Getting the Hard Stuff Done

Hello everyone,
Today I'll be making a quick post about getting the hard stuff done on any to-do list first. What this does for you is it gets the thing that you know will be nagging you at the back of your mind while you're focusing on other things.
Let's focus on homework for this example. Let's say you have to study for a math test, finish up a history report, and you have to find citations for an English book essay. You know that you're great at math, so you have nothing to worry about. For your history report, you're already about 3/4 of the way done with just the conclusion left. However for your English book essay, finding citations will be hard as you have very complex thesis points. While it may be easier to study for math and finish your report first, the best decision for you to make is to find the citations.

An easy way to decide what to do first and go in order of the things that will be the most difficult for you is making a chart like this:

             Assignment                                                                             Time Given   
     English book essay citations  1)                                                           1 Hour
     Studying for Math Test          3)                                                           20 minutes
     Finishing history report          2)                                                          30 minutes

Think of which one will be the most difficult to get done, and number them in order of difficulty/importance. Give yourself a fair amount of time to do each assignment, and try to get in under that estimated time, giving yourself an even bigger achievement. Keep in mind that if you start on one thing thinking it's the hardest, but then have another assignment stuck in the back of your head nagging at you, feel free to switch and come back to it later.

Above, I numbered the assignments in order of importance/difficulty. Normally the ones that you have given yourself the most time to do will be the hardest, although that's not always the case. If you add up the times you've given yourself, it gives you a better understanding of what you have to do and reduces most of the overwhelming factors with having a lot of work (although in the example it's not a lot.)

Another thing regarding breaks in work. It's fine to do them (I'm actually taking one right now in order to post this) but not right smack in the middle of the difficult assignment. If I've just started finding the citations, and I decide to take a break, how am I going to get done? Once you're done with the hard stuff and have easy things left, then it's perfectly alright to take a break. You deserved it! Just keep in mind the time you gave yourself. If you go over the time you give yourself due to your procrastination in taking breaks, that's not good. However, if you go over the time you gave yourself because it was harder than you expected, no worries. Just remember that it was harder than you had imagined next time you go to do something similar.

I think that's about it - please comment if you have any questions, leave me a tweet, or drop me a Direct Message on Twitter.

Regards,
Pappy