“Most things presented as urgent rarely are.” — from the article 50 Life-Changing Ideas.
To add to this, most things considered important are not urgent.
And to complicate matters we also have emergencies. Emergencies defined as something that’s urgent, and important.
However, these two things rarely present themselves at the same time. Most of the time, things that seem urgent aren’t important, and the important things aren’t urgent.
The worst part is when we fail to differentiate between the two. Every day we end up with a schedule filled to the brim with emergencies. Endless days of putting out fires.
There’s a noticeable difference between urgent and important yet the difference can be difficult to distinguish.
For example.
- Social media notifications appear urgent, which makes them seem important — but they’re not.
- A ringing telephone is urgent and therefore important — until it’s a telemarketer.
- An email request may be important, but not urgent — unbeknownst to the sender.
- Rest is important, but never urgent — so we sacrifice sleep.
And then there are actual emergencies. Things that are equally urgent and important.
- A crying baby.
- A smoke detector.
- A warning light on the dashboard of our vehicle.
- And so on…
In this post, we’re going to talk about the paradox of urgent and important. We’re also going to learn how to make better decisions based on urgency and importance.
I think this post will help you with productivity and perhaps change your view on how to prioritize tasks.
“What is important is seldom urgent and what is urgent is seldom important.” — Dwight Eisenhower
What’s Urgent and What’s Important
Now, we couldn’t possibly sit here and define every single thing that is and isn’t urgent, as well as, what’s important and what is not. That would be impossible, ineffective, and boring to say the least.
But it is imperative [notice how I didn’t have the guts to use the word important there] to distinguish between the two.
Important is defined as: Things that contribute to our long-term goals, overall life quality, and values. Things like…
- Tasks that further our career
- Tasks that improve our health
- Tasks that improve our overall happiness
- You get the idea.
Urgent is defined as: Requests from outside sources. Things like…
- Phone calls
- Emails
- Text messages
- And so on…
Thanks to the busyness in our daily lives it can be difficult to determine the differences between the two. The urgent things feel important [and stressful] while the important things get put on the back burner. We end up putting out fires instead of focusing on the things that will improve our lives.
The key is to ask yourself — Is this important, urgent, or an emergency?
How to Manage Urgent, Important, and Emergencies
There are 3 basic strategies I use to manage urgent, important, and the combo of the two. Here they are.
- Emergencies — Take care of these immediately. This is a no-brainer.
- Urgent — If it’s urgent but not important do your best to defer, delegate, or simply ignore it. As I said earlier, most things presented as urgent rarely are. In most cases, things that are considered urgent are only urgent to someone else. Just because something is urgent to someone doesn’t mean it’s important to us. Keep this in mind.
- Important — Important things are never urgent but they should be. Getting exercise isn’t urgent but it’s important. The same goes for getting our finances in check or working on projects that will advance our careers. Rest and relaxation aren’t considered urgent but are vital to our well-being. These are the things we should prioritize. The things that contribute to our long-term goals, overall life quality, and values.
Why It’s Important to Understand the Paradox of Urgent and Important
Understanding urgent, important, and emergencies is about decision-making. Knowing why we make the decisions we make in the heat of the moment.
To be productive, we need to recognize that urgency is a false god. Urgency gives us something to do instead of getting the right things accomplished. Urgency is that thing that aligns with other people’s goals and rarely our own. For the good of ourselves and loved ones, it’s best to keep urgency to a minimum. It’s best to focus on the things that are important.
Ignore the noise and embrace the tasks that are meaningful. The tasks that move us towards accomplishing our goals, whatever they may be.
For thoughts and comments @ me on Twitter.
Additional resources: