You might need to do some philosophical delving. If this is happening to you, then it implies that it's a task that you have told yourself is important, but tha

You might need to do some philosophical delving. If this is happening to you, then it implies that it's a task that you have told yourself is important, but that you don't really think is important. So there's the two versions of you. The one that diagnosed it important, and the one that behaves as if it isn't. Which is correct? There's a philosophical concept akrasia that might be worth reading about. But for a shortcut, here's what I like to do. Get very disciplined and explicit on the Why. Ideally, every priority of yours should be traceable - through strict logic based on sufficiency and necessity - down to values that are important to you. That explains why that split sometimes happens. Because sometimes the You that diagnosed it important is correct, because it really is implied by a basic value of yours, and is necessary as well - but the You that behaves is wrong because the Why pathway isn't explicit enough. An example might be putting off signing up for life insurance if you have kids. If you're more explicit to yourself about the reasoning pathway, it can add more motivation to see the effort through. And sometimes it's the opposite. The You that behaves is correct to ignore it, and the You that diagnosed it important is wrong. And this can be because your convoluted Why pathway is wrong somewhere. Perhaps a premise that originally justified its importance is no longer true, but you haven't realized all the implications yet. For technical people in particular, it's all too easy to start amassing an unbelievably huge todo list just because of ideas that sound cool. They turn into goals "just because". Keeping yourself aligned with your own values can help you pare down your priorities.