The following originally appeared in HECMWorld in September 2020

“I’ll take my family on a nice vacation once I make enough money.”

“I’m going to create a killer marketing plan that will attract more homeowners and help me close more loans.”

These are just a few examples of the rationalizations for why we’re doing things the way we are and avoiding the work required to reach our goals.

You may not have the money for a family cruise, but you may be able to take your family on a weekend getaway and not break the budget in the process. An imperfect business plan is better than nothing. Why not put pencil to paper and begin with a rough outline?

Truth be told, it’s the little things that often yield the best results. Taking 15 minutes without distractions to sit with your partner, child, or colleague to ‘check-in’ maybe ‘just one more thing’ but it may be the most important thing for them that day. Our lives have an overabundance of ‘just one more thing’ to do. The trick is to confront our tasks as if they were the last thing we will do.

What’s most important at this very moment? Taking a moment to give a sincere compliment? Inviting over your friend who’s overwhelmed to simply sit and relax in your backyard? Calling your widowed borrower to see how they’re faring during the pandemic? Is it shutting down your email and silencing your cell phone to make 15 outbound sales calls?

Each of us knows what that ‘just one more thing’ is. The question is what will we do without for the moment to make it happen?