing larger goals throughout the day. Productivity expert Adam Kirk Smith describes the productivity snowball as a task reduction strategy that creates momentum, focus, and better results. Your focus and energy intensify as you complete each small task. Just like the snowball in the illustration above rolling down the hill collecting more snow with each rotation, gaining more momentum, and speed as it grows larger and heavier. While we are all snowflakes, unique and there is only one you, in this case, we need to think of ourselves as snowballs, gaining momentum with each task you complete.

Breaking down a large project into smaller steps can feel less stressful and more manageable. If you are having a difficult time tackling a project think about what the smallest or easiest step of that project is and just do it. The feeling you get from accomplishing this task, no matter how small, will help motivate you to complete the entire project. Let’s say your closet is busting at the seams, and you have been meaning to declutter it, but the project as a whole feels overwhelming. Start by identifying one piece of clothing you know you don’t like or doesn’t fit or is damaged beyond repair and get rid of it. The act of purging that one item will more often than not lead you to identify other items that you are ready to part with until before you know it you have gone through your whole closet.  If you feel like you can do more than one item at a time pick a category of clothing that has the fewest items and go through that category, then the next smallest category, and then the next until you have worked your way up to that stack of t-shirts that rivals the Great Wall of China.

Life is full of tasks we are not looking forward to but by approaching these unpleasant tasks bit by bit we can accomplish a lot. As they say, Rome wasn’t built in a day, it takes time and tackling one brick (or step) at a time.