First of all, a very Happy New Year to all of you LifeClever readers.

I’ve been a pretty faithful GTD adherent for several years now. Barring project lists, which have never seemed worth the effort to maintain, I’ve stuck to David Allen’s guidelines no matter what combination of calendar, task list, and capture system I was playing with at any particular moment. Until now.

A Moment of Clarity

Last week, I was reading Neil Fiore’s excellent book on avoiding procrastination, The Now Habit. (I love his psychological approach to creating a happy work environment so that you actually look forwarding to work instead of resisting it, but I’ll do a more complete review after a few weeks of use.)

As I read the book, I started to think about the things that gave me anxiety about my own system, the things that soured me on tasks. And it suddenly dawned on me how much time I spent fussing around with them. Every time I finished even the smallest milestone, I’d click into my task manager and slowly work through my contexts, reading and evaluating each and every task. Not to pick the next task, but rather to just sort of “check in” with them. Yes, it’s crazy.

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Posted in: GTD, Lifehacks

We are closing shop for the holidays from now until January 2nd, 2008. We wish everyone a safe, restful, and clever holiday.

Thank you for sticking with us, and see you in new year!

I don’t look back on classes or homework or tests with misty-eyed nostalgia. (Actually, I try not to think about school at all, if possible.) But some of my fondest memories are of learning. The perfect mental engagement of figuring out how something works or how to do something new comes more and more infrequently as we get older. It’s a special experience we take for granted as kids.

Look at any eleven-year-old and you’ll see her or him do at least one thing obsessively and joyfully, whether that’s play video games, wail on their drum set, or do magic tricks. And they get damned good at it in the process.

Remember when learning was fun?

As adults, we learn new skills out of necessity, i.e. you have to be able to do A to get to B, whether B is get a raise or get the TiVo to record America’s Next Top Model.

This holiday season, take that big juicy chunk of free time you’ve been looking forward to and, instead of spending it in front of the TV, learn how to do something new. Not for your job, not out of necessity, but because it’ll be fun. Being able to do something just for the sake of doing it is a wonderful thing. (And face it, TV doesn’t “recharge your batteries,” it leaves you feeling more drained than ever.)

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Posted in: hobbies, new year's resolutions, skills

Dear Reader,

I have friends who write effortlessly like superheroes. Crank 500 words in 2 seconds? No problem. Others sweat uncontrollably, hyperventilate, and tremble at the mere thought of writing.

If writing stirs a panic attack in you, try this: start with an email.

Instead of launching an imposing behemoth like Microsoft Word, call up your humble email program and begin your next writing piece as a simple email.

Most of my articles start this way, as lowly emails addressed to an imaginary persona. It’s my favorite psychological trick for fooling the brain into thinking a writing task is less critical than it is.

Here are the benefits:

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Posted in: Email, Writing

Productivity bloggers place a lot of emphasis on granularity. According to accepted wisdom, if a task squats on your list for a while, you probably haven’t sliced and diced it enough. Solution: Start carving until you’re left with a “next action” that you can effortlessly knock off in 10 minutes flat.

But some tasks simply don’t lend themselves to the GTD slice-and-dice. They demand time, focus, and sustained concentration for half an hour or more. Some typical examples:

• Planning
• Designing
• Outlining
• Writing
• Brainstorming
• Polishing

When I need to do manuscript editing, I can’t slice things up much smaller than a chapter, and even a pass on a single chapter in some books can take a couple hours or more of sustained, uninterrupted concentration.

There are two obstacles to achieving this level of sustained flow: the constant barrage of information and distractions and “need it now” problems we all face, and the fluctuating levels of mental energy we can bring to bear throughout the day. How do we find the time and mental energy for the big stuff while juggling all the tiny-but-still-important stuff?

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Posted in: GTD, Lifehacks, scheduling

In the movies, people wake up to happy birds chirping and the sweet smells of coffee brewing. In fantasyland, everyone is a perky morning person.

I’m not.

Far from the picturesque cereal commercial, my mornings are a blur. Get up, feed the kitties, bathroom, shower, dress, get to the bus. All in 30 minutes. No breakfast, no coffee, no time.

By the time I get to work, I’m already stressed out, frazzled, and in a terrible mood. So this makes me curious. What are mornings like for LifeClever readers?

Are you in a hopeless frenzy? Or are you the Zen master of your morning? What’s your strategy for coping with the morning grumps?

Photo by mdid

Posted in: Stress

Let’s review the basics: Events go on your calendar. Tasks go on your to-do list. These two tools are the Batman and Boy Wonder of nitty-gritty productivity, but what about the long view?

Visualizing the Big Picture

In the world of publishing, we divide each year into three seasons: Winter (January through April), Spring/Summer (May through August), and Fall (September through December). A standard assortment of events occurs in every season, from the meetings when we “launch” that season’s books until the day they’re each published.

As an editor, I want to see in advance that our Fall sales conference occurs so many months before a particular book is published, that certain blurbs should come in before a particular marketing meeting, and so on. This is Big Picture information for me. We’re not talking about events or tasks so much as large guideposts that affect a wide variety of events, projects, and tasks throughout the year. These meta-events are the dark matter that keeps my galaxy spinning in lockstep. (Ding: I just won today’s “Geekiest Sentence of the Day” award.)

Whatever field you’re in, there’s almost always a call for this kind of long-term planning and strategy. Putting events on a calendar that you can only view a month at a time simply doesn’t cut it for this kind of thinking. And hardcore project management tools like Gantt charts are just overkill for individual use.

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I came to a realization yesterday. It’s something I’d understood on one level or another for a long time, but this was the first time I’d articulated in a way that really sank in:

I create new tasks faster than I could ever accomplish them.

Coming to this realization gave me a tremendous sense of freedom. I imagine other addicts feel the same way when they hit rock bottom and realize it can only go up from here.

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For the past year, I’ve been anxiously anticipating the relaunch of Macworld’s website. I had completed the design in 2006, but after a year, the site curiously had not changed…

Until this week.

On Monday, Macworld launched a beta version of their spanking new site. For readers, it was an early holiday present. For me, it was also a surprise–my design was shelved. Denied. Rejected. Canned.

Here’s what the new site looks like

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Posted in: Design, Macworld, Rejection

Over the next few weeks, we’ll be inundated with TV news segments, magazine articles, and (yes) blog posts about New Year’s Resolutions. Usually, these resolutions take a negative approach: break your smoking habit, stop eating sweets, quit being so lazy and unmotivated and get to the gym already.

Ugh. Usually, “resolutions” are just an excuse to really go nuts over the holidays. With winter setting in, the long nights and lousy weather get us down. So we eat more, smoke more, and indulge in all our other vices to compensate. Personally, I’ve been drinking much more coffee than I normally do. Feeling helpless, we promise ourselves that, as of next year, we’ll do better. This rationalization gives us full license to cut loose. And it’s a sensible strategy: if we really can’t stop ourselves from doing what we shouldn’t be doing, why compound feeling crappy with feeling guilty, too?

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The inestimable Merlin Mann runs a series of posts on 43 Folders called Inbox Zero, intended to impart “the skills, tools, and attitude needed to empty your email inbox”and then keep it that way.” It’s been a great series so far (my own inbox is nearly empty at this minute, for instance).

In a similar vein, I now bring you Memory Zero, a series of articles to help you prepare for the fact that, despite its billions of interconnected neurons, the brain is a fickle gray beast.

Example: It’s a rainy day. You catch a bus and rest your wet umbrella on the floor, trusting your brain”there are more synapses in the brain than stars in the galaxy!”to remind you to grab it when it’s time to get off.

Unfortunately, a block before your stop, you’re busy thinking about this really cool CSS hack you’re going to try when you get home, and then, hey, why are all the people getting off, this place looks familiar, oh no, it’s my stop, RUN!

Time to buy a new umbrella.

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Erik Spiekermann once told me, “Portfolios don’t matter. You hire the person, not the portfolio.” Like Erik, the statement’s bold. But he’s got a point.

Your portfolio demonstrates what you already know, not your potential for learning, adapting, and growing.

Sure, a portfolio shows competency. At the minimum, you should know how to read, write, lay out a page, work with typography, and make things look nice and pretty. These basic skills are great for jobs with well-defined problems and tasks. For example: designing a logo, a brochure, poster, or a widget. Design firms needing help with these projects can get away with hiring you based mostly on your portfolio.

But what about the harder, messier problems? The ones that aren’t well defined, the ones that are wicked hard. For example: designing a service, an application, an end to the American health crisis. You know, the interesting problems. For these problems, what matters is not what you’ve done, it’s how you think.

So how do you show-off your thinking skills? When interviewing designers, I look for these key traits:

1. enthusiasm (do you want to learn?)
2. skepticism (do you think critically?)
3. eloquence (can you speak and write well?)
4. attitude (will you get along with others?)

Notice that “talent” ain’t on the list.

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Posted in: Career, Design, Portfolios

If you’re a LifeClever reader, you’re probably working (or studying to work) in a creative field. And you know that creative work is hard work. It’s exhausting. In fact, doing your non-creative work can feel like a welcome break after spending all day just trying to think of stuff.

Being a book editor, blogger, and podcaster, I look forward to tasks like washing the dishes or going on the elliptical trainer because they’re opportunities to stop worrying away at creative obstacles for half an hour.

In her book The Artist’s Way creativity guru Julia Cameron argues that each of us has a “well” of creativity. The well fills up when we treat ourselves right: get enough sleep, eat properly, take long walks, go to museums. When we sit down in front of the drafting table or the keyboard and start working, we gradually deplete this reserve. Cameron warns against pushing yourself too far.

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Hi, everyone. David Moldawer here, book editor and podcaster and your new co-blogger on LifeClever. Very happy and excited to join Chanpory here on this most excellent blog. On LifeClever, I’ll discuss everything from my favorite stationery items to my most elegant productivity hacks. I’m a fervent Mac user, but I also use a PC at work, so I’ve got ideas about making the most of either system, as well as how to use Web apps to bridge the gaps. If there’s a topic or system or application you’d like me to cover in particular, please email me at david@lifeclever.com.

I’ve been a Getting Things Done junkie since Merlin Mann introduced me to the concept on 43 Folders. (How long ago was that, anyway? I find it hard to remember life before GTD…) Like many of you, I’m an incorrigible GTD tweaker, constantly trying out new methods to eke the last few ounces of productivity out of my day. (Yes, I’m aware that all that tweaking often wastes more time than you’d ever save, but I’ll get to that dilemma in a future post.)

What You’ll Need for Today’s Hack:

• Polder timer
• Levenger Shirt Pocket Briefcase
• 3×5 unruled index cards
• Pilot G2 Mini

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I’d like to introduce you to LifeClever’s new staff writer, David Moldawer.

David comes from the publishing and theater world. He is an associate editor at St. Martin’s Press and recently edited, among others, Mark Frauenfelder’s fabulous Internet guide, Rule the Web.

I hired David because he’s got great writing chops, is crazy obsessed about GTD/productivity, and he’s funny. Check out his two regular podcasts:

• Moldawer in the Morning
• Kick-Ass Mystic Ninjas

David is also a native New Yorker and graduate of Amherst College. Welcome, David!

This position is now filled.

It’s time to admit I can’t do everything myself.

For the past year, I’ve been a one-man blogging shop (with occasional help from generous guest writers.) I’ve enjoyed the late nights and extra working hours, but recent life changes have made me reconsider my priorities. I’m now looking for a regular writer to help out with my blogging duties.

I’ll still be editing and writing furiously, but I’m hoping the extra hand will help me reach the goal of getting up one quality post each weekday. It’ll also help me free up time to design bigger changes on the site, and more importantly, to spend quality time with family and friends.

Interested? Here are the official details. Feel free to pass it around:

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Posted in: Blogging, Jobs