There is an old proverb that falls on the humorous side: One person asks another “How do you eat an elephant?” and the reply is “One bite at a time”. It’s got many variations, is often referenced, frequently found in memes, and a wise reminder that big things can be accomplished with lots of small steps.
I am currently working on many big projects and have built a yoga teaching schedule that doesn’t leave many large blocks of time open to tackle these projects the way I wish to. And so, this idea of eating the elephant has been living in my head rent free these days as I work to get all the things I want to do to a level of progress I can live with. Getting specific, here’s a few ways I’m using this idea of small bites to inspire actual actions.
When the weather is reasonable, and at least twice a week, I try to spend an hour outside gathering up sticks and yard debris that needs to be cleared before spring arrives and new mulch and stuff will be spread. On days when an hour doesn’t work, I try to clean up one stick. I can do this when I take the trash out, when I get the mail, when I walk the dog. Working towards a slightly bigger (but still reasonable goal) is great, but the tiny step of adding in something small to something I’m already doing leans on the idea of “habit stacking”. So I pick up one stick, even if it feels ridiculous.
The run on my chicken coop needs big love, and most days I try to let the chickens roam free while I’m out there for a bit with them (we have a lot of predators, so while opinions vary on letting chickens roam the yard all day, I’m passing on that right now). Over the last week I’ve moved some border rocks that were unused elsewhere in the yard to form the border I wanted, and of all things gather up the spiky seed pods of my sweet gum trees to stand in for mulch around the run and it looks whimsical (in line with my coop aesthetic) and I found it oddly meditative to relocate the seed pods. Today I did none of that – balance means sometimes I just sit in the sun and let them do their thing while I relax.
In my email, eating the elephant shows up as unsubscribing when an email I don’t want is at the top of the list. My second approach when I no longer need an email is to do a quick shift to sort my inbox by sender to quickly delete any other unnecessary messages from the same sender that I may have missed deleting in a prior rush. I have a friend who boldly deleted an entire inbox of over 90k emails after deciding that anything that was important, the sender would reach out again. While I remain inspired by that action, I’m not bold enough to follow that track and instead am eating my email elephant one bite at a time.
I recently had a few doctors’ appointments (regular checkups) and used the waiting room time to delete and sort old screenshots on my phone instead of scrolling. That action had a double benefit as it made me feel like the waiting was productive, so although the waits were short my mood was much improved by deleting, and I found a few things that had slipped my mind.
It’s nice to get a task done and to get that rush of checking something off the to-do list. And it turns out it is equally nice to look around and see a tiny bit of progress on a regular basis. After a few weeks of this things just seem a wee bit less overwhelming. I can get a bit stuck on even getting started when something feels too big, so this is a wonderful shift for me. I’m not likely to suddenly have big blocks of “free” time drop into my lap, but it’s helpful to have thought out a few small things I can do in under 5-minute blocks of time when they appear.
Ready to try eating an elephant? Grab a piece of paper and list two or three big projects you never seem to get anywhere on across the top (so you have blank columns beneath each one). They don’t have to be particularly big life changing projects – just things you are stuck on that feel frustrating to you. Consider starting with simple things like clearing off your desk (one piece of paper at a time), cleaning the garage (putting away one tool at a time), or reading a book (one page at a time). Then list 5 things that can be done that take just a few minutes each. For my visual folks, cut that list into the columns, and tape them up where you will see them to be reminded of your smaller actions. Sometimes figuring out a small step or two is the important small step that gets us over the inertia and into moving forward.
P.s. The photo at the top is the sweetgum seed pods that are now around my coop.