Novel: tip on tackling tough projects

I'm reading Empire Falls by Richard Russo, his Pulitzer Prize-winning novel that focuses on life in a small, declining Maine town. It's the type of story I love: rich characters and emotions coming from ordinary individuals - the human drama of daily living.

Ironically, embedded in the story was the secret for success of the richest woman in town, a secret that makes even the most formidable task approachable. It's great project management advice, something everyone knows but is easily forgotten:

"After months of close observation, Grace finally discovered her great trick. Mrs. Whiting remained undaunted for the simple reason that she never, ever allowed herself to dwell on the magnitude of whatever task she was confronted with. What she possessed was the marvelous ability to divide the chore into smaller, more manageable tasks. Once this diminishment was accomplished, her will became positively tidal in its persistence. Each day Mrs. Whiting had a "To Do" list, and the brilliance of that list lay in the fact that she was careful never to include anything undoable. On those rare occasions when a task proved more complicated or difficult than she'd imagined, she simply subdivided it. In this fashion, the woman never encountered anything but success, and each day brought her inexorably closer to her goal. She might be delayed, but never deterred."

Unfortunately, Mrs. Whiting's daughter takes the polar opposite approach of her mother, with a corresponding lack of success.

"Her daughter, on the other hand, was forever being deterred. Temperamentally unable to master her mother's simple trick, Cindy Whiting immediately envisioned the entirety of what lay before her and was thus in one deft stroke overwhelmed and defeated by it..."

It's easy when looking for a job to be overwhelmed, like the daughter. Focusing on discrete, doable steps; being able to accomplish something every day: this should not only lead to a better result, but better mental health along the way.

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