I have an on-again, off-again relationship with productivity systems. I
usually don't bother with them but on those infrequent occasions when my
life gets a bit hectic, I will sometimes make use of one. When that happens
I always fall back to David Allen's Getting Things Done (GTD). I read
his book a long time ago and, at the time, found myself impressed.
The fundamental feature of the system is that it downplays the classic,
detailed, prioritized to-do list in favour of the so-called next action
list. When considering a particular goal, instead of allowing yourself to
become overwhelmed with all the myriad things you know you need to do in
service of that goal, you instead focus only on the very next thing you
can do to move closer to your goal. The end result is an unsorted list of
things you can do "in the moment", across all the various goals in your life
at the moment.
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