Pebble Tasking: The Cure to Procrastination and Multi-Tasking

We all get overwhelmed once in a while, especially high achievers. As a mother, an almost-wife, a sister, a community advocate, a volunteer, a friend, and a professional I am constantly pulled in several directions at once, making it seem impossible to ever get anything fully completed.  

What are we told to do in the face of a massive to-do list? Prioritize! Distractions run rampant in my life and prioritizing does not always work. I will be bound and determined to get the most important thing finished first, but all of those other things pop up like a nonstop game of whac-a-mole. I was having this sort of moment, trying to be so engaged in accomplishing a deadline and getting interrupted constantly, when it occurred to me - maybe I don’t have to completely finish this right now as long as I am making progress on it constantly. Had I started this a week ago I would not be rushing through it now anyway.

Then I started practicing what I call “Pebble Tasking”. I looked at my mounting to-do list and noticed that all of the daily tasks could fit into about five general categories. Each person’s categories will likely be slightly different; mine are marketing, emails, research, writing, and household.

I thought, if I could just commit to spending at least 15 minutes on each of these areas every day I could really achieve a great deal towards accomplishing these goals. That’s just over an our – I felt much less overwhelmed. We can do anything for just 15 minutes, right? I wrote each of the five categories down on a whiteboard and aspired to check them off.

That didn’t work.

Not a day went by when all five categories got checked off; however, that was the point of the exercise wasn’t it? Work a little on each thing every day so that nothing piles up.

I realized the problem. I needed to visualize the weight of these things a bit more literally, so I wrote each of the categories on their own small flat pebble. I found an attractive jar and glued an inspiring quote to it. The quote I chose was “The difference between what we do and what we are capable of doing would suffice to solve most of the world’s problems” by Mahatma Gandhi. I put the pebbles in the jar and set it on my work space.

Pebble Tasking!

Every morning I dump the jar of pebbles onto my desk so that they are slightly in the way and I have to work around them. I tell myself that I absolutely will not clear them from my desk until I have earned it. I take them one stone at a time.

My goal in the beginning was to get the pebbles off my desk and out of the way. To achieve this, isolated each task to 15 minutes or more, I tossed the pebbles back into the jar. Each time this gave me a little feeling of accomplishment. Even though the task itself was not complete, I had spent the allotted amount of time on it. Then I was ready to crack down on my most rigid deadlines with a pebble-less desk.

You may find that you will likely get caught up in what you are working on and you go way beyond 15 minutes on a task. This is a good thing. As long as you know when to cut yourself off so that you can get the other categories done, that is fine. I find that the stopping point becomes evident when I get writers block or my mind starts to wander from what I am doing. It usually does not take that long though, because I will usually get pulled in another direction and the transition takes care of itself.

Don’t be afraid to return to a task later. Spend 15 minutes on each task is just a way to get the juices flowing. After getting a big picture perspective on each of the things you should be working on in your day, it will be easier to zero in on the highest priority and the things that are more likely to be accomplished.

The beauty of Pebble Tasking is that stones represent the physical weight of your projects, and putting them back into their jar lifts that weight. This clears your mind so that you can be more focused on the task at hand, improving your productivity drastically.

This exercise works for anyone. Whether you are a student, a sales clerk, a housewife, a CEO, or anyone in between, it can improve your efficiency.

7 Tricks to Really Make this Work:

1)      Make your jar eye-catching and inspiring; this ensures that it will draw your attention often, keeping you focused on getting all of those pebbles in that jar every day.

2)      Never put the pebble away unless you have spent a full 15 minutes on that task; do not include interruptions.

3)      As soon as 15 minutes is spent on the task, toss it back into the jar, even if you keep plugging away at what you are doing.

4)      Make sure the pebbles are slightly in your way, but not debilitating progress.

5)      Keep the one pebble you are working on in front of you until your task is done. This keeps you focused if you are pulled away and have to return to the task.

6)      Mark each successful day (when all of the pebbles made it into your jar before you went to bed) on the calendar.

7)      Reward yourself for a successful week! Treat yourself to a little indulgence if you had a full week of success.

What is Pebble Tasking?

In a nutshell, break your daily tasks into 5 broad categories, write each of these on separate stones with a permanent marker. Put the stones into an inspiring container and dump them out onto your work space at the beginning of each day. This way they represent the literal weight of the task. When you have spent just 15 minutes on the task in a category, return that stone to its container. This gives a sense of accomplishment and keeps you plugging away. Reward yourself for successes. 

Taking It Further

If you have become a Pebble Tasking believer and you want to step it up a notch, time yourself. Get a 15 minute timer. An hourglass would be best because you can physically set it on its side when you get diverted. If it is a person distracting you, they will notice that you were clearly right in the middle of something and they will hopefully cut it short. This also takes the pressure off having to accurately assess just how much time you actually spent on that category. If you are looking at a sideways hourglass on your desk, it will nag at you until you can set it upright again.