The feeling of getting to zero in my email in box is something that really gives me a boost. I realized after a trip away that the piles in my life were very much like a backlog of email: incomplete decisions. I decided to go through my physical, written and electronic spaces to pursue a concept of zero.
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Getting my inbox down to zero means that I can approach my inbox each time without the dread of all the leftover email waiting for me to do something about it. It makes email much less stressful. I wondered if I could apply the concept of Zero to other areas of my life.
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In the US this month we have Thanksgiving. I find that being thankful, or having gratitude, is one of the things that helps keep me on track, both in how and what I am doing.
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If I have too many projects on my plate I shut down, overwhelmed by the volume. I needed to tackle this early this fall, and I tried something new: clearing the decks. It worked really well taking my 18 project list down to 4 in about 5 hours.
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I had a really rough August into September. Two days after we took my only child to college and became empty nesters, my mother passed away. My husband and I made the drive to Wisconsin. I came away with some profound lessons. These are things that I am trying to incorporate into my life.
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Perfectionism is a deadly enemy of productivity. Whether it is self-imposed, or imposed by others, the quest to get things absolutely right is a waste of energy and time.
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Managing our energy is one task that working parents face daily. Given the demands on us from both the office and home, we can quickly become drained. An old article over at Lifehack.Org got me thinking about energy sinkholes. I thought I would expand on these for working people.
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It’s always a big temptation to take shortcuts. Imagine where we would be if Columbus didn’t think it would be shorter to go east instead of west to reach India? But just as Columbus’s shortcut went horribly wrong on so many levels, other shortcuts can also go wrong. And so today we are going to take on the case against a particular type of shortcuts. This is Episode 68: the case against lifehacking.
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I love sticky notes. I love that they can be moved around. I like using them for quick task lists and reminders of routine items. I don’t love rewriting things. I thought, “wouldn’t it be nice if I could print on them?” I figured out how to print on sticky notes, and today I’ll talk about how I do it.
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When I was first studying music, one teacher told me that music was what happened in the spaces between the notes. It was just as important to be creating space as it was to hit the perfect pitch, tone and expression. This thought changed the way I looked at the music, giving the spaces as much importance as the notes themselves. Life is also like this. We need to give as much weight to the spaces between activities as we do the activities. If we allow those spaces to vanish, much of the beauty is lost. (If you don't believe me, listen to Flight Of the Bumblebee a few times in a row).We face overwhelm daily with all of the…
