“One day…”
Only two words, but what an impact! It’s the battle cry of the chronic procrastinator: “One day I’ll…!” We’ve all been there. One day I’ll clean out that gutter. One day I’ll order the salad instead of fries. One day I’ll muster up the courage to call my buddy and apologize. Even good ol’ Charlie Brown gets in on the action: “One day I’ll talk to that little red-haired girl.”
We promise ourselves and others that we’ll get around to that task or fulfill that desire…one day. Our intentions may be innocent and pure, but our motivation is slippery—that is, if it even exists.
As a certified Tiny Habits coach, I’m an expert at conquering procrastination. If you want, I can design techniques to help you overcome delay and “one day” thinking. And one day, just maybe, I’ll start using those techniques myself.
Certainly, “one day” thinking stifles progress and uplifts the lollygagger. But there is another way of looking at “one day.”
Consider this current moment—right now. Whatever is happening, much seems set. It’s hard for us to imagine change without choosing to do so. That pain in your back? It’ll pass as it has before, but in the moment, it seems like it will last forever. We even imagine the weather will stay the same as we perk up with the sun and turn gloomy with the rain.
In truth, though, as Gayle Forman puts it,
We are born in one day. We die in one day. We can change in one day. And we can fall in love in one day. Anything can happen in just one day.
Sure, Rome wasn’t built in a day, but one day there was no Rome, and the next—voila!—there it was. At least in theory.
So we have two flavors of “one day” to savor. The first is the “one day” of chronic delay—I’ll get to it. The second is the “one day” of inevitable change—it’ll get to me.
Indeed, while change can be measured in days, it is best measured in mere moments. Instead of a softly tossed ball with its predictable arc, life is more like a changeup—a baseball pitch that looks one way coming in but turns out to be something else altogether. Recently a friend told me about a high-flying professional who took an unfortunate tumble in his desk chair. One moment, he’s at work doing his thing, and the next, he will never work again.
And that’s just happenstance. What about the choices we make in a moment? How many momentary decisions of action or inaction do I wish I could take back, each one marking a change I did not anticipate or desire? Then again, I have to remind myself that each moment that has come before—whatever its impact at the time—has shaped me into who I am in this moment. What, though, will I be in the next moment?
It’s the stuff of so many cheesy rom-com plots—the near-misses leading to the chance encounter that blossoms into love. These little but momentous twists may seem far-fetched, but isn’t that exactly how life often is? Take my wife and me. Forty years ago, we met by pure accident—an instant that could easily have slipped by but instead changed everything. Now, I can’t imagine my life without her.
Which leads us to my other favorite distraction. It’s summer as I write this, which means I’m spending way too much time watching baseball. Here’s the thing, though. Baseball, more than any other sport, is a game of moments. Think of that changeup pitch I mentioned before.
A ball hurtles through space at 85 miles per hour, its path curving unnaturally with its spin. A bat swings powerfully yet gracefully toward it. The drama of the next nanosecond can be profound. A team that is down can suddenly surge…or sink even lower. Games can be won or lost, even seasons. Careers can be made or broken in that moment. Bones can be broken. Or maybe in the next instant we’ll witness a spectacular defensive play for the ages.
In baseball, the goat—the scapegoat—can become the GOAT—the Greatest of All Time—with a swing of the bat. Two outs, full-count, bases-loaded, and…
The anticipation and drama of each pitch plays out hundreds of times a game, each one like a snowflake—familiar yet utterly unique. As for those who say baseball’s boring, they’re missing out on the nonstop action right in front of them. Without the turmoil and constant movement of other sports, baseball becomes a game super-concentrated into individual moments.
Leaders and “One Day”
Great leaders understand the power packed into one day or even a single moment as well as the futility of constantly putting things off until “one day.” They act or don’t act, fully aware that their choices have consequences, that through choice and action “one day” becomes now, that in an instant all can change. Great leaders don’t wait for the moment, they seize it.
So, leaders are people of action, right, impulsive and always moving?
Well, not so fast. Part of understanding the power of the moment is recognizing when to slow down or even stop. Great leaders know that each moment is too precious for knee-jerk responses. Most often, a little deliberation will go a long, long way.
And great leaders also know that it’s okay to park those lower priorities—the ones that are neither urgent nor important—in the “one day” lot. “One day we’ll get to this.” Or maybe not. Does it actually matter?
I have seen too many managers—mere bosses really—who think that leadership means acting on every whim and reacting to every possibility. They can’t let anything go and think that they’re avoiding procrastination by tackling everything at once. In reality, they’re creating the perfect conditions for errors, delays, and oversights, which they then must counteract. It’s a nasty cycle that saps their energy and distracts their attention. It’s so debilitating, they might as well just go ahead and procrastinate.
So it goes with micromanagers, perfectionists, and control freaks. But because these folks look so frantic, we tend to put them on pedestals while ignoring their ineptitude. After all, as they tell us, they work soooooo hard!
What Shakespeare’s Macbeth said about life is just as applicable to the feckless exertions of these control freaks:
It is a tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing.
No, real leaders are not interested in just being busy. They focus on process, sure, with an eye on results. They know when to act and when to stand down. They understand that the true power of the moment lies in its uniqueness and unpredictability, and they leverage this knowledge to squeeze as much good as they can from each moment.
I once knew a leader who was prone to “one day” thinking—putting things off. But she eventually began to grasp how everything could change in that one day or one moment. She started making the most of each moment, and—lo and behold—her procrastination melted away.
Her people appreciated her new-found decisiveness as well as her willingness to slow down and think things through when necessary. She also taught them that they didn’t need to take on every little thing that came their way, often telling them, “We’re going to file that under “NOP”—Not Our Problem.”
When she moved to a new job, she found herself in a workplace that buzzed with aimless effort. She taught her new team—first by example, then by instruction—to slow down and to set priorities. For many years, this crew had been chasing quick fixes to deep-rooted problems—an approach that was not only fruitless but counterproductive. My friend took a different approach, looking at the big picture and strategizing to unwind their problems one by one. Once she was ready to act, it was like she threw a switch. Suddenly, in that moment, there was hope for real solutions. “One day” became right now.
That, my friends, is how true leaders harness the power of the moment. Not by reacting to the circumstance of a second but by waiting for the right instance to act. It’s where the “one day” of delay meets the “one day” of change, merging to become the “now” of choice. This is how leaders prioritize and get things—the right things—done.
The next time you mutter to yourself, “I’ll get to that one day,” ask yourself, “What if that ‘one day’” were today? What would be different? Remember, in just one moment, you could make it all change. What if that moment is right now?
What sort of “one day” thinking do rely on? How often do you lean into the change that a moment can bring?
Great leaders learn to leverage the power of “one day” thinking to choose to act most effectively, and I can help.
Unlock the Great Leader Within! Download my free resource, the Transform To GREATness Toolkit, now!
I look forward to hearing from you.
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“One Day” and the Truth of How Things Get Done