Getting Things Done

I think I've been slowly reading this since January... I wanted to go through David Allen's Getting Things Done methodologically so I wouldn't miss anything. And to implement his advice as I went along. Well, I was a bit too lazy to do much of the implementing, but I still think I will.

Getting Things Done has a subtitle: The Art of Stree-free Productivity. Is there anyone out there who doesn't want to know how to achieve that? Seriously, it sounds fantastic! Does it deliver? I don't know - I guess you can only ask that of someone who has been following the advice for a while... But I think it just might.

Allen offers advice on getting oneself organised, both at work and at home. To set up a system where things don't fall through the cracks, a system that is trustworthy and so stress-free. Since we're dealing with so many things coming at us from all directions these days, we need a new way of looking at how to handle it all. The difference between this and earlier systems is that Allen's aims to capture everything, both big and small, in the same system. The idea is that we're stressed because of all the unfinished things on our minds - so if everything that we need to do and want to do is captured in our system, we won't worry about it any more. The trick seems to be to capture everything - from needing to pick up milk to possibly wanting to learn Italian one day.

So after the initial organisation phase it should be fairly straightforward. Allen's system makes sense, it's logical. Oh and it requires lists!! Yay! :-)

Have you read this? Has the system worked for you?

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