Get Everything Done

Mark,

the reason why I like your new Autofocus system is that it is similar to my own emergency system that I use every time when my GTD-DIT-mixture-system crashes.

My emergency system goes like this:

For today and the next three or four days I schedule one to two hours per day for diciplined work on the most urgent and most important tasks.

After finishing that diciplined work hour(s) I go through my lists and work on the items that stand out for me, i.e. I'm motivated do do right now.

Items that are left 'untouched' will be marked by drawning a small check box next to them (your highlighted dismissed items). Unfinished list pages get a small check box at the top.

Items that are 'untouched' for several days get re-evaluated. Usually they are projects in the disguise of tasks, wishes, questions, etc. With these I need to clearify my goals and motivation.

At the end of the day I review what I have done and add new items to my lists and my calendar.

One of the things that seems apparent is that so many of us want to understand everything before we action it - it goes against our sense of security to just dive into the unknown. However for me it came down to the fact that, having heard Mark speak on a number of occasions and having read his books and tried his previous approaches, it made sense to firstly try it exactly as Mark said. Otherwise it would be like going to the doctor and deciding that we wanted to take a completely different set of tablets than those prescribed (and then wonder why we didn't feel better!).

I have already posted that I wasn't 100% sure of everything when I read the Quick Start Guide but just started. By the time I got to my first coffee break I actioned the "read rest of instructions" task and apart from the fact that they cleared up a few questions as to whether I was "doing it right", I had already experienced the almost uncanny way in which the system did somehow eliminate procrastination and create a real excitement about doing things - included things I had previously resisted.

Although I am using OneNote I made a conscious decision not to even look at a Digital Solution until I had done it exactly as prescribed and to everyone I would say forget about tweaking the system until you can see how it works - i.e. on paper, rotating lists, and crossing off items in the way Mark describes. The item "look at using Autofocus with OneNote" jumped out at me a lot sooner than I expected - but not until I had experienced the fact that the system works. My OneNote "add-on" is not a replacement to Mark's system but helps me personally keep everything in one place. I am still writing my lists on paper (A4 - 34 lined pad) and will continue to do so.

It is hard to explain how the system works but it has become clear to me that it works BECAUSE it is using the intuitive side of us rather than the rational side and for that very reason, trying to analyse the system or forcing items that we rationally assign importance to, actually sabotages the system. That is not to say that some things don't need urgent attention - that comes into the common sense area that Mark mentions.

I personally have some areas with fixed and impending deadlines which are causing me concern, but I deliberately threw them into the system and let the system decide. What it did the was the following -

It prompted me to set up a specific time where I will go away (physically to another location) to work on that task, uninterrupted and with no distractions. On my task list are the various preparations and collation of paperwork etc I will need in order to do that. That issue is now mentally deferred and not causing me stress. The interesting thing was that the actioning of that item (i.e. organising the "away day") was not the first thing the list prompted me to do. The first things were more practical and seemingly trivial items but which had the effect of (a) reducing my anxiety levels as they would have caused stress by not being done but rationally were unimportant e.g. emptying the dishwasher etc. (b) giving me a sense of completion and (c) giving me thinking time as they were "mindless" tasks.

Working in a home environment, personal and business stuff becomes very mixed up, and whatever you do you always feel like you should be doing something else. This system frees me from that.

As a specific (and I apologise for the length of this post but hope it may help someone else) in addition to work related tasks I entered onto the list a number of routine household tasks, such as clean the sink, clean the oven, empty the dishwasher, do the washing etc. all tasks that have to be done regardless but which are rightly called household "chores". My previous "trick was to empty (or stack) the dishwasher when making a cup of coffee. That worked for me but I now realise that it meant that, whilst making a cup of coffee and stacking/unstacking the dishwasher, my mind was focused on the action/s, i.e. coffee/dishwasher, which invariably i did not particularly want to be doing at that time. With Autofocus I was prompted to "clean the sink". Whilst cleaning the sink my mind was in overdrive, focusing not on cleaning the sink, but on "the system", how I was feeling, things that were almost leaping into my mind to be added to the list - and, curiously, an actual desire to do them! Cleaning the sink led on to doing other "chores" BUT my mind was still "working the system" and I actually enjoyed doing the chores. it really felt as though the items did themselves (in fact when I ticked one (admittedly very small) item off my list I actually could not recall having done it!

It might seem that, compared with the client work, accounts, projects, IT and other things we are involved in or responsible for, that these things are trivial but having done them I can see that they were causing mental blocks for me. My rational mind said "do" the client work/important stuff and worry about household chores later. Autofocus got those out of the way and now I CAN focus on the "important" stuff - IF that is what the system tells me to do :-)

In conclusion I would say do everything you can to allow yourself to trust the system - if you can't quite do that yet then do trust that Mark knows what he is talking about and "just do it" - exactly as he says and without questioning how it works ........

I would further add my comment to the ones here for folks to just try the system first and question it later.

I've been a big fan of Mark's rotating timeburst tasks approach in the book "Get Everything Done And Still Have Time To Play" for a long while now and even wrote some software for myself to use it systematically for large numbers of tasks.

I was also a fan, though less so, of the "Do It Tomorrow" closed list approach because I still found myself resisting those last few "tough" tasks on the list, and hence resisting closing off that list for good.

So when Mark Forster says a system is good and worth trying, I listen and try without questioning!

This AutoFocus method really hits the nail on the head for me because of the intuitive element. Just having the choice to NOT do a task, whether just for now or ever, is mentally freeing and paradoxically encourages you to start taking your todo lists seriously again.

And, as a further bonus (for the GTD fans), I am getting towards a Mind Like Water experience already with this because I'm just dumping EVERYTHING that comes into my mind onto the end of the AutoFocus list safe in the knowledge that I will be looking at it again shortly...and then again..and again..and again....etc...until I know for sure I don't want to do it. And even then, I have set up a task to review these rejected tasks in a month or so just in case I change my mind and decide to dump them back onto the list again.

The AutoFocus list appears to be basically a massive rotating Inbox that is continually being processed in an intuitive way without the need to resort to constantly-regenerating concrete GTD Next Actions.

I used to have massive GTD Someday/Maybe lists which I looked at less and less because they felt so oppressive and, while drowning in endless Next Action lists, it never felt like I would ever get the time to get round to them. I'm in the process of digging out all those Someday/Maybes again and throwing them all into AutoFocus to see what happens.

To sum up, the best thing to do with AutoFocus is TRY IT...you might just like it. <grin>

I have a confession to make - I have still not yet got around to reading the full instructions. Despite that, all I can say is "so far, so good". The thing I particularly like is that I seem to be finding time to do a lot of those long-outstanding little things, which were an energy-draining list but seem to take remarkably little time to fit in among other things.

Christine B

What great sense your post makes. I can really relate to what you are saying, I have a family to look after, so have lots of basic "chores" and I, like you, work from home, so one list has all tasks on it. I am having difficulties with letting go of my task diary, but am trying the new system and trusting it.

I love OneNote too, only had it for a month. But am using pen and paper as I still work best with a handwritten list.

Today I cleaned the kitchen window and door, something I have been putting off for months! But it just jumped out at me and the satisfaction of crossing an item off the list! You are right about the release of stress these seemingly unimportant tasks give.

Wasn't sure how the system would select the tasks for me, but it seems to be working.

Stephanie

Hi Stephanie

What I love is being able to put everything on the list - with other systems it somehow felt that "chores" were not meant to be on a list. With AF there is no right or wrong task - if a thing needs doing it is a task and can go on the list.

Much as I love OneNote I agree that pen and paper seems to be the best start point. I am certainly starting my lists on paper and will continue to do for the forseeable future, using OneNote as an add-on rather than a replacement. It gives me a great place to keep additional things generated by Autofocus, such as a shopping list, ideas, and new projects.