Feeding the wolf I want to win » GTD

Tom Peters on “The Single Most Important Thing”

Will — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 13:14:44 +0000

Journal entry for today.
http://www.tompeters.com/entries.php?note=006635.php

Tom Peters on “The Single Most Important Thing” turns out to be two. Meditation and 4 item to-do list EVERY MORNING! Got the first part down, now on to the second.

Note to Will, start a 4 item todo list and put it in front of you each day. Things to include are important work commitments, blogging, relationship stuff, woodworking goals, technology, life work. Things to exclude, time wasters, shopping lists, frivolous Internet distractions, appointments, etc. Seems like two lists are called for. The 4 item “Single Most Important Thing” list and a combo appointment/shopping/errand list. Mixing these two list has been my method and now I see that may be my problem with consistency. If the list doesn’t have important things on it or too many items from the appointment/shopping/errand category, the list losses its power.

Even just the process of setting the todo list and setting the priorities will be skillful. As Tom Peters says, what is left off of the list list is just as important as what is included. That helps in understanding the importance of culling dead, negative and unhelpful activities from the list. Onward!

Zen Mind Map

Will — Sun, 17 Jun 2007 14:24:21 +0000

Tools on the web for research and knowledge orgainzation are really growing. This site – wikimindmap – will take any term and create a mindmap using entries and appropriate links from wikipedia.org. It does this in English and currently five other languages. Click on the above mindmap to activate all the links. Try this out with your own search term and you will be amazed.

Open Source Lunar Calendar

Will — Sun, 17 Dec 2006 16:13:44 +0000

Dr. Drang over at ‘And now it’s all this’ pointed me to a pair of command-line program call pcal (for regular calendars) and lcal (for lunar calendars) that creates neat little calendars. As a photographer, having some knowledge of the lunar cycle is helpful. I was able to convert this to a OpenOffice Draw document and size it of my HipsterPDA. Here is a copy for you! lunar-2007.odg

77 Ways to Learn Faster, Deeper, and Better

Will — Sat, 02 Dec 2006 03:43:16 +0000

Gratuitous cat picture (Zia).

The Online Educational Database has a new article titled “77 Ways to Learn Faster, Deeper, and Better“. Some great tips there. Here is a brief sample.

8. Change your focus. Sometimes there simply isn’t enough time to take a long break. If so, change subject focus. Alternate between technical and non-technical subjects.

11. Do walking meditation. If you’re taking a hike (#25), go one step further and learn walking meditation as a way to tap into your inner resources and your strengthen your ability to focus. Just make sure you’re not walking inadvertently into traffic.

19. Brainmap it. Need to plan something? Brain maps, or mind maps, offer a compact way to get both an overview of a project as well as easily add details. With mind maps, you can see the relationships between disparate ideas and they can also act as a receptacle for a brainstorming session.

44. Cross-pollinate your interests. Neurons that connect to existing neurons give you new perspectives and abilities to use additional knowledge in new ways.

Connect the dots

Will — Sun, 29 Oct 2006 15:29:44 +0000

“Again, you can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.”

Commencement address by Steve Jobs,
CEO of Apple Computer and of Pixar Animation Studios,
delivered on June 12, 2005 at Stanford University.

How will these dots be connected? I really don’t know.

“Does it matter if you have a clean desk?”

Will — Sat, 05 Aug 2006 13:19:33 +0000

My desk on a better day.

Having a organized and tidy desk does promote productivity, period. Mark over at Manager Tools has a great post today clarifying this. This is not only great advice for me but also for the people that I mentor. I like this quote because it is advice for us mere mortals! Horray for all us mere mortals.

All good career advice starts with the fundamental premise that for the
purpose of the advice, everything else IS equal. It may not always be
able to be purely applied (YES, brilliant geniuses can have AWFUL
desks), but it is the best way to advise your charges (because they are
likely NOT brilliant geniuses for whom standards of culture don’t
apply.)

I recommend to anyone who is a manager or wants to manage themselves, get over to Manager Tools. There are great tools and resources there. Some are text, some are audio, all are priceless. Priceless in there value and price less as in FREE! I still can’t believe this stuff is free.

In the above picture of my desk we can see my home made bleacher for my hipsterPDA (link and link) with my custom vi key bindings card in the front. I still use the evil 3M Sticky Notes. Next to my eye glass case is a fun little retro PDA tool called pocketMOD. It is a PDA made out of a single sheet of paper. I haven’t used it but it is cute and my appeal to some. I’d like to figure out how to put callouts on pictures like this ala Flicker so that this things in the photo can be identified.

7 Habits

Will — Tue, 20 Dec 2005 02:07:17 +0000

The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People
Stephen Covey
First published in 1989

I’ve had this book on my shelf for a long time. After seeing a recommendation from Steve Pavlina, I got to thinking that I might reread Covey’s Seven Habits book and then go on to his newer book The 8th Habit. To my surprise I found I hadn’t read the entire 7 Habits book the first time – the corner of page 149 was folded over.

Well now I finished it and I can report that the advice and strategies outlined by Covey are as relevant today as they were in 1989. This doesn’t make them timeless but a lot of what passed for “Self-help/Psychology/Inspirational” advice in the 1980’s has proved to be hogwash. The one strategy I’m implementing is to plan my time in week long blocks rather than in a shorter day block.

The first step I do is use a wonderful mind mapping tool called FreeMind to map out all my roles. See example below. First I list the roles in my life. Then I add 2-3 things I’d like to accomplish in the coming week in each role. This week I had 3 items for most roles and it was too much to add along with all my usual stuff. So for the coming week I’m limiting myself to 2 items per roles. In the next step I put the items into my Outlook calendar and sync with my palm. Over time I think I’ll have to refine my roles and possibly give some up or trade for new ones. Also I think it might be helpful to separate my professional roles from my personal.

What has me really excited is my new goal of reading a book a week. I’m on my fifth book in five weeks. (I’ll try to review each book after I’ve read it.) This idea I lifted from Steve Pavlina as he demonstrated that in a few short years of using the “book a week” strategy, he had read over 600 books, mostly on personal productivity and was now a personal productivity expert. The reading alone does not make him an expert, many other skills, training and experience combined to make him an expert. How many experts do you know that have read 600 books in their field?

43 Folders: Getting started with “Getting Things Done”

Will — Wed, 22 Jun 2005 13:56:00 +0000

I think I found the help I've been looking for.

Stuff is bouncing around in our heads and causing untold stress and anxiety. Evaluation meetings, bar mitzvahs, empty rolls of toilet paper, broken lawn mowers, college applications, your big gut, tooth decay, dirty underwear and imminent jury duty all compete for prime attention in our poor, addled brains. Stuff has no “home” and, consequently, no place to go, so it just keeps rattling around.

Goalsetting

Will — Sat, 11 Jun 2005 14:13:00 +0000

Goal setting is the laying out on paper of the experiences you wish to have, the possessions you wish to own, the places you wish to go to and the people you wish to meet. The emphasis is on the experiences. Unless our possessions, acquaintances and destinations provide us the experiences we desire, they have no value for us...

Concentrating while studying

Will — Tue, 10 May 2005 13:38:00 +0000

Concentration: the ability to direct your thinking. The art or practice of concentration, no matter if studying biology or playing pool, is to focus on the task at hand and eliminate distraction...