Quote for the day:
Don’t be fooled by the calendar. There are only as many days in the year as you make use of. One man gets only a week’s value out of a year, while another man gets a full year’s value out of a week.”
~ Charles Richard
.
Another week is nearing an end, and I haven’t gotten nearly as many things done as I hoped. The lists keep multiplying and growing longer. In fact, I haven’t even finished the task of adding all my new items to the to-do lists!
That’s a sorry state of affairs that reflects the problem with my GTD system. I’m great at capturing ideas and to-do’s and getting them into the In Box. And there they pile up into a daunting stack. Anybody else have this problem with Getting Things Done?
According to the official site What is GTD, “Implementing GTD alleviates the feeling of overwhelm, instills confidence, and releases a flood of creative energy.“ I can tell I’m not doing this right. Flood of creative energy – check. Feeling of overwhelm alleviated? Nope!
On the creative energy front, I have zillions of ideas. Every day, as I read, listen, watch, and talk, I get more and more ideas. “Hey, that’s cool – we could do something like that…” Wonderful! Capture that idea, and get it into the In Box, and from there into the rest of the system. I’ve got thousands of ideas documented now, available for review whenever I want. It’s overwhelming though to know that out of those thousands of ideas, I’ll only be able to implement a small number.  The rest will sit there in my system until they just evaporate — ideas that came out of nowhere, and returned to nowhere. Some ideas turn into reality, some are passed on to others.  The rest just vanish.
On a bigger scale, the entire year is nearing an end. Yikes! How can it be nearly over already? We do get an extra second this year, but I could use a few more months, instead. 
However, as the quotation reminds us, it’s all in how well you use your time. If I spend this evening reading the latest economic news (with appropriate wailing and gnashing of teeth), then not a lot gets done! It really doesn’t contribute anything – either to helping the business, helping my well-being, or helping anyone else. It’s unproductive and depressing, yet remarkably compelling. Right now, we’re watching history unfold around us. Of course, I suppose that’s true all the time, but it’s a lot more dramatic history some days than others!
OK, enough rambling philosophy for one day. I’d love to get a year’s value out of the next week. Or how about a week’s worth out of the rest of the night?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
On a totally different topic, we just announced a special deal on our Costa Rica wildlife tour. Book your trip by Jan 15, and get a free hotel night in Costa Rica the night before the trip!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
16 responses so far ↓
1 Billy // Dec 12, 2008 at 12:26 am
I completely agree with this philosophy! I always try to live every day to its fullest and make every minute count.
2 Dave // Dec 12, 2008 at 4:16 am
Time should always be allocated for things of interest or fun rather than things that are useful in the progression of your life! Living by the constraints of the calender year can be frustrating, but I agree that time can be found for things if they are wanted enough.
3 khushe // Dec 12, 2008 at 5:07 am
I think this article has touched my heart. It made me think about what all things I have not done tilld date. It gave me an inspiration to value my time and finish off my pending tasks.
4 Eric // Dec 12, 2008 at 6:01 am
Using time management everyday actually “adds” additional time to our everyday lives. We often devote too much time to an individual tasks which can take away from time available to complete other tasks. Good time management allows us to devote just enough time to complete most tasks throughout the day.
5 Stephen Nolen // Dec 12, 2008 at 6:02 am
Ahh I do understand Deanna – your “list to do” has turned into a “list of doom”. I feel the same often and found my problem was having too many things in my lists that I thought I had to do right now as next actions. Finally started shuffling them over to a someday list and then checking them during my weekly review to see what, if any, I wanted to tackle next week.
Actually just doing my weekly review has really helped me know I’m doing the best I can to accomplish what I want. Without the review, which I was lax way too long on, I felt overwhelmed.
I just try looking at my list on TaskWriter.com and my system at work as things that I 1) need/should do now, 2) should do very soon, and 3) would like to do someday. I filter everything down to the need/should do now and concentrate on them after identifying them during my review and leave the rest for the next review… they never go away that way but I don’t stress over them either. Of course I keep capturing as well but it sounds like you have many more ideas than I do.
Don’t give up – I bet if you look back on this year and really check what you’ve gotten done you may be surprised!
-Stephen
Stephen Nolen’s last blog post.. Twittering Away Local Government
6 Deanna Keahey // Dec 12, 2008 at 10:47 pm
Billy – I love the “every minute counts” philosophy, but I admit I have problems with actually doing it every minute! (-:
Dave – You’re too right about taking time for the things that are fun, interesting, and “just for us”. Those tend to take a back seat.
Khushe – That concept of “value my time” is an important one. Gee, how much of it should I fritter away watching TV?
7 Deanna Keahey // Dec 12, 2008 at 10:49 pm
Eric – You’re right that time management can actually add its own layer of time burdens. That’s what I feel when I look at my in box – just the time to process the tasks is a lot, and that doesn’t actually get them done — it just gets them onto the list!
8 Deanna Keahey // Dec 12, 2008 at 10:54 pm
Stephen – I love your phrase “list of doom”! That’s perfect! Or rather, it’s not a perfect situation, but it’s a perfect description.
Thanks for the words of wisdom. I think you hit on something with the weekly review. I’m too lax on that part myself. I can suck up a full day on the weekly review, and still not get everything reviewed. So I don’t do it weekly, and then it gets longer, and then I don’t do it…
I know a lot of people busier than I am manage to make this system work, so there must be a way!
9 Pat Wells // Dec 12, 2008 at 11:25 pm
Life is always about prioritizing, isn’t it. This time of year that seems to be particularly important. I have many ideas that never get looked at again, much less implemented because I fail to prioritize. Good reminder!
10 Stephen Nolen // Dec 13, 2008 at 7:35 am
One thing I forgot to mention is if GTD is too overwhelming, Lou Babauta’s “Zen to Done” or ZTD might be helpful if you haven’t seen it already. Based on GTD but put together as ‘habits’ like Covey they outline GTD but with a slant towards simplifying.
I don’t go so far as to remove things from my list as suggested but simply hide them as someday/maybe future items. You wouldn’t want to lose all those great ideas you’ve had!
Take Care
-Stephen
Stephen Nolen’s last blog post.. Twittering Away Local Government
11 Deanna Keahey // Dec 13, 2008 at 10:55 am
Thanks for the tip Stephen! I’ll definitely check out ZTD. A little simplification sounds like a good thing.
12 Rodney@Blogging with WordPress // Dec 14, 2008 at 11:52 pm
My philosophy is similar to Stephen’s: I prioritise my list and (in theory anyway) only work on the highest priority stuff. The rest sits there until it becomes the highest priority.
I’ve found that having a system like this definitely helps with the feeling of being overwhelmed by all the stuff you have to do. Sure, the list never gets any shorter – in fact I tend to write down stuff that I may never get to, but capturing the thought releases me to better focus on whatever else I’m doing – but I feel more in control of it.
Rodney@Blogging with WordPress’s last blog post.. WordPress.com statistics plugin
13 Dan // Dec 22, 2008 at 1:50 am
If you’d like a tool for managing your time and projects, you can use this application inspired by David Allen’s GTD:
http://www.Gtdagenda.com
You can use it to manage and prioritize your goals, projects and tasks, set next actions and contexts, use checklists, schedules and a calendar.
A mobile version is available too.
14 Deanna Keahey // Dec 22, 2008 at 5:07 pm
Dan – Thanks for the suggestion – I’ll take a look at it. I’ve been using Central Desktop, but (obviously) not as thoroughly as I need to!
Leave a Comment