I was standing in my backyard and I could see lots that needed to be done: hedge trimming, grass mowing, dead branches to be removed, and so much more. I started on consolidating some unused flower pots into a single spot. While doing that I thought it would be a good idea to remove an overgrown fern. I pulled the fern down and then got distracted by the idea of some other task.

My Dad, who is a gardening enthusiast, arrived about an hour later to drop off some tools. He took a look around at my yard and gave me some advice. He encouraged me to finish one job completely and to tidy up any mess before moving onto the next job. Without realising I had started three or four different jobs - all currently at different levels of completion. My Dad's logic was that you might be interrupted at any point and you don't want to be in a position where you are left with large cleanup jobs, or where you have to leave the yard in a bad state with unfinished and dangerous things around.

I spent the next few hours going through each of the jobs I had started earlier and finished them one by one, cleaning up as I went. I didn't get through as much of the gardening as I would have liked that day (things had a bad habit of taking longer than I expected) but everything I started I finished. I could come back another day to do the remaining jobs. The yard was left tidy and the kids could enjoy it.

Focus on one task at a time. Get it done. Tidy up. Then move on