A habit to keep trying and get your things done?
Background for this post: I distinctly remember being excited about David Allen’s “Getting Things Done” book for a couple of reasons: for one, it’s about an algorithm for your brain - the “software developer” in you gets a chance to go through the logic, trying to find flaws and make improvements. Geeky as it sounds, it felt a little like programming the way your daily activities are organized and executed. On the other hand, the book sounded like an interesting solution for anybody with a chaotic workflow: the company that I was working for was being sold and my friends and I were starting a new gig on our own, for the first time for some of us. No longer was it possible to focus on just one or two responsibilities (read “coding and not giving a damn about anything else”) all day every day. A.D.D. started flaring up due to constant context switching, and the productivity was out the window. GTD seemed like a great solution.
If you are not familiar with it, “Getting Things Done” describes an approach to organizing your tasks and reference material, and prioritizing your activities. The goal is to increase your productivity by making sure that you are working on the right things at the right time. It all makes sense and sounds very good (to me, anyway). Obviously, David Allen spent a whole lot of time polishing the system to get it right. Very inspired by all this, I tried taking some of the more significant parts of this system and applying it to my own daily routine - and it seemed to work pretty well for a while. It was almost like owning a new computer game that I needed to master. Or a new cool toy.
Then the going with our new company got easier: we started coding more than anything else. Life got simpler and less chaotic again. The GTD toy was spending more and more time in the corner, not needed and half-forgotten. I did keep using task lists, but that’s about it. This went on for a while until our startup business started getting more interesting and I had to once again upgrade my hat rack from being able to hold one or two hats (“programming” hat and “semi-running business every once in a while” hat) to a dozen or so. No bonus for guessing what followed: ADD, context switching, poor productivity, stress. Once again, GTD was called to the rescue. The toy was dusted off, marked up parts of the book were re-read. And once again it felt like a game, like something that you can put down and not look at for a while. There must have been a better way to do this - to keep the productivity going no matter what the work load is.
This is when I caught myself thinking “Wouldn’t it be easier to go get a job and not deal with all this?” I’ll spare you from the details of my internal struggle that resulted. At the end of the day, the biggest draw of that idea appeared to be that “somebody tells you what to do and you can just dive into coding/technology/learning/whatever and get paid for it” The best response to that conclusion that I could find was “No shit, Sherlock” Why not try applying for a job at a successful company and maybe get a glimpse of what they do to be successful? How do THOSE people Get Things Done? This post is not the place to argue for or against such approach. Let’s just say that I didn’t go looking for a job and kept on going with our startup. But I did manage to figure out what was missing from my GTD soup.
Consider this example: You must have heard the notion that one needs to exercise to stay in shape. Do you believe it? If yes, do you do it? If you know that it’s necessary but don’t actually do it - why not? Exercise itself is usually not difficult - many people that do exercise find it quite enjoyable. You don’t have to push yourself like an olympian would, you can take it easy and do it at your own pace. The first few days/weeks might be hard, but then it gets much better. You probably know that. So, why don’t you exercise? If you follow this rabbit hole of reasoning all the way to the bottom, you might arrive at the same conclusion that I did: you don’t have enough discipline to keep doing it for long enough before it becomes a habit and you no longer have to convince yourself to do it. It’s fun the first few times, but then novelty wears off. The toy gets pushed into a corner and starts gathering dust. You become content with the fact that you aren’t pushing your limits anymore. Mediocrity settles in.
The same applies to other aspects of our lives. It’s not all about how good that idea/approach/algorithm is. More than anything, it’s about “doing” as opposed to “knowing what to do”. GTD is a good system - but only if you keep practicing it. Day in, day out. In other words, GTD requires discipline. Fun fact: “Getting Things Done” book mentions the word “discipline” exactly 5 times, but it never in the same context as what I’m talking about. Instead, David Allen talks about “tricks” to get yourself doing something that you might not otherwise have enough motivation to do. Only he doesn’t take it far enough, in my humble opinion.
But enough with the philosophical crap. More doing, less talking. Here is the one trick that I think works really well for people that realize that then need to improve themselves (whatever that usually means) but don’t have enough motivation to start and go through with it. Take a piece of paper and a pen and write down one very simple activity that you agree to do every day (I literally wrote down “Read this text”). That’s a simple commitment - it arguably can’t be any simpler (as long as you didn’t write “Cure cancer”). For the next few days, make sure to pick up that piece of paper, read and follow what it says. It sounds silly, I know. But stick with me here. Start adding simple activities that you’d like to do every day. One of the things that I wrote down initially was “Keep work desk clean”. I used to clean my desk every 6 months or so. Always felt guilty about not doing often enough, but could never convince myself to do it - it seemed like too much work. Then one day I read somewhere that “the state of your immediate surroundings affects your ability to focus and be productive” That same day, “Clean desk” went on my “daily ritual” piece of paper. Now, believe it or not, I clean my desk every freaking morning. It feels good. It feels like an accomplishment. And after doing it for a while, I no longer have to think about it or argue with myself about whether or not I really need to dump those unnecessary papers or carry the coffee mugs to the kitchen. Next thing that became a daily ritual is checking the calendar in iCal. Sounds simple enough, but how easy is it to forget to do it? Very easy. But not with that little piece of paper. You’ve trained yourself to look at it every day - now you can be reasonably sure that you won’t be forgetting to do stuff that’s written on it.
One important point: The things that you write down have to be VERY concrete, VERY achievable and NOT difficult. Otherwise, you start resisting and procrastinating, and the whole idea starts losing it’s appeal. “Getting Things Done” does a good job explaining why people put stuff off and how to avoid putting yourself in that position.
Why does this work? Here is one theory: In a psychological/productivity sense, it’s more difficult to start moving than to add speed and go faster once you are already moving. The notion is similar to “inertia” from the world around us, but not exactly the same. Example: sometimes, it’s hard to break procrastination and start working on something. But when that happens, it’s much easier to keep working and take on new tasks. And once you stop and need to restart, you might need to deal with that warm-up period again. The aforementioned piece of paper provides the initial push and helps you get going. From that point on, you just keep chaining those activities, one after the other. On the other hand, the habit of “do this every day” helps you avoid procrastination altogether, hopefully.
You plant the “seed” - a commitment to do one simple thing every day, which requires a very small amount of effort. If you keep going, it then starts growing into something larger: a habit. You can start asking yourself to do more and more without requiring too much external motivation or slipping into procrastination again. (I’m not entirely sure what happens if you keep doing this for a very long time - supposedly you will transform into a superhuman that can solve all of the world’s problems without any sleep or encouragement).
There is nothing “heroic” or “glamorous” about this trick - you are not going to spend years “building your character” or “serving as an example to younger generation”. It’s not about “reinventing yourself” or “getting saved by a miracle and becoming a completely different human being” You just need to keep going about your business, doing small but smart things every day that can help you get something done and become a little bit better. That’s all.
