Get Everything Done

I find it interesting to reflect on what I put on the AF-list.

Mostly I have a tendency to start filling it with duties, obligations and commitments to others, but fewer items relate to where I promote the greatest good for myself, such as having a long lay in, taking a weekend break, reading a book - pursuing simple pleasures, or striving to become a better person. The AF-list tends to fill with what I "need to get done". A cultural malaise. My emphasis drifts on to outer productivity more than inner quality. I get distracted by outer activity, my time fills up, but not especially with things I want to be there.

This is revealing. It shows me my own attitudes to the day and week.

Since I became aware of this I am making a more deliberate effort to do more of what benefits me. I reason that the clearer I am on my purpose for the day and the week the more tasks can be dismissed. I hope that when I look back at the week I can see a direct link between what I did and the benefit I gained.

Michael
<duties, obligations and commitments to others>

These of course are OK in themselves and can do much good both for others and for you as well. They are, after all, a part of what makes you a better person.

But I also understand that you would like to give some prominence to other "self-nurturing" things. I have two ways of catering for this:

1. Some things like reading and taking short exercise breaks (walks, Tai Chi, yoga etc...) have a permanent place on my FV list.

2. Many other things are given their due importance by scheduling (daily, weekly etc.) Various self-care activities (both physical and spiritual), special times with loved ones, gardening, gym visits, music, naps, outings, meals, play, prayer, journal, library visits....
This genre of things cannot be provided for by putting them on my FV list. They have to be habits that are done at special scheduled times or when the body tells me I am ready for them.

In short, in a standard day, there might be no more than 20 things I do because they are on my FV list. But there would be scores of other things that have become regular habits because of their importance to me.

I have noticed that as the range of my habitual activities expands, my FV list becomes shorter and is mainly confined to those one-off things that might otherwise slip my memory.

Life has prevented me from pursuing this idea or commenting much, but I'm definitely chewing over what you've posted, michael. Very thought-provoking, thank you.

Thank you. The idea is expressed well at

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/do-your-commitments-match-your-convictions/

Michael

You have taken this issue to a whole new level by referring to the article from the Harvard Business Review entitled "Do your commitments match your convictions?"

In my post above, I tried to stress the importance of creating life-giving habits rather than simply putting life-giving activities on our to-do lists.

I was struck by the following from the article you cited:

"Once you've spotted gaps between what matters most to you and how you're investing your resources, use a time-out (a sabbatical, course, or retreat) to rethink old commitments and define new ones more consistent with your values."

In my former post, I was highlighting the value of shaping our lives inch by inch with the fostering of habits that enhance our experience of life.

But you have drawn our attention to the option of moving ahead "yard by yard" through the strategy of taking time-out to totally reassess major issues in our lives.

This practice has been very important to me. Right throughout our married life, my wife and I have never let a year go past without taking such a time-out to reassess the deeper things in our lives. (Last year we had a big one - 7 weeks in a monastery in Scotland).

I believe that it would be a very rare person who would be able to make a major reassessment of their commitments and values alone and unassisted. I have always found it essential to seek wise and skilled leadership for our periods of review.

I would be very interested in hear if others have taken time-out to "refocus" their life's commitments and how they have gone about it.

I've found huge value in a journaling process where I examine what I think I should do and what I want to do, and then make a micro-list of about five items that I term "worth doing" - some fulfilling my obligations and some promoting self-care of various types. michael's post made me realize that I tend to do this journaling process any time I have discretionary time, instead of turning to my DWM list (1). Sometimes working my list pops up as worth doing, but I don't consult it at all in the making of my worth doing list, so only tasks that are actively on my mind get worked on. In thinking about what is worth doing, my habits are getting better, as jim describes.

Regarding the article: I don't feel like I have a clear idea where to begin assessing/reassessing my values and commitments, and I think I'd find it to be anxiety-producing and abandon it without guidance. It contains very good advice but suffers from what I think of as "Unbolt and withdraw the transmission"(2) syndrome. A long, involved, and challenging process is described as a single step that LOOKS easy.


(1) My list is theoretically DWM and I frequently work it in Remelsbach style. I'm effectively not maintaining it right now. There's some super-old stuff on there.

(2)That instruction was one of the few places where a Haynes automotive repair manual failed me. Removing the transmission took three of us something like four hours, I think, and it was not a simple matter in any way.