Wow, time really zips by doesn't it?? My last post was four days ago!
I'm still successfully avoiding the TV and it's starting to feel more natural. Each day gets a little easier because I no longer feel drawn to it like a magnet. Just two nights ago, I got a bug up my butt and decided I was going to empty my Outlook Inbox at work. This strange idea was prompted by my reading of concepts taught in David Allen's book, Getting Things Done. The concepts are amazingly simple and it's probably one of the best time management and organizational systems I've ever found.
So while Michele was busy in the kitchen, I was sitting in the family room VPN'd into work attacking my Inbox. After about 3 hours, I managed to whittle my messages from just over 1,000 all the way down to 0 (yes, ZERO)! The incredible thing is that I only saved about 20 into a reference folder, and about a dozen others became tasks for me to take care of later. I had no idea how wonderful it would feel to see an inbox with ZERO messages in it after almost 4 years of working at the company. But, let me tell ya', it was great!
(Did I mention the TV was TURNED OFF the entire time? Man it was awesome! We listened to CD's on the stereo and talked while we both worked productively. What a concept!)
Oddly enough, Friday at work I felt about 10 times more productive. As new emails came in, I dealt with them immediately or turned them into tasks to be dealt with later. I left work with my Inbox once again at zero. David Allen calls this "Zero Base" in his book. Of course, zero base also includes all the other inboxes (is that a word?) in our life such as desks, coffee tables, kitchen tables and wherever else we have papers strewn about that need to be dealt with. I'll be working on THAT part of my life very soon. I've really only scratched the surface of Getting Things Done because I haven't even read the whole book yet.
Have you noticed yet that I like to jump around from book to book to book? I never seem to finish anything. I skim and skip, taking all the nuggets of wisdom I want, and then I move on to something else.
See, I told ya' I have ADD! :-)
2 comments:
>Have you noticed yet that I like to jump around from book to book to book? I never seem to finish anything. I skim and skip, taking all the nuggets of wisdom I want, and then I move on to something else.
See, I told ya' I have ADD! :-)
I've thought for a long time that I might have a touch of ADD too. My school performance has always been poor, from grade school through grad school. I think of myself as flighty -- usually unable to stay focused on one book or project long enough to finish it. (That's caused me lots of problems in my work too.)
So maybe I do have some ADD. But now I'm wondering just how much my TV addiction has contributed to my problems staying focused. I know that a lot of studies say that TV does just that, but it's one of those things that I always just shrugged off with an "Oh, I'm above that, that only affects mere mortals" attitude. :-/
Well, if I can just stay abstinent ... reckon I'll find out!
Thanks for sharing Chris. I posted an article last night that ties television watching to ADD. Check it out.
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