Advice on Thinking at Higher Altitudes

[Anonymous]

High Altitude Thinking

seems to me that some folks are in danger of slipping into the either/or false dichotomy when contrasting the effectiveness of visualisation with taking action (whether "massive" action or GTD bite-sized next actions).

From my own experience (similar generally to DFE's), its (now) clear that

1. visualisation alone won't work (where "work" means being satsified with progress towards meaningful goals)

2. just "doing" without some sense of where you want to go, who you want to be (a.k.a visualisation) does not "work" either.

I think we all need a blend of visualisation and next action to feel fulfilled (and systems to support each activity). The GTD system is focussed on the runway and 10K ft. level (projects and next actions) but the whole GTD philosophy is informed by deep thinking and reflection on the higher altitude stuff. The system is the best I've encountered for drilling down high-altitude thinking into "what now" thinking and taking action.

So go do the high altitude stuff (but don't forget to make it real).

 

[CosmoGTD]

Just a note on the nature of the human mind/brain, I just watched a fascinating Nova show about the neurobiological nature of the human mind. Brings up some astonishing questions about Consciousness, "reality", and even religious experiences at the end of the show.

Coz

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/mind/

Here is the transcript of the show.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/transcripts/2812mind.html

But its undeniable success in uncramping James's phantom hand suggests that even pain can be a construct of the mind. The phenomenon of phantom limbs reveals how our brains can delude us into being conscious of something that isn't there.

--------------------
But Ramachandran has come across an even stranger condition, a remarkable ability of the brain that allows you to see even though you are totally blind. This rare condition is called "blindsight."

If there's one thing that this phenomenon of blindsight teaches us, it is that vision is not entirely seeing, that there can be a disconnection from the capacity to respond to visual information and the actual act of being visually aware of something. Those two things can be separated and probably are in our everyday lives. But the problem is that, obviously, we're not aware of the things that we're not aware of. We just don't know the extent to which they play a part.

V.S. RAMACHANDRAN: It's almost as if the patient is using ESP. He can see and yet cannot see. So it's a paradox, it's almost like science fiction. How is this possible?
-----------------------

 

[Busydave]

Coz

I saw a two part documentary on UK’s Channel 4 last year called “Soul Searching” which dealt with consciousness.

It featured the idea that all our knowledge is packaged in the form of little narratives, or stories: that’s just the way information hangs together for us.

The most intriguing theory was that consciousness and “self” are also just stories by which the brain explains to itself what it is doing. Even though we are “inside” our minds, we really cannot give much of an account of all the stuff that’s going on in here.

So, a short hand account of all that activity has evolved, and that is what we call self/consciouienss/my mind: but there is no actual separate “self”.

Dave

 

[cris]

Re: Some additional info

This is certainly not true for me. Much of what I do begins with learning. Learning math, learning how to throw a party, learning a language, etc. First I learn, then I do. I wouldn't have been able to go to France and speak French with the people there had I not sat down for half an hour to an hour every morning for five weeks and read about how to speak French from a book. "Just do it" wouldn't have worked for me in this case. Maybe it works for the person who wrote those rules, but not for me. I wouldn't be writing computational geometry software had I not studied math in college for four years. I read the DA book before I started collecting, processing, and organizing in a way that transformed the way I carry out my mundane tasks. Etc., etc., etc.

Obviously from the rules you get the idea that for this guy "loser" has something to do with material circumstances, and in that sense I'm no loser, though thinking about my life in terms of "winning" or "losing" seems completely irrelevant. Everybody is different. I think these methods and books we're discussing can all be subtitled, "The System That Works For Me." This is fine if you have something in common with the author. I've just searched until I found those authors.

Cris

SECRET NUMBER 2: LEARNING IS FOR LOSERS.
Don't learn it. Don't study it. DO it. Where would your life be right now if you had simply done everything you already know?

 

[dsueiro]

What happens to an artist if he starts to believe that he needs the typical tools that goal-setting gurus tell us we need? He will believe that the first thing he has to do is smother his sensitivity, and the second thing he has to do is take life by the scruff of the neck and kick its ass. The result? He ceases to be an artist.

Ok, artists might need different ways of structuring their work, but I'd like to share a quote from a great game programmer who basically says that sometimes lack of inspiration might be, in some cases, procastination in disguise:

"Putting creativity on a pedestal can also be an excuse for laziness. There is a lot of cultural belief that creativity comes from inspiration, and can't be rushed. Not true. Inspiration is just your subconscious putting things together, and that can be made into an active process with a little introspection.

Focused, hard work is the real key to success. Keep your eyes on the goal, and just keep taking the next step towards completing it. If you aren't sure which way to do something, do it both ways and see which works better." - John Carmack

 

[Bellaisa]

My oh my! I didn't realize what an interesting conversation I'd be starting when I posted my seemingly simple question! Thanks so much for all these replies. They gave me a lot to think about. I had the much-awaited day-off yesterday and thought it might be a good idea to circle back around and tell how the day went and what I learned.

This has been such a landmark 12 months for me, so taking some time to do this was especially valuable. To put it mildly, my life looks quite different than it did a year ago. During the past year I had my second baby (in late spring actually - just thrilling), managed working full time plus motherhood (challenging), dealt with an increased work load while being down one key staff person for a good part of the year (stretching), sold a home and bought another home (rewarding), my husband was diagnosed and treated for prostate cancer (frightening) and my then two year old daughter was diagnosed with autism (devastating). It's been wild - so slowing down to get some perspective was great.

Here are some random thoughts -

1) I did take the advice of using Your Best Year Yet. It isn't the kind of book I would ordinarily buy, but the questions she uses provided a nice structure for what I was wanting to do. She has great clarifying questions. So thank you for the recommendations. I think it would be interesting to develop my own set of personal questions to use each year.

2) Best Year Yet recommneds looking back over your past year and reflecting on your accomplishments/dissapointments. Somewhere along the line, I remember DA saying something the similar. Don't throw away your projects list!! I printed a list of projects that I'd completed during this time frame and it was very, very powerful to read through them. I came away profoundly grateful for getting through some tough things fairly intact, but also with a more clear picture of what areas of my life need more attention.

3) I took the advice about getting out of my usual routine and spent the morning in a part of the city I had never visited. I just "happened upon" the perfect little cafe where I could sit by a window and look out onto a fountain, eat breakfast and write. This was great for the more big picture, reflective, creative thinking - it kinda shook things up - and it was fun!

4) I found however, that when it came time in the afternoon to organize these thoughts into more concrete actions, I instinctively wanted to head home. I wanted to be able to kick off my shoes, use my computer, play music of my own choosing and not be distracted by things/people coming in and out of my environment. I tried going to a coffee shop in the afternoon and that just didn't work - too many conversations going on too close to me.

5) Looking back over all that had happened made me realize more fully the value of the weekly review. Any one of the things I mentioned that happened over the past year had the power to be completely all consuming - and of necessity, there were times when I had to put a lot of focus in certain areas and let other areas slide. However, the weekly review kept reminding me on a consistent basis of all that I am am committed to so that I didn't get sucked too far into just getting run over by these things.

6) My major mistake - I tried to cram too much into one day...I wanted to also make it an R&R day, so I scheduled a massage at the beginning of the day and getting my nails done at the end....a treat like that is great, but one of those things would have been plenty. I was actually really tired when the day was over. Doing something like this for downtime is a nice thing though - and I think best at the end of the day - going to the driving range and hitting a bucket of balls, whatever suits you to let your mind decompress. Basically, what I need is a good vacation - coming soon!

7) What I think I came away with is a much clearer understanding about what is important to me and what part of my life needs to most focus along with a few solid, actionable ideas that I think will make a difference. I'll pop them into my projects, next actions and weekly review checklist and see how it turns out!

In short, it was extremely valuable, and I intend to make it an annual event (got it written down ).

 

[Anonymous]

Bellaisa,

Thanks so much for your very inspiring post!!!

I've been implementing GTD for half a year now but am still avoiding thinking in higher altitudes.

I would much appreciate if you could explain how you "translate" your goals / higher altitude projects to the 20 k and 10 k altitudes.

 

[Bellaisa]

hmmmmmm, boy, I wish I could say I was an expert on this, but I avoid thinking on higher altitudes too! I'm much more of a nitty, gritty clikc things off your list type of person. If fact, the goals I've been using for my weekly review were written in July 2002. So I was working with yearly goals that were well over a year past due. Not all of them were done yet, so perhaps that was OK.

At any rate, I think what I allowed myself to do when I set some time to think about this was tune into my "inner in-box" - and I think daily reviews and weekly reviews do the same thing. We have our email, voice mail, meeting notes, etc - but periodically we need to let our minds and spirits give us input on what we need to do. On an earlier post on weekly reviews, somone gave the advice of "pray before you start" which I think is absolutely right and is important for the daily review as well- you need to activate this side of yourself. It is just as an important part of doing our work as attending meetings, processing our in-box, etc.

Back to your question.... what I realized in doing my big picture thinking that a big thing I need to focus on in my life in general - at more of the 40,000 foot level is ask for more support from people - my staff, my husband, etc. Focusing that issue on say, my daughter's autism, I came up with the goal/focus for this year of "put together the best possible support team for daughter's autism - family, school, medical professionals, etc.". Which is important, but not very actionable....but I'm putting projects around it that are very actionable - for example, find an easy to understand article on autism to give to family members to educate them and make this less scary, come up with 3 activities that grandpa and grandma could do with daughter to help (i.e., rolling a ball back and forth is excellent for building interaction), call people in my network to find a referral to a better developmental pediatrician. For right now, I think I need to keep those projects down to things that could be done within about three months; otherwise my sense is that it could become too ominous.

I hope that helps. I am a big newbie at this element of GTD - in fact, I'm kicking myself at not tuning into this part of it sooner.

Oh well, we learn things in layers.

 

[Anonymous]

thanks so much.
I will give it a try

 

[Scott_L_Lewis]

Heading Home

4) I found however, that when it came time in the afternoon to organize these thoughts into more concrete actions, I instinctively wanted to head home. I wanted to be able to kick off my shoes, use my computer, play music of my own choosing and not be distracted by things/people coming in and out of my environment. I tried going to a coffee shop in the afternoon and that just didn't work - too many conversations going on too close to me.

Interesting post, but I'm curious about one thing. In retrospect, did you find that your impulse to head home was rooted in a desire to procrastinate organizing your thoughts, or was it rooted in a need to let your thoughts incubate for a while before organizing them further?

 

[Bellaisa]

Interesting comment! Hmmm. I don't think I was procrastinating because I was really motivated to work on it; however, I very well could have needed a break and time to incubate and the drive home gave me that. But I think overall, I just needed a place that was quiet and comfortable -- being in a new scene was invigorating in the morning when I wanted to be creative, but distracting in the afternoon when I needed to focus/organize.

Alicia

 

[Anonymous]

self discipline

Hi,

I don't come around all that often, but I just read through this rather long thread, which has been of great interest. What I especially wanted to respond to was the comment by DFE about self discipline and freedom:

There are some snappy ripostes to Adorno and Horkheimer around the web, usually along the lines that you cannot have true freedom unless your have strong self discipline – I suppose they mean freedom from short term gratification, which enables you to get your hands on more substantial stuff.
[/quote]

I have spent most of my life as a ballet dancer (I am now moving on to a career as a writer), and I spent a lot of my teenaged years rebelling against the conformity and perfectionism of my art. I absolutely loved dancing, which is why I left home at 15 to persue it whole heartedly. But I had a deep internal conflict with the conformity and perfectionism my art demanded. I craved the sense of freedom that accomplished professionals obviously had with their bodies - their expression, their range of movement, their sheer artistry - but I wanted it ASAP, and I didn't understand that the actual daily process of conforming and perfecting were exactly what was going to get me the freedom I so craved! I thought I just wasn't good enough, that my personality wasn't cut out for it, that I would never be like them (none of this was true.) I would quit for months at a time, and then feel a horrible sense of grief, go back and do it all over again. Eventually I committed heart and soul to my art - I married it, gave it everything it asked, sacrificed, quit questioning, like a monk in a monastery. One of the greatest milestones in my life, the thing that I feel so priveledged to have experienced, was that exact freedom I so desired. One day in class, I realized I had no resistance, I was able to do everything the teacher asked in a very difficult class with complete ease, my heart was full, and the music played off of me like never before. Freedom. Absolute bliss.

It really comes down to the Yin/Yang of the universe: constrict to release, dark before light, ect. In some great irony, the complete discipline of self (for me, in this one aspect) leads to infinite freedom of that same self in exact proportion to the discipline given.

Knowing our goals, and seeing and feeling them clearly, is what gives us the capacity to commit in such a way. For me, I had to clear out a lot of cobwebs that surrounded my true goal. Getting a job with a national company was a carrot that I thought was the goal. Eventually I realized that freedom (of movement, of expression, overcoming the limitations of my body) was my only goal as an artist and that had nothing to do with external achievement. It was only once I understood what I truly wanted that I could give everything. Knowing what I wanted very clearly was the linchpin of the whole experience.