As we worked our way around the group, one of the members recognized she had become completely stalled - making no progress on one of her key goals for several weeks. I posed a question that gave everyone pause.

"What have you been tolerating?"

It sounds simple. But that's deceptive. Sometimes sheer genius is hiding in the simple.

It's very natural for each of us to startle, and say "Who me? I'm not tolerating anything!"

As I use the question, I have to laugh in understanding at that first response - it's so very much my own reaction, no matter how many times I hear the question.

Our ego pops straight up and starts deflecting, just like a defensive child. I, me, my. "Tolerating? Me? I don't 'tolerate' things. I have exactly the life I want. There's nothing weak about me. My challenges are just stuff I haven't gotten around to yet..."

After a moment of that chatter, a quiet inner voice usually speaks up. "Well, I'm annoyed by the pile of papers I haven't gotten to yet." And "Well the house / office / car isn't as clean as it should be." And then there's the list of broken electronic equipment, poorly fitting shoes, and weeds in the garden.

All answers that feel safely impersonal.

When I give this exercise to my groups, and use it for myself, we push for one hundred items.

It can be shocking to do this the first time. So many unaddressed annoyances!

As we write, an interesting shift takes place - it starts to feel playful and confessional all at the same time. And there on the page are a rich list of items that can easily be sorted into three categories:

The 2-minute Teasers

You know. These are the little tasks that ought to only take a couple of minutes to solve. Yet, when they come to mind, we shove them to the side as unimportant and flag them mentally as 'things I'll get to when I have free time.'

They keep popping up and nibbling another second's attention and another and another. It can go on for months!

My list often contains things like reorganizing the closet, getting an errant spider web down from a ceiling corner, and fixing the paint patch that's missing on the office wall. None of these are important but they constantly, quietly tug at my attention.

The 2-hour Tamers

You'd probably find these on your list as well: sorting piles of papers, returning calls that need problem solving without knowing what the outcome might be, designing the layout for the furniture in a room that just hasn't felt comfortable for ages.

They're activities that are so common we all run into them. We let them hang on for days, even months, rather than step into the unknown to sort them out. So we spend what becomes hours over weeks thinking 'about' them rather than just taking them one after the other and eliminating them.

The 2-Mind Tanglers

Every time I create my Tolerating List I confess there are 4 or five 'biggies' on the list. I'm usually thinking about them the entire time I write everything else down. These are the items that have my logical brain saying "Just Do IT!" while my emotional brain argues "Maybe this will just go away."

I see topics and issues I've seen on this list before, such as sitting down with my financial planner to determine whether I ought to take any action with my portfolio. Another is deciding to wrap up and conclude work with a client who is four times as demanding and one quarter as satisfied as my other very happy clients.

They're topics filled with complicated emotion. I anticipate I won't like dealing with them, so I dance around them rather than facing them head on.

The irony is that the very act of taking each of these on usually gets them sorted out in under a half hour - barely a quarter of the time we imagined we'd need!

The miracle of listing them is that's the first step of taking action. The rest of the steps that solve all of them are usually done within 72 hours.

So don't wait to be stalled - clear out what you're "tolerating" today, and get back all your attention for the things you're excited to be doing.

Copyright (c) 2009 Linda Feinholz