I read David Allen’s book, Getting Things Done about one year ago, and being generally enthusiastic about improving my productivity while maintaining a relatively stress-free existence, the methods in GTD were a revelation to me. I was particularly excited about the prospect of not having to continually remember to-do items, but rather, have a system to remind me when the appropriate time came to do them. I implemented the methods laid out in the book with one modification - instead of using 43 folders to lay out the next 1 year of my life, I used text files in a folder on my computer desktop at first, and then switched to task managing website – rememberthemilk.com.
Once implemented, I immediately felt a load off of my shoulders. I felt like my life was better organized, I was more productive and that I was on my way to a better and brighter future. For a while, I felt like I had completely mastered the art of productivity and that I couldn’t possibly more so. However, after a little while, I felt a bit of heaviness come over me when I would open the to-do list and the tickler file each morning. For those who are unfamiliar with the tickler file, it is a list or a folder of stuff that you want to accomplish each day for the next 30 days. According to GTD, you should also have a tickler file for each month for the next 12 months.
Looking at the to-do list and tickler file, which was another sort of to-do list each morning was cumbersome to me because they felt like additional responsibilities – both looking at them as well as carrying out the items contained within them. It was like an additional job or a to-do list that would never end. I wouldn’t always finish what was in the tickler file for each day, and when that would happen, I would feel like I had failed. I compare it to being on a vacation but having list of things you want to see or do and feeling like you have to do it. I was forcing myself to carry out the items on the list whether I felt like doing them or not, and whether I was feeling creative that day or not. How about if the weather was nice, and I felt the urge to just take the day off and go sailing? Needless to say, I felt tied to my desk all the time, and going sailing was associated with a feeling of guilt - this at a time when I was trying to free myself from a 9-5 schedule.
I think part of the reason why GTD doesn’t work great for me is that my work ethic and the level of creativity I’m feeling fluctuates on a daily basis. In college, when I would maintain erratic hours, I recall that there were days when I was so lethargic that I would sit in front of the TV for an entire day with my roommates, but there were also times when I felt so motivated that I would sit in a study room with my classmate Bob for 8 hours at a time reading and learning about neuroscience. As I write this blog post, I’m sitting in Tea Spot, a café in the Village in New York City, but this type of post isn’t one that I could just sit down and write at will. As a matter of fact, the motivation to write this came just about 45 minutes ago when I was surfing 43folders.com.
The other day, while watching a TV show about powder skiing in Canada’s British Columbia province, I myself felt the urge to do some research and plan just such an excursion, so I spent the next 2 hours doing research on various ski areas and tours in British Columbia. It was 2 hours spent being very productive in my opinion – I got the information I wanted and I was having fun. Now, what would have happened if I were following the GTD protocol? I would’ve created “Ski in Canada” as a project, then place “Research skiing in Canada” on my to-do list. This would mean that I wouldn’t get to do this research until working through all the to-do items above it. Once the time came around to doing it, however, it would probably feel like a chore rather than the pleasure that it actually was.
The GTD method takes spontaneity and instant gratification out of work and morphs it into lists and order. However, I think that these are valuable elements to life whether you’re working or not.
To me, whenever something is done and completed impulsively, it feels like a pleasure whereas if it’s on a list, it feels like a chore. Furthermore, I’m the most productive when I act on some sort of impulse, get lost in it, and am fully engaged. I’ve recently re-learned to act spontaneously and it has worked wonders for my productivity level. I still make sure not to keep to-do items stored in my head, but I also maintain no sort of timeline associated with getting certain things done.
Edit (Jan 10, 2007) – The comments to this post made me think that my understanding of GTD wasn’t the same as some other people’s and prompted me to re-read it keeping in mind many of the comments. Here is where I think I fell short:
- The first time I read GTD, the concept of context-separated lists didn’t really resonate with me I think because none of the examples given really pertained to me. Due to my line of work, I’m usually at home and in front of the computer and contexts such as @computer, @home, @work, @phone don’t really apply to me. One of the commenters pointed out that contextual lists can be based on energy level and frame of mind as well and this was a lot more applicable to me. I now have such contextual lists as work:next, research:fun, research:work and web development:next.
- For some reason, I didn’t understand that the lists are for when you want to be productive as opposed to something that has to always be in your hand and you are constantly working off of it and checking off things as you accomplish them.
Sometimes, I will read something and take it perhaps too literally, and I think that might have been what happened here. In any case, thank you all for the comments.
I’ve been using Voice-over-IP (VoIP) for about 1 year now and have tried out 3 different services and I’m the happiest with my current one. I’ve used Vonage and Gizmo Project and had issues with both of them. Then I started using Skype and found the connection to be very clear and the price to be right (free for domestic calls to U.S. phone numbers until 2007, at which point I think it goes up to 1 cent per call).