"Out of context but I particularly like this bit of the
article:
To-do lists are best if you
cannot remember where you put them
The
great thing about writing something down is that your subconscious brain will
stop obsessing about it and you can relax and go to sleep or the movies or
whatever. But the bad thing about to-do lists is that you might feel compelled
to do all those things. Luckily, I’m great at making and losing lists. The list
helps me get to sleep tonight and then tomorrow when I cannot find it I only do
what
I
remember to do, which turns out to be the important things." M'reen
If you manage your
time terribly, you’ll get more done
Brooke Alle
I’m terrible at doing what people tell
me I should do, but I still get things done. I’m not sure why this is, but here
is my best guess:
I manage my desires more than my time.
In high school, I never seemed to find
time to do homework I didn’t want to do. It got so bad
that in 1969 my high school calculus
teacher, Mr. Foster, told me that if I did one single homework
assignment, he’d base my grade on my tests—meaning I’d get an A. But if I
continued to do absolutely no homework, he’d base my grade on the homework and
give me a zero.
So I decided that if I was going to do
only one homework, I would make it suitable for hanging
in a gallery. I spent a big chunk of my
savings to buy a mathematical font attachment for my parents’
IBM Selectric and
I typeset my answers. In my dad’s sculpture studio I was able to use fixative
to emboss my answer sheet and mount it on a wooden backing that I carved by
hand.
Mr. Foster was so thrilled that he wore
my homework around his neck the entire day.
Other teachers saw it and they all
demanded one homework from me, too. Damn!
To this day, before doing something I
don’t want to do, I try to transform it into something I’m eager to do. For
more on this I refer you to that great 20th century philosopher, Mary Poppins,
who said, “In every job that must be done, there is an element of fun. You find
the fun, and—SNAP—the job’s a game!”
Don’t
do hard boring useless things
My friend, Ken Caldeira, runs a very
productive
lab at Stanford.
He once told me that many academics get bogged down with really hard esoteric
problems nobody cares about, even the researchers themselves. He told me he
only wants projects that are fun, impactful, and easy.
If someone is paying you to do hard
boring useless things then you need to have a conversation
with your boss. If you are a student
going into debt to have people give you hard boring useless assignments then
perhaps you’d be better off dropping out.
You
don’t need to finish what you start
Recently, a successful businessman told
me that a few years ago he was diagnosed mid-life with ADHD. This helped
explain why his personal and business life was such a mess; he was always
starting things but he never finished them, and that would drive everyone
around him nuts.
He told me his therapy began with a
year of Ritalin, then a year of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), and then
finally his business itself became his therapy. He explained that the drug gave
him
a break from himself, and the CBT
helped him re-frame his circumstances. Finally, he realized that most people
are great at finishing what they start but they have a hard time getting
started.
So he starts all manner of things and
gives his projects to other people to finish. They are happy,
he is happy, and his business has
really taken off.
As he exemplifies, the biggest problem
with ADHD isn’t so much that you have it but that everyone around you hates
that you have it. Just think how much better things would be if schoolmarms
would stop guilt-tripping the rambunctious and just let them start running the
world as soon as
they are ready.
Clear
thinking saves time
I once asked Dennis Shasha of NYU’s Courant
Institute of Mathematical Sciences how
he accomplishes so much and still has
time to help so many people. He said, “I focus on what I do best—usually
thinking through a problem, writing something clearly, or programming in
K.” I also try to think clearly, and for
problems that cannot be expressed with words I use
APL, which is a forerunner to K.
Having
time for people saves you time
The more you do for others the more
they will do for you. This saves you time.
Kind of obvious, if you think about it.
Don’t
lie
Living in a fictional world is
exhausting and a huge time sink. Don’t do it.
Manage
people
If you want your life to be about being
of use to other people then there is only a very limited amount of time
management that makes any sense. Other people have needs and present
opportunities on their schedule, not yours. You need to get good at managing
those people
and the time will take care of itself.
Learn how to say “no” and this will
allow you to say “yes” much more often. I once asked a friend
to do a favor for me that would have
taken him about six hours. In his e-mail turning me down
he said that while many people might
say “I don’t have time,” that would be false; he has the same amount of time
that we all do, and although it would be possible for him to do what I asked,
he chose to spend his time differently
from the way I’d hoped.
Perhaps you are not used to such
forthrightness, but interestingly if you treat people honestly
in this way then you’ll find it
strengthens your relationships rather than hurts them.
But
don’t manage other people’s time
When I asked my friend to do something
for me, I was trying to tell him what to do with his time. When he told me “no”
he was not telling me what to do with my time, he was telling me
what he did not want to do with his
time.
And if you are a grownup, stop
torturing the little ones. My parents let me have a childhood,
which is an age-appropriate thing for
me to be doing at the time. They forced me to do chores,
but they didn’t make me do much of
anything that was “for my own good.” Summer, for example, was for getting into
trouble, getting out of trouble, and not telling my parents about it. This was
fine with them as long as the lawn got mowed.
The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of
Mental Disorders was first released in 1952, the year I was born. It was 130
pages long and listed 106 mental disorders. By 1994, when my sons were
children, this manual had grown to 886 pages and itemized 297 disorders, some
of which I think are fancy names for what Mark Twain used to define as a boy,
namely: “Noise with dirt on it.” A new DSM has just come out and I suspect they
have not added Time-Obsessed Parenting Syndrome, and they won’t until someone
comes up with an expensive drug for it. But there is a cure: just stop.
To-do
lists are best if you cannot remember where you put them
The great thing about writing something
down is that your subconscious brain will stop obsessing about it and you can
relax and go to sleep or the movies or whatever. But the bad thing about to-do
lists is that you might feel compelled to do all those things. Luckily, I’m
great at making and losing lists. The list helps me get to sleep tonight and
then tomorrow when I cannot find it I only do what
I remember to do, which turns out to be
the important things.
Also, keep “did” lists. If you track
all you’ve already done, the little bit still to do will seem less daunting.
Structured
procrastination
I am writing this story for Quartz
because I should be getting ready for a presentation instead.
But I am sick of thinking about that so
I checked my inbox for something fun to do and found
a request from my editor at QZ. This is
how my life works; nearly everything I’ve accomplished
has been because I was trying to avoid
doing something else.
John Perry, a professor emeritus at
Stanford, calls this “structured procrastination” and he has
a website and even a whole book about
it. Someday you should read it, unless you’re behind
on a deadline—in which case you should
read it right now.
What
is time good for anyway?
What are we talking about anyway? We
are talking about your time on earth, so before you decide on how to manage
your time, you need to know what you want your life to be about. You cannot
have it all and therefore if you concentrate on one thing then something else
will have to give.
For example, if your life is about
checking chores off of a to-do list then you will probably have less time to
explore unanticipated opportunities. And, if you are more of an explorer then
you’re likely
to leave undone the things you were
working on when you received the call to adventure.
http://qz.com/172718/if-you-manage-your-time-terribly-youll-get-more-done/
and find easy, fast and efficient ways of working with
the issues or little unpleasantness’s in your life.
Further down you will find:
Time management – some potential options. 20/01/14
Time Management and the Twitter trap. 19/01/14
Powerful goal setting rules. 10/01/14
How to say what you need. 29/12/13
Words that can get you into and out of trouble. 26/12/13
How to say ‘No’ at work in a way that helps your career.
24/12/13
How I learned to stop procrastinating and love letting
go. 08/12/13
The art of resting fully. 29/11/13
Take back your power. 09/11/13
