Get Everything Done

Of the many systems Mark has developed, I've only ever used Simple Scanning for any useful period of time. I find it interesting that Mark has on a couple of occasions, blogged about returning to SS after many years in other systems.

However, I feel like there are many lesson learned from other systems that translate into being a more effect Simple Scanner.

For example, Autofocus systems have a dismissal system, so when it's actually time to dismiss certain items, you know what that feels like. I suspect that feeling of knowing when to dismiss based on this experience helps you know when it feels right to dismiss an item while Simple Scanning.

Also, Do It Tomorrow helps you learn to develop the skill of knowing what things need to be done now and what can be deferred (i.e. written into your long list for SS later). When I first started Simple Scanning, the idea of "do it now if it needs to be done now" was at odds with putting everything in my long list. I started to grasp the concept and how it fits in with SS.

What other lessons have you learned from one of Mark's systems that has helped you be more effective in using others, but more specifically in Simple Scanning? (More particularly interested in the latter since I'm using that.)

A lot can be said here.
One could keep to one list, and that might be a good way to start.
Put all appts, reminders there.
But eventually the list will get too big to review daily. I find up to about a month, everything in one list goes very well, and has a good rhythm, but eventually after a month, the list gets too long.
One could put appts in a calendar.
Keep a calendar/planner and put repeating tasks in a future date. So a weekly task put in next week. I even put daily repeating tasks, in the next day, or other day.
I follow the DIT method, for the most part, of any new item that does not need to be done today, to put it in tomorrow.
I date the pages, and find it easier to mentally work a date at a time, instead of a page at a time. If the task was actioned on the past date, but not today, I might rewrite with today's date. The object is to get it off past dates.
I find that breaking it up into a list for each day to be more manageable than to have one long list.
Eventually there will be too many items, and some weeding will be needed.
Any of the dismissal rules can be used.
The neat thing about having a long list is that it can manipulated in different ways, and dismissed in different ways. I begin to notice whether a page has only 1,2,or 3 items left and tend to highlight them to see them better, and that motivates me to do, defer, or delete them.
I might rewrite some unactioned tasks and put them all on one page to process at once.
Basically, the longer one works with the long list, one develops one's own hacks and workarounds.

The answer might depend on what the long list is.
Is it a catch-all list? - then there will be likely an excess of items eventually.
Or only items that one is committed to doing in the next few days? Then the list will be shorter.
The ideal would be to review the list daily, and actually work from the list at least once.
The ideal would be a contiguous list with one item on each line.
I don't do this. I have notes on some intervening pages and no-lists on some pages. Right now I am realizing that I am losing a sense of the long list, and have to find a workaround.