Jotlab

I recently read and listened to the Audiobook of David Allen, titled “Getting Things Done”. It was quite effective in its message, I did indeed enjoy it. There is one message in this book that i think is the most important of all the content. Its through this one concept that he builds up the workflow and technical elements that are needed to effectively achieve this concept. So in turn, if you learn to understand what his main point is, you can pretty much drop the book and get things going to suit your own workflow and life style.

The main point of getting things done and getting things done well, is to get ideas and thoughts out of your mind that do not need to be worked on and can be completed in the next 2 minutes. For all other ideas and tasks, they should be written down in a systematic order contained in a system that your mind trusts that you will look back on and review regularly. This is the key. You simply must have a notebook, a spreadsheet, or any other form of notation tool that your mind trusts that whatever you store in it, it will 100% be looked back upon. If you don’t trust that you will look back on it, then your mind will constantly be juggling all these ideas, sorting them, figuring them out all at once. What you are left with is a mind that is working on 10 different calculations at a time, instead of 100% for the task at hand.

So what i use to get things out of my head and into a system i trust are two tools:

1. A Notepad
2. Things

That’s right! I could tell you how exactly i use both of them. But instead i simply use the notebook for immediate notation, when I’m out and about or need to visualise an idea to scribe, and then dump it into Things! However i think it is more important you get both of these tools, and start using them however you want to. This way you will be more free minded about how to insert and track items, instead of sticking to a strict regime of how to get things done according to the formula of David Allen. The main point is, write ideas down, don’t think about them again until it’s time to get it done!

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