Good quotes, or tricks for getting things done

I keep a file in Smart Notes of good quotes. I have quite a few, and I add to it pretty regularly. I try to read through it occasionally because, well, otherwise, why am I keeping it?

This one speaks to me right now:

Let this be an example for the acquisition of all knowledge, virtue, and riches. By the fall of drops of water, by degrees, a pot is filled. — The Hitopadesa

Some days, the best I can do is about a drop. Nice to think it adds up.

This also inspires me:

No obstacle will ever leave you the way it found you. — Anonymous

And these caution me:

Lots of folks confuse bad management with destiny. — Kin Hubbard (1868-1930)

There is nothing more frightful than ignorance in action. —Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832)

But this is the one that I find I really have to hold on to sometimes:

Anyone can do any amount of work, provided it isn't the work he is supposed be doing at that moment. — Robert Benchley, "How to Get Things Done" (from The Algonquin Wits & others)

Robert Benchley
Photo from biography.com

There are days when I the one thing I cannot face doing is the thing that has a deadline about to slap me in the face. As Benchley discusses in his essay, sometimes the best way to get it done is to take the pressure off and put it on something else. Say, for example, I have to write an article about networking. I may start it with the best intentions, but will soon find myself sidetracked into something completely unrelated, such as tidying up my office.

If, though, I can convince myself that I really and truly have to get my office cleaned up before I can do any work, I'll drag out the Endust and a file storage box, set them down and—before I even realize it—get to work on the networking article. At that point, of course, I'm telling myself that I'll be able to focus on cleaning once I bang out that article real quick. And so it goes.

Do you have any tricks (or tips) for resisting procrastination?