Gross metaphor aside, Mark Twain had a point. If you have to do something difficult or unpleasant, it’s best to get it over with as soon as possible. Otherwise, we spend too much time procrastinating and avoiding it, which inevitably makes the thing you have to do even worse. If we “eat the frog” right away, we don’t have time to ruminate on how bad the thing we have to do is. Plus, the thing we have to do is rarely as bad as we think it will be. 

Let’s say you have to call your doctor to schedule an annual checkup, but you hate making phone calls. You could procrastinate, carrying this simple task over from one day to the next, forcing you to think about this unpleasant task for days, or possibly weeks, on end. Then, when you’ve procrastinated as long as possible and you finally feel enough motivation to make the call, it ends up being a relatively quick and painless process. However, the stress and frustration you’ve been feeling since you added this task to your to-do list is no less real. You’ve increased your mental distress exponentially without actually doing anything. Had you “eaten the frog” right away, the only distress you would have felt would have been from the phone call itself. 

So, do yourself a favor. Make that phone call, send that email, schedule that appointment. EAT THE FROG!