--- title: "Time, Motivation and Chunking" id: "4633" type: "post" slug: "time-motivation-chunking" published_at: "2014-11-15T02:22:37+00:00" modified_at: "2022-03-10T00:52:19+00:00" url: "https://johnpoelstra.com/time-motivation-chunking/" markdown_url: "https://johnpoelstra.com/time-motivation-chunking.md" excerpt: "I was talking to someone recently about blogging and how there just didn’t seem to be a way to make consistent progress or posting to their blog. They talked about their schedule and how other things were often more important......" taxonomy_category: - "Productivity" --- [Skip to the content](#site-content) [John Poelstra](https://johnpoelstra.com) ### Bringing order to chaos and clarity to confusion - [One Conversation](https://johnpoelstra.com/) - [Podcast](https://johnpoelstra.com/category/podcast/) - [Coaching for Directors](https://johnpoelstra.com/coach/) - [About](https://johnpoelstra.com/about/) Toggle search field - [One Conversation](https://johnpoelstra.com/) - [Podcast](https://johnpoelstra.com/category/podcast/) - [Coaching for Directors](https://johnpoelstra.com/coach/) - [About](https://johnpoelstra.com/about/) # [Time, Motivation and Chunking](https://johnpoelstra.com/time-motivation-chunking/) [http://www.morguefile.com/archive/display/898298](http://www.morguefile.com/archive/display/898298) I was talking to someone recently about blogging and how there just didn’t seem to be a way to make consistent progress or posting to their blog. They talked about their schedule and how other things were often more important than writing on their blog. They said they wanted to publish consistency on their blog and that it was a good thing to publish and yet they weren’t publishing on their blog. It turns out they have a business blog where they do publish every day, but it is easier to publish to it because it is a different type of site, etc. I kept thinking something was missing… if they say it is important but aren’t getting it done, how important is it really? Is it [mistaken priorities](https://johnpoelstra.com/priorities/) ? Easy for me to say, of course. I kept coming back to the sense that something else was at play. As we talked more it sounded like the real impediment was what posting to that blog meant. It required topic ideas, completed posts, etc. which since it wasn’t a regular activity felt daunting and hard to tackle unless there was a big enough block of time. That’s when I figured it out. I think the real block was their [definition of success](https://johnpoelstra.com/defining-success/) : “A well written, decent sized post, must be composed, written and published” to call that effort worth it, or a success. It was all too much. I suggested chunking and changing the definition of success. Maybe instead of needing to “publish” to declare success, success could be “spending 15 minutes trying to write something every day whether it gets published or not.” Thinking about this inspired my challenge for this month of writing every day. I’ve had so many posts that are “almost done” or things that wouldn’t take very long to write floating around in my head. And, I [defined success](https://johnpoelstra.com/defining-success/) in a way I thought I could achieve it. #### John Poelstra John Poelstra coaches directors in finance and software. Trained through the Co-Active Training Institute, he has coached for more than 10 years, with over 520 clients and 3,150 sessions, including people at well-known Fortune 100 companies. In over 30 years of professional experience, he spent 25 in technology and finance: software testing, project management and team leadership at Red Hat and Dell/EMC, and finance as a bank auditor at Wells Fargo and a CPA at Grant Thornton. He hosts The John Poelstra Show podcast and is based in Portland, Oregon. [Author archive](https://johnpoelstra.com/author/john-poelstra/) [Author website](https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-john-poelstra-show/id1130635146) November 14, 2014 [Productivity](https://johnpoelstra.com/category/productivity/) [Previous post](https://johnpoelstra.com/defining-success/) [Next post](https://johnpoelstra.com/security/) ### Leave a Reply [Cancel reply](/time-motivation-chunking/#respond) ### John Poelstra [https://johnpoelstra.com/?attachment_id=3756](https://johnpoelstra.com/?attachment_id=3756) ### Work With Me I coach directors in finance and software who want to prioritize, delegate, and lead with clarity. Start with One Conversation, a complimentary 60-minute coaching conversation. 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