Front end Priorities + Way too many ideas

[spiritualclarity]

Hello all,
I'm relatively new to GTD and I have two main issues/complaints i can't reconcile yet.
1. Priorities Projects
2. Having more ideas in a day than the average person

I only have so much time, as all do, so to put everything in a context list, without priority or urgency, and just work from a "Next actions" list, gives equal weight to all things. That is silly. "Create new sales" is not nearly as important as "Write that blog post". Yet doing it the way David suggests would have me do just that.
My "Contexts" are strange because I work from home. I don't do phone calls. So 90% of everything is @computer.

Second, i'm an idea's person. I could just have ideas all day, capture them, organize, and never get to doing them. That is what I did years ago when trying GTD. I became the classic complaint "I'm spending all my time IN GTD i'm not IN my life."

So at some point I just have to say "ok brain, enough ideas, shut up. I need to get to work now."

I don't have time to capture all the "Open loops". They literally never stop.

Any suggestions on either would be most welcome!
Wil

 

[TesTeq]

I only have so much time, as all do, so to put everything in a context list, without priority or urgency, and just work from a "Next actions" list, gives equal weight to all things. That is silly. "Create new sales" is not nearly as important as "Write that blog post". Yet doing it the way David suggests would have me do just that.

@spiritualclarity How often do you do Weekly Review? How many Weekly Reviews have you done? Do you use Someday/Maybe list?

My "Contexts" are strange because I work from home. I don't do phone calls. So 90% of everything is @computer.

Why do you think it's strange. Many people have big @computer list these days.

Second, i'm an idea's person. I could just have ideas all day, capture them, organize, and never get to doing them. That is what I did years ago when trying GTD. I became the classic complaint "I'm spending all my time IN GTD i'm not IN my life."

Park them on your Someday/Maybe list.

 

[ivanjay205]

Hello all,
I'm relatively new to GTD and I have two main issues/complaints i can't reconcile yet.
1. Priorities Projects
2. Having more ideas in a day than the average person

I only have so much time, as all do, so to put everything in a context list, without priority or urgency, and just work from a "Next actions" list, gives equal weight to all things. That is silly. "Create new sales" is not nearly as important as "Write that blog post". Yet doing it the way David suggests would have me do just that.
My "Contexts" are strange because I work from home. I don't do phone calls. So 90% of everything is @computer.

Second, i'm an idea's person. I could just have ideas all day, capture them, organize, and never get to doing them. That is what I did years ago when trying GTD. I became the classic complaint "I'm spending all my time IN GTD i'm not IN my life."

So at some point I just have to say "ok brain, enough ideas, shut up. I need to get to work now."

I don't have time to capture all the "Open loops". They literally never stop.

Any suggestions on either would be most welcome!
Wil

Priority Pojects
There are a few ways to handle this in GTD. There is nothing to say that you ONLY can work on your next actions list. That is certainly ideal but I have a perspective set up in my system to view client work. I always scan that list after finishing my morning routine to ensure I am tackling those items that I can. Once I do that I switch to my contexts. GTD promotes Areas of Focus. If certain areas are higher priority for you, you can certainly zero in on them through this area of focus.

However, what you will find is that you can still work on the priority projects just working out of contexts.... You can pick out the next actions related to the projects you need to tackle first. But if you are on an airplane, you cant make calls. Regardless of where the priority is on the project. So tackle what you can do at that time.

Having more ideas in a day than the average person
I hate to answer it this way but how do you know what the average person does? I often will have 20-30 items captured a day. Somedays only 6. IT varies. But capture them all and decide what you want to do with them. I often will move 1/2 of my days to the someday list because I know I do a weekly review weekly.... And I cannot tackle all of those items this week. So park them when I can come back to them.

I found for me that computer is a parent task and I have subtasks under it for different tools on the computer. This way if I am in Outlook I can fly through everything in outlook etc. That works for me.

As to the idea of capture, organize and never do them.... Are you organizing them as you capture them? The idea is to capture them instantly and ignore them. Come back to them during clarify/organize later.

I think you need a full major brain sweep initially to get into things. After that you will find the ideas calm down a bit. But why is capturing a ton unhealthy? It sounds like you are committing to too much, not capturing too much.

 

[Gardener]

I only have so much time, as all do, so to put everything in a context list, without priority or urgency, and just work from a "Next actions" list, gives equal weight to all things. That is silly.

I move pretty much everything that isn't a high priority, and that I'm not likely to get to in the next couple of weeks, into a Someday/Maybe list.

"Create new sales" is not nearly as important as "Write that blog post". Yet doing it the way David suggests would have me do just that.

The system doesn't tell you to do "create new sales" first. It doesn't even tell you to make it an active project. That's your choice. If "create new sales" is not a priority right now, you could move it over to Someday/Maybe. Or you could choose one small subproject (it sounds like Create New Sales is a project, and in fact a pretty large project, not an action?) to keep in your active lists.

My "Contexts" are strange because I work from home. I don't do phone calls. So 90% of everything is @computer.

You can divide your computer tasks into contexts other than computer. For example, Design versus Coding versus Testing versus Documentation, if you're a programmer. Focused Work versus Cranking Widgets versus Brain Dead. Or any number of other categories.

Second, i'm an idea's person. I could just have ideas all day, capture them, organize, and never get to doing them. That is what I did years ago when trying GTD. I became the classic complaint "I'm spending all my time IN GTD i'm not IN my life."

What's involved in "organize"? I suspect that you may be investing too much time in each idea. When I have an idea, I take perhaps five seconds to type it into my Inbox, and a week or so later I may take another two seconds to put it in one of my Someday/Maybe lists with other ideas in a similar category. Then every month or two I may go through those lists to choose one or two ideas, out of dozens or hundreds, to actually consider implementing. Edited to add: Only then would I even begin to consider the possibility of considering the possibility of making it a project and giving it any actions.

 

[spiritualclarity]

You can divide your computer tasks into contexts other than computer. For example, Design versus Coding versus Testing versus Documentation, if you're a programmer. Focused Work versus Cranking Widgets versus Brain Dead. Or any number of other categories.

Thanks for taking the time to reply. I'm new to this forum so not sure the best way to reply back. For this suggestion you have above ...

This would seem to point more to old system i've used. Not "Context based" but "Priority based" . For example, if I see in my week I should do content creation, sales, customer support, website design, client follow up - I would time block each. So those aren't each a "Context". They are a priority or even an area of focus. So i would time block those in my calendar.

So why bother having a next actions list if they are going to be automatically filed into a priority from the start ? That is what my question was. Having a front end priority to say "Well i know my goal is to increase sales, so make sure I have more time booked for those actions in the week than Content creation."

But then that isn't GTD.

And for how long it takes to Process my inbox. Each one is 2, sometimes 5 minutes on average. To decide on a "next action" and "What is my outcome here?" that is usually about 2-5 minutes. I'm not doing anything else. I'm just thinking it through.

Not sure what i'm doing so wrong on all this.

 

[spiritualclarity]

@spiritualclarity How often do you do Weekly Review? How many Weekly Reviews have you done? Do you use Someday/Maybe list?

I've done 3 very chopped up weekly reviews. I never get 2 hours at a time. Looks like I would need 3. Family time, job and business. So i do an hour at a time best I can.

Why do you think it's strange. Many people have big @computer list these days.

Ok, that is good to know! So then what is the breakdown after that? THey are no longer "Contexts". They are "Priorities". If it is "@Blog Writing" or "@Sales" that is a goal, or area of focus, not a "Context" as I understood them in GTD

Park them on your Someday/Maybe list.

So I just throw everything in there and review later? I thought I was supposed to think through each one, ask "What is the next action? And what is the outcome?" and then decide from there. That is the part that takes me ages.

Thanks for takiing the time to reply! This all seems insane to attempt still!

 

[mcogilvie]

1. GTD has a model which classifies next actions by context, time required, energy needed, and priority, in that order. If your not familiar with this, I recommend that you (re-)read the GTD book.

2. Everybody has lots of ideas all the time. Maybe you are above average, maybe not. But having ideas is not the same as implementing the good ideas you have. To do that, you have to capture ideas which may be good, and apply a process to triage them. So we normally don’t capture “I want a doughnut, but I shouldn’t have one” or “I’d like to meet that charming young lady who just walked past me.” We might capture “Maybe the hardware store has a tool to help fix the toilet” or “We might save money with solar power.” it’s common for people over-capture when they start GTD but it’s usually self-correcting. What are you doing with all those ideas without GTD?

 

[spiritualclarity]

1. GTD has a model which classifies next actions by context, time required, energy needed, and priority, in that order. If your not familiar with this, I recommend that you (re-)read the GTD book.

Thanks for jumping in. I have been re-reading the book for a month and re-apply as I go. I've done this 3 times over the past 10 years roughly. Always get overwhelemed and less productive. Trying to break through this time.

That first one "Context" makes no sense to me as a self employed person with my computer with me all the time. I don't fly, who does phone calls anymore, and my business isn't widget cranking. So ...? All of my work requires a lot of thinking, planning a launch, designing a program, re-working a sales pipeline. I can do these at any time. So contexts don't make any sense to me.

2. Everybody has lots of ideas all the time. Maybe you are above average, maybe not. But having ideas is not the same as implementing the good ideas you have. To do that, you have to capture ideas which may be good, and apply a process to triage them. So we normally don’t capture “I want a doughnut, but I shouldn’t have one” or “I’d like to meet that charming young lady who just walked past me.” We might capture “Maybe the hardware store has a tool to help fix the toilet” or “We might save money with solar power.” it’s common for people over-capture when they start GTD but it’s usually self-correcting. What are you doing with all those ideas without GTD?

Before, i would write down what seemed like the most important - Life things that would blow up like "Change tires" and business things like "Make 10 new sales" and ignore everything else the best I could. I would time block for specific projects and pick priorities for the day and week.

Now i'm doing the opposite. Capturing like a pro. But my productivity is gone down, and i'm getting less done. I have 90 minutes a day to work on my business (Job and family the rest). So if i spend 30 minutes even to process my inbox, now I just have 60 minutes. Or I stay up after the kid is in bed.

I can feel i'm making this more difficult than its supposed to be. But i'm following what he says in the book, and listening to the podcast and webinars every chance I get, and there just isn't enough time to process my whole life and get anything done afterwards.

Hence my question of "There has to be some front end priority here." Otherwise, without some kind of filter, i'm sunk.

Seems that others have an easier time sorting and putting things in "Someday maybe" if they are doing on average 30 seconds each item. Takes me 2-5 minutes to think each one through to decide on next action for most things i'm "Capturing".

Thank you for jumping in to try to lend some experience to the mess i've made of this so far!

 

[TesTeq]

2. Everybody has lots of ideas all the time. Maybe you are above average, maybe not. But having ideas is not the same as implementing the good ideas you have.

@mcogilvie I've got a lot of brilliant ideas all the time. Then I go to the shopping mall or browse the internet and find most of them implemented in beautiful products…

 

[Oogiem]

I only have so much time, as all do, so to put everything in a context list, without priority or urgency, and just work from a "Next actions" list, gives equal weight to all things.

No, you are missing that you adjust what you work on first by context then by time available then energy and your own understanding of importance. Context is the necessary condition. Other conditions may also be necessary but context allows you to ignore the hundreds of other things on your lists because you can't (or shouldn't) do them right now.

My "Contexts" are strange because I work from home

I've been working from home for over 20 years. Most of my contexts could be @computer but that leads to excessively long lists that are repelling to me. So I split up @computer by application I need or which of the multiple computers I work on is the most efficient and best suited for the task. Or you can split up by the type of work, refactoring code is a lot different from writing code or SQL queries which is different from creating executables. I'm currently working on a huge system that has a mobile app written in Java, a desktop app written in Python and a database that is shared between the apps. I need to work in one language or the other because I get confused if I don't. So I stay in a Python mode, typically for a day, switch to database mode for a day then to Java then back to database before going back to Python. That’s the only way I can keep all 3 pieces moving forward efficiently. Yes I double up on the database but that's appropriate because the work I need to do there is converting from one system to another and due to limitiations of the source system it's a lot of by hand cut and paste. I also have to refer to paper backups and original historical documents to verify the entries in the database. The original digitization was over 20 years ago and there were errors that did not surface until last year that I have to trace back and fix. That is a high energy task so I need to break it up so I don't introduce new errors into the data. Low energy for me is writing SQL queries. I use that as a break between bouts of conversion work.

Having more ideas in a day than the average person

I would say that you probably have just as many ideas as the next person. I have actually counted and I generally produce between 30-100 new captured items or thoughts each day to process. I also usually get between 100-300 email messages a day. Processing time for that level of inputs is between 1-2 hours a day. In just over 1 night I can use up half a small 3*5 spiral bound notepad I keep by my bed when I wake up with ideas related to problems that I was working on the day before. Those can become bug or feature reports into the project plan for one of the software projects or can be added to the future directions. Sometimes they are just long lists of things like shpping things that I need to add to the shopping list or just possible future things I want to do or work on. Sometimes I capture the same basic idea twice, that's ok. I do note that I've had that idea again. If I find that the same things keeps coming up I may try to figure out why, and see if I need to drop something so I can make room to work on that since it's clearly still on my mind.

What you are missing is the proper triage of those ideas. My breakdown is that usually 75% of the email is into the trash. For the other things I capture that I generate as opposed to externally generated I find that about 10% can be trashed once I actually re-read and look at them. Usually at least 50% goes directly into Someday/Maybe. The remaining 40% are usually part of existing projects or related to them in some way. They take a bit more time to review and incorporate into the project they belong to. I capture to one of my inboxes (paper, email, task manager or my reference tool) and then process out of there.

Then you have to review your entire system at appropriate times. Current active projects get reviewed weekly. Often that's when the half formed ideas and notes related to that project get incorporated into the real project plan. Sometimes I feel a need to do a mini project review more frequently.

For me reviewing all my someday/maybe lists at weekly review would be impossible. I have over 30 different ones and there are over 800 individual projects on those lists. I review them once a quarter over the week I take to reset my system and my priorities for the next season. I look at my areas of focus and often pick only 2 or 3 to really push forward each season. Over the course of a year I will hit all my major AOFs with some quality time completeing projects but I don't try to keep them all at full active all year.

Capture does not mean you have to do. It's ok to capture and NEVER do the thing you captured. It's also necessary to limit what is active and have a place to park the things you might still want to do but don't have time to do now.

 

[spiritualclarity]

No, you are missing that you adjust what you work on first by context then by time available then energy and your own understanding of importance. Context is the necessary condition. Other conditions may also be necessary but context allows you to ignore the hundreds of other things on your lists because you can't (or shouldn't) do them right now.


I've been working from home for over 20 years. Most of my contexts could be @computer but that leads to excessively long lists that are repelling to me. So I split up @computer by application I need or which of the multiple computers I work on is the most efficient and best suited for the task. Or you can split up by the type of work, refactoring code is a lot different from writing code or SQL queries which is different from creating executables. I'm currently working on a huge system that has a mobile app written in Java, a desktop app written in Python and a database that is shared between the apps. I need to work in one language or the other because I get confused if I don't. So I stay in a Python mode, typically for a day, switch to database mode for a day then to Java then back to database before going back to Python. That’s the only way I can keep all 3 pieces moving forward efficiently. Yes I double up on the database but that's appropriate because the work I need to do there is converting from one system to another and due to limitiations of the source system it's a lot of by hand cut and paste. I also have to refer to paper backups and original historical documents to verify the entries in the database. The original digitization was over 20 years ago and there were errors that did not surface until last year that I have to trace back and fix. That is a high energy task so I need to break it up so I don't introduce new errors into the data. Low energy for me is writing SQL queries. I use that as a break between bouts of conversion work.

Thank you for such a detailed reply. I think what i don't get is "Context". As I read it in Davids books, context should tell me all the other things I CAN"T do right now.
On a plane, can't do email
At work, can't mow the lawn.

For me, context by that definition means nothing. I work from home. I would write a sales sequence for my email list, create a new blog post, record a video, or follow up with potential clients on FB. They are all equal. I could do them all, all day long. There is no context.

So then i have to Schedule or Time Block that "Mode" for appropriate amounts of time in the week.

Otherwise i look at my lovely "Business admin" list, or "Write new copy for home page" and feel good, and never get to working on my sales conversations to have, or potential clients to reach out to.

So if they are on different "Lists" than they aren't Contexts, they are goals, priorities, area's of focus.

If this was the 90's or early 2000's, i get context. I would have only my phone sometimes, or only my calls list, or only my computer. But today its all right here in front of me, all day. And since i'm not a computer programer, i can do it all, all day long.

So i need some kind of way to prioritize. Context isn't it for me it seems. So it would be more so "Time and/or Energy Available". So in the morning I have more energy, I generally do creative tasks. In the afternoon less energy, i Generally do admin tasks. But again, that isn't a context. It's all right in front of me. That is a "Mode".
Maybe someday i'll have to pay for his teams coaching because this is a real sticking point for me!

Thank you for jumping in to help! I'll read more forum posts and see what others do as well. I love the community here so far!

I would say that you probably have just as many ideas as the next person. I have actually counted and I generally produce between 30-100 new captured items or thoughts each day to process. I also usually get between 100-300 email messages a day. Processing time for that level of inputs is between 1-2 hours a day. In just over 1 night I can use up half a small 3*5 spiral bound notepad I keep by my bed when I wake up with ideas related to problems that I was working on the day before. Those can become bug or feature reports into the project plan for one of the software projects or can be added to the future directions. Sometimes they are just long lists of things like shpping things that I need to add to the shopping list or just possible future things I want to do or work on. Sometimes I capture the same basic idea twice, that's ok. I do note that I've had that idea again. If I find that the same things keeps coming up I may try to figure out why, and see if I need to drop something so I can make room to work on that since it's clearly still on my mind.

What you are missing is the proper triage of those ideas. My breakdown is that usually 75% of the email is into the trash. For the other things I capture that I generate as opposed to externally generated I find that about 10% can be trashed once I actually re-read and look at them. Usually at least 50% goes directly into Someday/Maybe. The remaining 40% are usually part of existing projects or related to them in some way. They take a bit more time to review and incorporate into the project they belong to. I capture to one of my inboxes (paper, email, task manager or my reference tool) and then process out of there.

Then you have to review your entire system at appropriate times. Current active projects get reviewed weekly. Often that's when the half formed ideas and notes related to that project get incorporated into the real project plan. Sometimes I feel a need to do a mini project review more frequently.

For me reviewing all my someday/maybe lists at weekly review would be impossible. I have over 30 different ones and there are over 800 individual projects on those lists. I review them once a quarter over the week I take to reset my system and my priorities for the next season. I look at my areas of focus and often pick only 2 or 3 to really push forward each season. Over the course of a year I will hit all my major AOFs with some quality time completeing projects but I don't try to keep them all at full active all year.

Capture does not mean you have to do. It's ok to capture and NEVER do the thing you captured. It's also necessary to limit what is active and have a place to park the things you might still want to do but don't have time to do now.

 

[John Forrister]

Thank you for such a detailed reply. I think what i don't get is "Context". As I read it in Davids books, context should tell me all the other things I CAN"T do right now.

You may be limiting yourself if you interpret contexts as what you "can't" do right now. You can do almost anything, and contexts help you choose what's most efficient. You might assign tasks to contexts that have low switching cost. I do bookkeeping and coding. Both are at my computer and online. But it's much more efficient for me to do a batch of bookkeeping tasks and not bounce to any coding, because they are different mindsets.

The challenge with trying to prioritize up front is that most of us have so many new inputs each day that what we decided was a priority yesterday isn't today.

It could also be useful if you consider what contexts match your areas of focus and accountability.

 

[Oogiem]

As I read it in Davids books, context should tell me all the other things I CAN"T do right now.

That is not the only definition of context. Context can be so much more. Look at the switching cost between things you do.

I would write a sales sequence for my email list, create a new blog post, record a video, or follow up with potential clients on FB. They are all equal. I could do them all, all day long. There is no context.

Let's take your list.

Writing a sequence for an email list is a thinking task, you need to be creative. So perhaps a context for that work would be "On Top of the World"

Creating a blog post implies writing. What tools do you use to write? to design posts? to code them for publication? The Tool is a context. I write things in Obsidian, sometimes in Libre Office and sometimes in Scrivener. Each tool has strengths and weaknesses and is better suited to certain types of writing. So when I have an action to "write a blog post" I'll choose the tool that works best. In the past that used to be DEVONThink, now I use Obsidian because I can easily take the markdown files and publish them on the web so less work and less friction. So the tool that is best for the task becomes a context.

Recording a video, you may have a camera, perhaps a steadicam, audio recording equipment, lights, a nice neutral backdrop. Even if you have a dedicated space with all the hardware and software and equipment you need to shoot a video always available it's still going to be a bit more complex to do that ccompared to say, writing the blog post. When you are in the video studio mode, doesn't it make sense to not just record the video you are thinking of right now, but also perhaps segements for use in a future video? When I go out to shoot video of the sheep I take lots of things I may never use in the current project, my B-roll as it were. But I still capture and reocrd and document what they are and I can then have a stable of shots to use for future videos. In that cse you are using context to limit how many times it takes you to get ready and clean up after a task. Think of it like cooking. It's far more efficient to cook up a lagrge batch of say ground meat and onions and freeze it. The time is the same no matter how much. But by making base ingredients ahead of time I can make a variety of meals quickly with less hassle and mess to clean up. Cooking 1 meal of biryani takes the same amount of time as making a larger pot and freezing it. I can make 8meals with only 1 get ready and clean up so it's more efficient. Contexts are like that, adjust them so you are able to do your best work.

Following up with Clients rmesans you need to have a list of the clients to talk t, know how to contact then and so you don't look like an idon have your notes abou them so yur conversationsn can be to the point. That means you need your Farley file or its equivalent and a computer. So that becomes a context.

So in the morning I have more energy, I generally do creative tasks. In the afternoon less energy, i Generally do admin tasks. But again, that isn't a context.

Those are contexts to me.

Here are some of mine: Red barn, Hay Barn, Scrivener, Libre Office, e-mail, Obsidian, SQLite Conversion, Python Programmming, Java Programming, iPad, inside by Myself, inside with help, Outside with help, Phone Business hours, Phone, Zotero, Hobbies, and so on. Some are places, some are tools and some are time based.

that isn't a context. It's all right in front of me. That is a "Mode".

Why do you think a mode and a context are not just facets of the same thing? So a mode for me is creative work, that's every bit as much of a context as Far West Pasture or Computer Internet.

 

[gtdstudente]

Hello all,
I'm relatively new to GTD and I have two main issues/complaints i can't reconcile yet.
1. Priorities Projects
2. Having more ideas in a day than the average person

I only have so much time, as all do, so to put everything in a context list, without priority or urgency, and just work from a "Next actions" list, gives equal weight to all things. That is silly. "Create new sales" is not nearly as important as "Write that blog post". Yet doing it the way David suggests would have me do just that.
My "Contexts" are strange because I work from home. I don't do phone calls. So 90% of everything is @computer.

Second, i'm an idea's person. I could just have ideas all day, capture them, organize, and never get to doing them. That is what I did years ago when trying GTD. I became the classic complaint "I'm spending all my time IN GTD i'm not IN my life."

So at some point I just have to say "ok brain, enough ideas, shut up. I need to get to work now."

I don't have time to capture all the "Open loops". They literally never stop.

Any suggestions on either would be most welcome!
Wil

In all seriousness, If I too were someone who is "Having more ideas in a day than the average person" I know I would needs much more serious Capturing Methodology and Tool(s) in my arsenal than the average bear. As such, I would spring into action with a Brand New Fresh Shiny, 50 cent - 99 cent Notebook and go bananas on finding a favorite Pen, and while this set-up would be portable, it would still have a dedicated place and it would always, always be open to capture any and all ideas. However, before all else, I would dedicate and name this Brand New Fresh Shiny Notebook, with ceremonies for future attractiveness, the Chronic Mind-Sweeping notebook and be sure to go through it during my Weekly Review and extract anything worthy given current life's circumstances. That's what I would do for Getting Things Done. In fact, I might do this even with my fewer/less ideas than the average person. Thank you . . . and "Keep on Mind-Sweeping" !

 

[GTDengineer]

As a person with so many ideas vs time to implement them, you either have to add to your someday/maybe list, delegate them, or move to trash. If they are business related ideas then forming a company and delegating the work to staff or contractors might be your next project.

 

[James M]

A thought about Contexts

There's lots of research now showing that there is a cost to your mental energy from context-switching. This is where the concept of batching comes from. In other words, if task 1 is "Email Jeff about windows", you make the best use of your current context and mental energy to do another task from your @computer-email list.

If that's what you want to do.

Are you familiar with the Horizons of Focus model at all? I'll admit to skimming through this thread – but one of the ideas behind the Horizons of Focus model is that once you've filtered down your master list by Context (what can I do?), Time Available, and Resources (what do I have the energy to do?) - if you've then got more than one thing left, you apply your higher horizons of goals, values and purpose to choose between.

Or you do what you feel like doing.

One of the mysterious features of GTD is that, if you've got confidence that your actions list is accurate and up-to-date, you can treat that list like a menu of options for your time. Then pick the one that you want to do.

If there are things you feel you ought or have an obligation to do, ask yourself the question of why you don't _want_ to do that thing. Try breaking down the action into an even simpler next action. For instance, if "Call Jeff" repels you every time you see it, why is that? Maybe the next action is actually, "Write a list of what I need to say to Jeff" or "Email Jeff to arrange a time for a call".

 

[John Forrister]

I'm an ideas person. I could just have ideas all day, capture them, organize, and never get to doing them. That is what I did years ago when trying GTD. I became the classic complaint "I'm spending all my time IN GTD i'm not IN my life."

It may be different now, but as of 25 years ago, the Johnson O'Connor Research Foundation didn't have a measure for creativity other than measuring ideaphoria. They gave a topic and asked you to write as many ideas about it as you could in a short time. It's a wonderful talent for many occupations.

You may also process information associatively more than sequentially, according to the Kairos Cognition survey.

GTD can work very well for ideaphoric and associative people. I recommend making liberal use of the Someday/Maybe list, and reminding yourself that items on that list are not commitments.