Okay, stop me if you’ve heard this one. There was a lazy grasshopper and an industrious ant…

Those of you who can’t finish that tale may have something to worry about. But I’m here to help so here are the Cliff Notes – lazy grasshopper starves to death. Yeah, old fairy tales don’t usually have Disney endings. That’s okay – we’re dealing with the real world today. The TL;DR is lazy loses.

This is true in your personal life and you already know it. How many things have you missed out on or opportunities passed you by because you were too busy sitting on your backside? Way too many – just like everyone else. We all get a little lazy sometimes. That’s not the problem. The problem is staying that way.

Here’s the thing, no one has to be lazy. Lazy is a choice. It’s usually more complicated than just being unwilling to work. It’s more often the mindset that lets us make excuses not to work. Not merely putting off work – making the bed when you get home is kinda dumb but at least it got done before you went to bed. The occasional dish that doesn’t get washed until the next morning is not the problem.

The stack of dishes that have been there a week – that’s the problem. The water was too cold. You didn’t feel like doing them right then. You didn’t have any soap. You couldn’t find the dish cloth. There was a mouse. Air raid. Neighbor’s house on fire. New release on Netflix.

Sound familiar? You have a bad case of the lazies.

I’m a recovering lazy myself. It galls me, but my (much)* older sister was right: there are the same 24 hours in a day for you as everyone else. If nothing ever seems to get done, you are the common denominator. You have just as much time as everyone else but you aren’t using it very well.

You are only hurting yourself when you have the bedroom from the Black Lagoon and haven’t seen the floor in two years. But be honest, that’s not where it stays. Perpetual foot dragging bleeds into every aspect of your life. You never seem to get your car tuned up. Bills are always a little late. Your work isn’t as good as it could be because you end up doing things at the last second.

Oh sure, you do get some things done – when there’s a nasty deadline or a kick in the pants – but you’re always having to excuse yourself. Sorry it’s late, the dog ate my credit card. Sorry I didn’t spellcheck the report, I had another project to get started. (FYI: Tomb Raider is not a project unless you’re a beta tester.) Sorry this, sorry that, sorry, sorry, sorry…

You get the job done when you have to but only barely, so you are never first in line for promotion. You know you need to find another job but only once you get the pink slip do you start looking.

The list goes on but you know if this is you or not. So, let’s get to the important question – is this really how you want to live your life? Laziness will let your whole life slip by with you getting little done and having nothing you really wanted to show for your effort at the end. It will bleed you dry emotionally, financially, socially, professionally and personally.

See, the ‘I’ll do it later’ or ‘I don’t feel like it now’ where later never comes means of stress relief is just a stress trap. Sure, it feels good at the moment – but then the deadline hits or life throws a curveball or the thing you didn’t do gets in the way of what you want to do. In order to avoid a few moments of minor stress you pay the penalty in hours of major stress. Or in years to come with a life you aren’t so proud of.

So, if this is you and you don’t want to stay this way, the first step is to make that decision. You and you only can decide to change and to work toward that change.

Still with me? Great. Now, here’s the thing. Baby steps but consistent baby steps. Don’t decide to clean the whole house tomorrow – you will almost certainly fail and end up more convinced than ever that you just can’t succeed. Instead, clean a corner. Just one. Might want to start with those dishes if they are a week old, otherwise, just pick a corner and get it clean. Tomorrow, clean a small section next to that corner. Everyday, another small section.

It will take time but you will have a room clean in a week or so. The house in six to eight. Most importantly, you’ll have a new habit of cleaning just a bit each day. A goal you can reach is much more important than one you can’t when you’re embarking on something new. Pick a corner and get started.

Back already? Great. So, in a few weeks, once your new habit is established, move on to the next one. Bills always late? Prepare one payment each day – automate it if you can – even if you can’t send the payment that day. Set it up to pay when it should (or when the money is in the account) or just write the check and put it in the envelop to mail on time. Most of you don’t have to worry about writing checks, so this one is easy but you have to also schedule a time every week to look at your bills, or at least once a month if they are automated. Every month – this keeps you from getting them messed up when something changes. A week or two is all this habit takes and you have a second win.

See the pattern? Start small and stick with it. That’s the only secret. Sure, there will be bad days. Don’t let them derail you. Had a bad day? Forgive yourself, decide that you want to continue and pick up where you left off. Don’t try to fix every aspect of your life all at once. Just pick something, tackle a small part, and do that again tomorrow.

You can eat an elephant – not that you’d want to – but you can, one bite at a time. That’s all that is between you and that mountain of stuff that you need to get done. The mountain is too big and you are too stress adverse to take it on all at once, no matter how committed you feel at first. But take one rock at a time, day by day, and before you know it, that mountain is gone.

Consistent baby steps. Don’t just do one small thing and forget about it. Do one small thing today and another tomorrow and another the day after and keep right on going. Consistent, manageable steps will get you where you are going. It will get you where you want to be.

One step at a time.

What’s this got to do with politics? Everything in a democratic republic like America. The current dysfunctional levels of political hysteria all trace to the laziness of the electorate. That’s the problem with government by the people – it’s always our fault when we let the stupid thing run amok. Take your eyes off of it for a minute and the stupid government is legislating away ladies rooms.

Okay, so we took our eyes off it for a LOT more than a minute. Same song, different verse.

The best argument against populism is that people are lazy. Which is partially true – like I said, I’m in recovery myself – but really has more to do with a lack of education. I don’t mean time in school – I mean the opening up to understanding and wisdom that is what education is really supposed to help you do. In the political realm, we do a deliberately poor job educating the populace and specifically failing to teach them about the tools at their disposal for use in managing this government of ours.

The lazy part is when we Americans refuse to educate ourselves. It doesn’t have to be this way and it doesn’t take going back to college or taking online courses or hours and hours of study or watching the lamestream media until your head explodes – none of that.

Just consistent baby steps. Watch a video about an issue. Watch an actual newscast (these are the ones that just tell you what happened without any opinion of who benefits or why). Listen to a podcast. Read a blog. Pick one to do each day. Heck, you can pick a different one tomorrow. Just get a little better informed every day.

Notice what I didn’t say. I didn’t say seek out the opposing viewpoint or try to balance your sources. For now, just find sources you can listen to a few minutes each day. You just want the facts, not the opinions, but you don’t need to worry about the difference. Just find something and get started on the road to not being a lazy anymore. One step each day, that’s all.

Start the habit of becoming an informed voter. Don’t worry about all the related stuff – we’ll get there. Just start. Later we’ll worry about sources and bias and polling and how foreign affairs are supposed to work – one small step every day will eventually get you where you want to be.

The first step is to decide to take the journey to becoming an informed voter and responsible citizen. Then put one foot in front of the other until you get there.

Let’s get started! Oh, wait, you read an entire blog! Congratulations, you are already on your way!

One small step – DONE!

*My sister is twenty years older than I am. And she will kill me if she ever sees this!