Angela Crocker, Author at Angela Crocker

Swallow the Frog: How To Overcome Procrastination

09.16.2015 by Angela Crocker // 2 Comments

For everyone, including writers, there are always necessary tasks that we don’t really want to do. We may procrastinate or never accomplish these “to do” list items.

What’s your nemesis?

Have you delayed writing a first draft?
Are you behind in your self-editing?
Have you got an abundance of neglected ideas?
Do you put off updating your biography?
Neglect your blog?

I’m certainly guilty of this last one.

Look At The Research

Research* suggests we waste time and energy keeping these items on our to-do lists, rescheduling reminders and, sometimes, worrying about what’s not done. In order to finishing things, though, somehow we have to find the motivation or, maybe, overcome impulse control.

How can we reframe what we are avoiding and the overcome procrastination that’s keeping us from finishing things?

Time to Swallow the Frog

The best thing to do is just do it. Get it over with and move on to other things. Finding the motivation to take action isn’t always easy but I’ve never regretted taking care of the distasteful task first.

I first heard this about this approach at a Canadian Women in Communications luncheon in Vancouver back in 1990-something. I wish I could remember the speaker’s name because he was compelling and dynamic. He described a mindset to tackle procrastinated tasks as moments to “swallow the frog” and that description has stuck with me. The phrase is now so commonly used that most don’t know its origin. It’s often attributed to Mark Twain but actually originated with French politician M. Gambetta circa 1872.

So the life lesson is: Swallow the frog. If you have to do something distasteful, just do it and be done. By making it the first item you accomplish for the day, you can immediately enjoy a sense of accomplishment and get on with enjoying the rest of the day. No need to waste energy and time, wondering what the frog will taste like or how it will feel sliding down your gullet. Once you’ve done it, you will know the answers to all these questions and the best part?

It will already be done.

Have you swallowed your frog today?

* See Association of Psychology Science, Forbes, The New Yorker and many others.

An invitation to my BCIT colleagues

03.31.2014 by Angela Crocker // Leave a Comment

Dear colleagues,

If you’ve found your way here, we must be connected through BCIT. Welcome! I’ve been honored and inspired to meet so many wonderful instructors and fellow writers in the Technical Writing program.

I’ve set up this page to invite you all to stay connected. In particular, I’d love to include you in my upcoming book launch.

As you may know, Self-Counsel Press will publish my next book, The Content Planner, in October 2016. I’m pretty excited about it and would love to share that “new book” experience with you.

To keep in the loop, please fill in the short form below. Easy, peasy.

Thanks for your support. It means a great deal to me.

See you soon,

Angela

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Finding my voice … again

08.16.2013 by Angela Crocker // 6 Comments

The more time on spend writing and posting on the web, the more I come to realize what I have to say is one voice in a symphony of millions. I’m ok with that relative obscurity. I’ve found many opportunities to express myself online and am fortunate to have met so many interesting people along the way. I know I’m not alone. There are thousands of bloggers having thousands of conversations every day.

Over the past year, I’ve been thinking about where I want to have those conversations, where I want to join in a community and keeping it all real. What part of my voice should SPEAK UP and be heard? Do I continue to write here about social media, arts administration and marketing? Do I go gangbusters on my newest blog – Sing of Happy? Do I write for other blogs like the Coastal Sound Music tour blog and the Reinventing M Network? Do I rejenvate the website where I firsted “blogged” with hardcoded HTML photo sharing back in 1998? Do I start over and finally put AngelaCrocker.com into action? Its very likely I’ll do some of the above but to tell you the truth, I’m undecided.

Quite by accident, I stumbled across the Parent Bloggers Unite (#PBUYVR) meetup that’s happening Friday evening at 6Pack Beach in Richmond. Many of my favourite writers will be there – Rebecca Coleman, Meghan Simington and Kerry Sauriol among others as well as some new-to-me bloggers I’m looking forward to meeting. [Shout out to Eschelle Westwood and Raj Thandhi.]

I feel good about my decision to go to this meetup and I’m looking forward to some new perspectives on blogging and taking another step on the journey to find my own voice…again.