...Getting Things Done is a book by David Allen that I picked up earlier this week after seeing it mentioned in one of my RSS feeds. While I like to think I've been rather out of control for most of my life, it's gotten especially bad in the last few months. I was just stressed all the time about God knows what--not even important things! Just the trash and recycling that was piling up, the newspapers piling up near my door that I only subscribed to because some kid came to my house asking me to subscribe to help fund his college tuition, and proceeded not to have time to read or even take the rubberbands off, the unread mail piling up on my desk, the dishes piling up in the sink, the music not reviewed, the practicing not done, the thing not cleaned, the task not finished. All these things that I worried about until I was paralyzed and had indigestion (not to mention the fact that this didn't get me any closer to finishing everything).
So this book, which essentially describes a system for getting organized, looked like just what I needed. The premise is that most of the stress people have comes from the fact that they have all sorts of unresolved "stuff" in their minds--things that aren't where they need to be, which weigh down on their minds, attention, and energy. (For a great example of that, see the paragraph above.) The method is just a system for organizing all this "stuff" in such a way that you can get it off your mind, trusting that your system will remind you of all the things you need to do when, so you don't have to sit around trying to keep them all in your head at once, and so you don't let anything slip through the cracks.
Apparently there is already a cult following of this method, and I have to say, after trying it out for the last few days, I already feel much better. You basically start by collecting everything you have to do, want to do, dream of doing, and everything that is physically or mentally not where it needs to be, important or trivial, big or small, into one place. That is a catharsis in and of itself. Then now that you have everything together, you can process each one, deciding which stuff needs action and which stuff just needs to be filed away as reference material. Then you organize it all into a "system you trust" so that you'll see all the things you are supposed to do, when you're supposed to do them, and review the system regularly, so you can get all those things out of your mind until you need to actually do them. And it also makes it much easier to choose which things to do at any given point, based on whether there are deadlines for some things, or whether it's just convenient to do them at the moment.
I still don't think I'm totally done implementing the system for myself; I haven't quite finished the last sections of the book, and I'm still waiting for a bigger file cabinet I ordered so I could organize once and for all the piles of papers I have in various parts of my house. But already in the past few days, I've gotten more done than I have in weeks, and I have this nice new feeling that I'm actually *not* forgetting something really important, and that I don't need to be racking my brains at every moment trying to remember whether I need to put out any fires I may have forgotten about. It's a *very* new feeling, so I still catch myself wanting to obsess about something, but I could definitely get used to living like this, and actually letting myself relax once in a while!
There are plenty of online overviews about this method, such as the ever trusty Wikipedia, or the official website, or the many, many blogs devoted to discussing its details, like 43 Folders, whose author actually came to my company to give a presentation about how to manage one's email inbox, interestingly. But the only real way to see this method in all its splendor is to read the book, Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity by David Allen. It may seem all like common sense, or even like the level of detail described in the book is a bit on the anal-retentive side. But that's the beauty of it too; it is all common sense, but just integrated into a full system that works, and it is rigid in principle but flexible in implementation. And, if you're anything like me, it could be just what you need.
Anyway, I have yet to see if I can maintain it, or elements of it, in the long term, but I really hope so. And so far, so good....
So this book, which essentially describes a system for getting organized, looked like just what I needed. The premise is that most of the stress people have comes from the fact that they have all sorts of unresolved "stuff" in their minds--things that aren't where they need to be, which weigh down on their minds, attention, and energy. (For a great example of that, see the paragraph above.) The method is just a system for organizing all this "stuff" in such a way that you can get it off your mind, trusting that your system will remind you of all the things you need to do when, so you don't have to sit around trying to keep them all in your head at once, and so you don't let anything slip through the cracks.
Apparently there is already a cult following of this method, and I have to say, after trying it out for the last few days, I already feel much better. You basically start by collecting everything you have to do, want to do, dream of doing, and everything that is physically or mentally not where it needs to be, important or trivial, big or small, into one place. That is a catharsis in and of itself. Then now that you have everything together, you can process each one, deciding which stuff needs action and which stuff just needs to be filed away as reference material. Then you organize it all into a "system you trust" so that you'll see all the things you are supposed to do, when you're supposed to do them, and review the system regularly, so you can get all those things out of your mind until you need to actually do them. And it also makes it much easier to choose which things to do at any given point, based on whether there are deadlines for some things, or whether it's just convenient to do them at the moment.
I still don't think I'm totally done implementing the system for myself; I haven't quite finished the last sections of the book, and I'm still waiting for a bigger file cabinet I ordered so I could organize once and for all the piles of papers I have in various parts of my house. But already in the past few days, I've gotten more done than I have in weeks, and I have this nice new feeling that I'm actually *not* forgetting something really important, and that I don't need to be racking my brains at every moment trying to remember whether I need to put out any fires I may have forgotten about. It's a *very* new feeling, so I still catch myself wanting to obsess about something, but I could definitely get used to living like this, and actually letting myself relax once in a while!
There are plenty of online overviews about this method, such as the ever trusty Wikipedia, or the official website, or the many, many blogs devoted to discussing its details, like 43 Folders, whose author actually came to my company to give a presentation about how to manage one's email inbox, interestingly. But the only real way to see this method in all its splendor is to read the book, Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity by David Allen. It may seem all like common sense, or even like the level of detail described in the book is a bit on the anal-retentive side. But that's the beauty of it too; it is all common sense, but just integrated into a full system that works, and it is rigid in principle but flexible in implementation. And, if you're anything like me, it could be just what you need.
Anyway, I have yet to see if I can maintain it, or elements of it, in the long term, but I really hope so. And so far, so good....
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4 comments:
Hi Cindy! I read this book a while back and had high hopes indeed. However, I have yet to implement it (though your post is making me think I should give it another go now that I have my own apt, grad school is more manageable, etc...)
My strategy these days involves the calendar in my laptop, which I carry everywhere, and a whole lot of "letting go." :)
I wish you luck in your journey to organization! Those feelings of accomplishment and freedom are amazing!
Thanks for the well wishes! I've still managed to keep it up so far.
Your blog post inspired me to make a list of all the stuff I need to be doing and all I have now is a stupid list that keeps growing and now I'm more stressed than before. Thanks Cindy!
D'oh! Aki, always there with the gratuitous low blow... :p
Actually, it is true that I had a similar feeling at first. The key is...to actually do things on the list. ;) And to be okay with having things on the list that you choose not to do at the moment, depending how important they are.
Listing things down doesn't remove the fact that you will always have more things to do than time to do them--but at least having them all in one place will allow you to a) spend less time worrying about forgetting something, and b) seeing them all together so you can choose what you are willing and able to do at the moment.
But there are also a whole bunch of little tricks/tips in the book for how to make the lists more efficient too....if you really want to learn more about it.
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