By breaking the path to its achievement into separate intermediate stages, you can conquer the intended peak without much effort. But be that as it may, it is at overcoming the step-by-step stages that the problems associated with forcing yourself to make the next breakthrough begin. Starting a business is always easier than finishing it triumphantly.

All the successes and failures in our life depend on how fully the work we have started is completed. Leaving your project at 95% readiness, you can forget about it forever, there will be no return from it (except for the experience gained in the process of its development). A simple example: by writing an article, but not publishing it on the site, the work will not be finished and the article will not benefit anyone. So it turns out that time and effort were wasted in vain, but there will be no sense, no material reward for this work.

What needs to be done in order to learn how to bring the started cases to a successful ending?

Careful approach to project selection

There are only two reasons why there is a desire to take on several projects at the same time: the desire for novelty and the monotony of the routine stages of work already started.

The realization that it was not possible to complete the work begun due to one’s own laziness, shortcomings in the process of work, inevitably leads to the accumulation of certain discomfort, an increase in the level of stress, to a subjective assessment of one’s personality as inferior, flawed. And from such conclusions not far from mental disorders and the development of an inferiority complex. That is why it is necessary to pay special attention to the choice of projects for implementation, based on an objective awareness of the possibility of 100% completion of the selected task, to the order of their implementation.

Learn to learn from your mistakes

A negative result is also a result. If you do not complete any business due to your own laziness, sluggishness, or under the influence of external circumstances, you do not need to tear your hair out and fall into depression. It is necessary to soberly analyze the situation, draw conclusions for the future. Without summing up, we will once again try to move forward, once again stepping on the same rake.

Having subjected the situation with the non-completion of the project to analysis, we must draw the following conclusions:

• - it is impossible to turn back time, it is useless to reproach and reproach yourself for failure, you need to forgive yourself for your miscalculations and move on;
• - having found the root cause of your failure, you need to fix it in your mind so as not to repeat it again;
• - you need to find the strength to refuse to carry out several projects at the same time;
• - having singled out 1 - 2 priority cases from the flow, it is necessary to concentrate on their solution and successful completion;
• - at the end of the projects started, you need to fix positive emotions from getting a positive result and start a cycle of work on a new business on this wave.

Rejection of ineffective strategies

It happens that people use the same strategy for years to achieve any goals, despite the fact that it does not bring positive results. You need to find the strength in yourself to get out of the vicious circle, admit to yourself that the strategy has ceased to be effective (even if it once was), abandon it, find other ways, develop a new strategy. This decision will be the first step to success.

You need to be able to say “no” in time to what slows down the movement forward. To do this, it is necessary to consciously approach the understanding of the causes of failures. You should not look for and find additional motivation to do things, you need to pay attention to finding possible ways to simplify your life. It is worth stopping and thinking: what is the ballast for moving forward, throw it away, find new ideas that can work and help achieve a positive result.

Positive mental attitude

It is necessary to fix in the mind the psychological attitude: “I can!”

Without a positive attitude, it is impossible to work fruitfully and carry out the plan. A negative attitude, which may have been entrenched due to previous failures, can negate all the efforts made to achieve the goal. Therefore, it is simply necessary to carry out some psychological work on oneself. To do this, it is enough to recall those projects (even if they are quite simple) that have been successfully completed. And if in the arsenal of completed cases there are complex and time-consuming projects, then this is just wonderful! So, you need:

• - fix a positive attitude to reality and the achievability of the goal,
• - specify the task: complete what has been started on time (it is not necessary to do it brilliantly, the main thing is to do it).

As a result, with a high degree of probability it can be argued that the work will be done on time and with the proper quality.

Setting up for difficult tasks

No matter how interesting the project you are starting may seem, you should always keep in mind that in the process of its implementation there will be stages that will not bring pleasure. It doesn't matter what kind of difficulty. It can be a technically difficult moment, or a large amount of routine work. All good projects require a lot of effort and time. Therefore, it is necessary to tune in to the fact that no matter how difficult or tedious certain stages of the project are, they still have to be completed. In the awareness of this postulate is the firmness of the decision to bring the matter to the end, this is the key difference between the urge to start a project and the ability to complete it.

If we analyze the unconscious desire to give up before a difficult stage, then we can conclude that objectively this is nothing more than an artificial creation of resistance to the passage of a certain moment with the involvement of emotions and justifications for one's unwillingness to work. To overcome such a subconscious “rebellion”, it is necessary to change the interpretation of this stage: to present it not as an unpleasant job in some respects, but as a new step up the ladder of success.

Of course, you can only take on obviously easy projects. But then the value of the work in general, and self-esteem as a performer, in particular, will be lost.

Apply methods of psychological influence on one's own will

A small example: a programmer is creating a program, he has a large array of data in development that needs to be structured, that is, the work is simple, but tedious. And after a while, this friend is no longer doing business, but checks the mail, writes off with friends. That is, he puts off doing work that is unpleasant for him in all sorts of ways. Agree, this situation is very similar to everything that you periodically do. In psychology, this situation (postponing things for later) is called procrastination.

There are many techniques to overcome the internal resistance that hinders the movement forward. But the main difficulty in their implementation is the unwillingness to systematically apply them. In order to subordinate your mind to the actions that are urgent at the moment, you need to inspire yourself with the following attitude: “Only my conscious will is responsible for all my actions and decisions, only it should guide me and my actions.” Nothing super complicated and unusual, but this installation will help in difficult times to pull yourself together and force you to act in the right direction. At the moment when you are distracted from the case, an impulse will appear in your mind - a signal that you have deviated from the course, that you need to return to work. The next important nuance in the application of the described internal installation will be obligation pushing this signal to a priority position, and not pushing it to the back of consciousness. The way of thinking of each particular person is connected with his attitude to the signal of the mind. There are two options:

• The first one is ignoring it. In this case, procrastination will become a constant companion of a person;
• - the second - the impulse-warning is a priority in the stream of consciousness. Only in this case there is a complete concentration on the performance of the necessary work, a person identifies the desire of his "I" with the requirement of the mind to concentrate, the internal discomfort that occurs when the requirements of the lazy "I" and the signals of consciousness diverge is removed.

Don't allow yourself to be self-deprecating

If every time, after a failure that happened due to the fault of the lazy part of one's "I", to look back, then involuntarily there is an identification of one's personality with the culprit of the failure. A person begins to blame himself, engage in self-abasement. This position leads to the creation of a vicious circle, from which it is quite difficult to get out. There is an underestimation of self-esteem, and, as a result, self-doubt arises. And even simple things that previously seemed easy to do begin to seem impregnable peaks.

How to get out of this situation?

First, you need to stop thinking that the “lazy person” who did not allow you to complete the work you started is your main essence.

Secondly, it is necessary to remember that the main function of the “lazy person” is to maintain a sense of self-preservation. For example: an old joke about a man who was doing nothing, and when asked why he was doing it, he answered: "What if there is a war, and I'm tired." So our "lazy person" is trying to protect us from unnecessary gestures in the name of saving strength. Let's forgive him for this and we will adequately treat our miscalculations.

Thirdly, it is not in vain that a person bears the proud title of “homo sapiens” (reasonable person), our rationality lies precisely in being able to control ourselves, our consciousness, not to allow any part of it to prevail over the rest. A deep fragmentation of the personality - and does relate to the pathological states of the psyche.

Conclusion: to manage oneself, one's actions and deeds is in the power of each person, it is only necessary to control so that the diverse components of our "I" would not fight among themselves.

Strengthening willpower

Willpower, like muscles, can be trained and strengthened. Even if a person feels completely weak-willed, he still has a chance to revive and educate his will. You just need to do some exercises.

Such an example: early in the morning, you don’t want to get out of bed at all. Two sides of your "I" are fighting in consciousness, active and passive. One says: “I don’t want to!”, the other answers: “I must!”. So, in such a case, you need to concentrate, accept as a fact that the active side is you yourself, and the passive side is someone else, and firmly command: “Quickly get up and start doing business!”. There is a 90% chance that you will follow the command of your willpower. Well, if it doesn't work the first time, then it will definitely work out the second time. Even the smallest victory on the path of educating the will is a step forward. Having made it, you need to stay at the achieved level for as long as possible, in order to then take a new step. It happens that a person breaks down, rolls back in work on himself. Do not despair and scold yourself, you just need to start all over again.

Another self-education technique: for 2 weeks, you need to stop every hour (you can use an alarm clock) and ask yourself the question: “What am I doing now, do I control my actions, act rationally, or go with the flow, like a leaf in a river?” .

These exercises should be performed from time to time for prevention or when depression, depression, laziness, procrastination occur. Exercises will allow you to return the dominance of your active strong-willed "I". You must always remember that this part of your consciousness is you.

I often receive letters with questions, requests for help, to get out of the impasse. I answer and find solutions to my own predicaments. Armen Petrosyan is right when he says that the development process consists of three stages - Think, Do and Share. The last stage leads to new discoveries and realizations that take us to a new level.

Hello Olesya! We really need your help! The fact is that I am now working on writing a dissertation, or rather rewriting it. After completing three years of postgraduate studies, I submitted the full text of my dissertation at the end, but the reviewers recommended that I redo almost 90% of the text (my supervisor and I went into the wrong area). I was so upset that I just hated my dissertation and didn’t touch it at all for two years.

As a result, my conscience tormented me, and I realized that I had to finish it. But as soon as I sit down to work on it, I have a bunch of other “urgent” things to do, just not to do. It feels like my whole gut resists it. I analyzed the situation a lot, I even thought about quitting my dissertation. But in the end, I came to the conclusion that I should still finish this business, otherwise I’ll “eat myself from the inside” later. I kindly ask you to advise, please, how to stimulate yourself, to put together, as they say, “in a bunch” in order to finish your dissertation! Thank you very much in advance!!! Really looking forward to your reply!

For example, a person by himself can be super talented, be a generator of ideas, and if he brought at least 1/10 of his undertakings to a result, he would become a super successful, famous and rich person. And since he does not bring any started business to the end, he does not receive positive results at all. Because of this, it seems that a person does a lot, and the results are "0", this state of affairs quickly undermines a person's self-esteem and he becomes a loser.

First what we will consider in this article are the reasons why this happens, because of which a person does not bring his undertakings to the seemingly desired result.

The main reasons why a person does not finish what he started

Many business coaches and book authors consider this problem mainly from the v.z. discipline and willpower. But besides willpower and effective organization of one’s life, there are still very important underestimated components - this is the strength of aspiration (the strength of a person’s motivation), these are feelings (love, gratitude, devotion, a sense of duty, others), these are the right priorities.

How to get things done

Let's move on to consider the causes of the situation "I start and quit."

1. The problem is “Today it caught fire - it went out tomorrow”, I got sick. When there seems to be a goal, but the fire of the desire to achieve this goal, to put it mildly, is weak. And there is a car and it’s clear where to go, but kerosene is not enough. This means that a person is not motivated, he does not have enough internal energy to achieve his goal. This is one of the most common reasons why many people quit - they are not motivated!

It is sad that the vast majority of people do not know how to purposefully motivate themselves, they do not know how to ignite in their souls a great desire for the goal.

2. Not controlling your desires (not controlling yourself)! Because of what a person cannot effectively organize his life, and as a result, he does not achieve anything significant in life. At first I wanted one thing, five minutes later another, an hour later a third, and so a person is pulled by his own uncontrollable desires, like a puppet, tearing him apart.

Such a problem is very common when a person's real life goals are replaced by momentary desires "hochuha". In this case, a person runs year after year, hour after hour, satisfies his petty and base desires, but does not go to the Goals, as a result, he and his whole life stand still. The Rat Race, as Robert Kiyosaki would say.

The problem is that the person has not decided what he really wants from life! He did not set real life goals, for which it is really worth living, and to which, by and large, all his momentary reactions and desires should be subordinated.

3. Wrong, unaligned priorities. Indeed, many people do not distinguish at all what is main and what is secondary. In books about success, you can find the so-called "Pareto Principle", its essence is as follows: there are always 20% of things that give 80% of the final result, and 80% of the things that most people are used to doing provide only 20% of the final result.

One of the foundations of success is the ability to single out exactly those main 20% of cases that will ensure success and the desired result. And give these things most of your life. This is what most people do not know how and do not want to do! People are used to doing not what they need, but what they like more, or what they are used to doing. Because of this, their efforts bring them a maximum of 20% of the final result, and this is always not enough to achieve success.

But the problem of unaligned Priorities is not limited to the Pareto principle. There are a lot of nuances that need to be studied. A little on this topic can be found in the article “Main Life Goals of a Human”, which are correctly arranged according to priorities.

4. Lack of discipline, lack of ability to competently and effectively organize their time. The problems that most interfere with people here are laziness, negative habits (vices), for example, the habit of leading an idle lifestyle, as well as the lack of strong personal qualities (discipline, timeliness, will, responsibility, others).

But remember, a person always has compensating forces that you need to know! You need to know your strengths and bet on them! Thus, if you lack discipline, you can compensate for discipline with your other strengths, such as creativity and the ability to ignite and motivate yourself on your own.

If you work through point 1 well, then this may well be enough to achieve your desired goal.

Finishing things is one of the most common weaknesses of our people. I don’t know how things are with this skill in other countries, but in the process of recruiting personnel I have repeatedly observed that even among managers and “salesmen” - people whose activities are results, bringing things to completion is the weakest point.

Even those employees whose results are satisfied, bring to the end less than 50% of their undertakings. And, therefore, we could be even more successful if we learned how to complete things. And then what about those in whose work it is not required?

Of course, it is always easier to choose a medicine by conducting an individual diagnosis, but in most cases the causes are quite typical.

1. We start things that shouldn't be started at all- we get involved in projects for reasonable reasons, shutting up the voice of our hearts, we want to support loved ones, or we simply do not find the courage to refuse.

In this case, the solution is obvious - ideally, abandon such projects at the very beginning. Or, if courage or confidence is not enough right away, give yourself a short time to determine.

2. We lose the emotional wave on which we started the business, and we cannot catch it again.

The most powerful breakthroughs in business are based on the corresponding emotions. This is the main reason that trainings or communication with successful people help us. Our thoughts enter into resonance with the thoughts of other people, and on this wave we do what normally takes a lot of time. When the wave "subsides", we do not feel enough effort in ourselves to budge the "heavy" task.

In this case, it is optimal to create an emotional wave for yourself again, or place yourself in the environment in which these waves will be created naturally with enviable regularity, allowing you not to look for additional incentives to complete things.

For this reason, mass trainings and marathons for achieving goals for a limited number of people work well. If you are not doing anything yourself, such activities are unlikely to help you. If you are moving towards your goals, just not fast enough, this marathon will create a resonance effect and make you move faster.

3. We try to do everything at once, rush in different directions, leaving for later and forgetting forever what at first seemed interesting and important.

The natural solution to a problem like this might seem to be to not let yourself get carried away and keep yourself in line. However, in practice, such measures often lead to “breaking” themselves and the loss of their integrity and uniqueness, which will only worsen the situation in the future. However, being aware of what you are doing at a certain moment and conducting regular “cleansing” of accumulated cases can help to change the situation.

For example, when you sit down at a computer, you do it for a specific purpose - to check your mail, chat with relatives, find information on a specific issue. As an example, you can use a sticky note on a laptop with the inscription "What am I doing now?" or “What am I doing now?”

A person with a lot of unfinished tasks is like a computer with a lot of open windows. If you're like the latest Mac, these files won't take up much energy or memory. But if you are an ordinary Windows computer, then most likely, open windows noticeably affect your productivity, and all you need to do is close all irrelevant files, deciding whether to delete them or save them. In fact, the most important thing is to make a decision on each “hanging” issue.

That's what plans and lists are for. If you don't even plan to live according to the plans, you just need a place where you could put the information for temporary storage.

Simply make a list of things to do- complete, postpone, or do something. But this is only part of the task.

The second part is to finish what you started. We are moving in small steps. We start with the easiest, fastest, simplest. 1-2 cases per day. 5 minutes a day. As much as it becomes natural for us.

Here the main mistake is to redo a lot on emotions at once and again turn into the “Big Bad”. Therefore, the main principle is . Gradually we introduce into the habit and regularly complete the unnecessary.

There is another nuance - we often think that we can do it once, complete everything. But that doesn't happen. New cases, new projects appear constantly. And the habit of completing is needed not in order to get rid of them altogether, but in order to make room for the highest priority for today. For the most interesting, joyful and inspiring.

4. Next error - give too much importance to unfinished business, put them at the forefront. Most often this happens with the preparatory work, which can be carried out ad infinitum. For example, you want to start a business, but you spend a lot of time on paperwork. Or you write a book for years, constantly refining it.

In that case it will work reception "Between times". Here the effect of the lever works - the creation of conditions under which the suspended business is carried out quickly and quite naturally, as if in between times. For example, when you have clients, paperwork issues are cleared up very quickly. The contract with the publishing house makes it necessary to quickly complete the editing of the text, and the prospect of an upcoming date stops the endless search for the perfect outfit.

As a rule, the idea to get rid of the burden of solved questions and started cases comes already when they really interfere with us - years after we began to acquire them. Therefore, it is also not worth waiting for them to fall off at the same time. Slowly but surely. Every day, with small steps imperceptibly, we lead ourselves into the bright future of our life order.

Each of us, if you think about it, there are a dozen unfinished business. Maybe you started learning English, but abandoned it? Or have you started a repair in the corridor, but for many years you have not been able to complete it? A dissertation started, an unfinished book or article, a half-knitted sweater - we light up easily, but often stop halfway. But in order to succeed in any field, you need to see things through to the end. Almost any task consists of several intermediate stages, but is considered completed only if all stages are achieved. Farmers do not sell half-ripe fruits, and car dealerships do not have cars that are 90% ready. If you drop out of university in your third year, you will not be able to say that you have a higher education. How do you learn to get things done? Say "Easy Useful".

The main thing is to start?

"Quick Beginner's Guide: Get Started." This and other motivating phrases are often found on the Internet and tell us that the main thing is to start. Quite right, because if you don’t start, you won’t be able to finish. But once you've started something, the best thing you can do is gather your strength and see it through to the end.

There are tasks more complex than knitting a sweater or finishing repairs. For example, you set out to improve your health or reduce stress in your life. How do you know if you've completed the task or not? The criterion is this: if the job is completed, you will see the fruits of your labor and feel the difference.

"An ordinary person who does not have special talents, but who has managed to develop the habit of clearly prioritizing and quickly completing important tasks, can give a hundred points ahead to a genius who talks a lot, makes great plans, but finishes little."

You may have noticed that the most gifted or educated people are not always the most successful. The chances of success are much higher for the most ordinary people, who, however, are able to notice a worthy idea and bring it to life, bringing the matter to the end. Indeed, not even the newest and most promising idea, but fully realized, better than a brilliant idea, which remained in the imagination of its creator. Therefore, you should not chase trends and grab all the projects in a row in the hope that one of them will bring you good luck. Choose your direction and move in it, making every effort, and then you will definitely succeed.

Setting priorities

Does this mean that you need to complete all the things you started? Not at all. Be honest with yourself and identify for yourself those unfinished projects that are better to stop. Moreover, this should be a clear stop, and not just throwing the task to the far shelf. You shouldn't have the feeling that dozens of unfinished projects are waiting for you to return to them.

To stop work means to click not on “pause”, but on “stop”. Dissolve an unfinished dress, delete a file with an unfinished article, give Spanish textbooks to someone who is determined to learn the language. How do you decide which projects are worthy of completion and which are not? Answer yourself a few questions.

The number of “yes” answers will tell you how worth it is to do it, on a scale from 0 to 4. If you put a lot of effort into a project, then sometimes it is worth seeing it through to the end, even if it no longer meets your current goals . For example, you are in your last year of university, but you realize that you have chosen the wrong profession, and decide to get another education. Does this mean you need to drop out when you're only a few months away from graduation? Of course no. You have invested a lot of effort and work, and a diploma of higher education is never superfluous, even if it is received in a related profession.

If the ratio between the work already done and its remaining volume is definitely in favor of the first, then gather your strength and bring the project to the end.

How to find the strength in yourself to finish the job to the end

So, you've done away with projects that aren't worth finishing, and you're left with only really meaningful things to do. Do you feel how the value of each of them has increased in your eyes? This will give you the motivation to get back into working on them. However, the enthusiasm may not last long. How to overcome the project, if the forces are running out? Here are some simple tips.

Remind yourself why you are doing this business and what you will get after completing it.

Rethink your schedule and put aside all non-essential activities like watching TV and surfing the Internet to reduce fatigue and save energy for the important things.

Break the rest of the project into parts and find a use for each completed section to feel the satisfaction of the work. For example, if you are writing a book, you can post chapter after chapter as articles on your blog.

So, finishing everything to the end is a useful and important ability, but not every business is worth doing. Sometimes it will be more correct to stop the project and do something really necessary and important in the free time.