Each Day R/Evolution

Productivity & Spacing Out: A 10 Step Primer

From reading his books, and attending his Roadmap seminar, David Allen's whole point of putting things in the GTD system is to give oneself as much time as possible to relax, goof off, and space out. That's what "stress-free productivity" means.

There's a high associated to kicking ass under high-stress situations, a rush to the ego and self-satisfaction of multi-tasking efficiently. One feels superhuman, pushing limits of time and energy to the limit and expanding one's limits.  I used to be prideful about this kind of plate-spinning-split-attention-multitasking proficiency.  But what am I busy with?  That's a Tim Ferriss-kind of question, to evaluate the "busy work," and if what I'm doing is worthwhile (also David Seah-style). 

Sometimes, coming off a binge of hyperproductivity and an extremely fast-paced, high-octane stretch of work focus, it can be difficult to wind down.  The mind's machine whirs and clicks and becomes greedily accustomed to crunching tasks and data. When the work is done, it becomes hard to relax, and in the absence of "problems to crunch" the mind troubleshoots even the most silent, content moments, for some new problem to solve, even inventing or exacerbating problems just for FOOD.

My point, and the point of all the thinkers below, is that the goal of efficiency and productivity is to create more space/time for higher level creative thinking, pleasure/leisure-centric activities and RELAXATION!

Let me summarize what I've grokked from these guys below:

David Allen: capture data in trusted system and set times/contexts to execute and review - goal of stress-free productivity; clear psychic RAM and be focus-efficient with the details, free up mindspace for abstract, genius, creative thinking. Goal: Chill time.

Tim Ferriss: Energy and time-efficient clients. Paring down to sparest and most effective actions, outsourcing, automating or eliminate all else.  Work smart and efficiently to be more productive in less time. Goal: Chill time.

Malcolm Gladwell: Blink. I decided. Trust intuition about decisions and eliminate inefficient struggle or self-doubt. Goal: Chill time.

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi: 
"It is also important to develop the habit of doing whatever needs to be done with concentrated attention. Even the most routine tasks, like washing dishes, dressing, or mowing the lawn, become more rewarding if we approach them with the care it would take to make a work of art. "
Likens the Flow state to the basic concept of Zen mindfulness. To summarize: GO WASH YOUR BOWL!
Goal: Chill out time.

Jim Loehr: As a corporate athlete, the most energy-efficient way to work is in sprints of hyper/productivity. Focus sprints allow for long periods of downtime to rest, recover, relax. Goal: Chill time.

David Seah: Be aware of how you spend your "billable hour" and if what you're doing is the best use of your time.  Do what's the best use of your time and skillset, don't waste time doing what's beneath your skill level if you can help it. Goal: More chill-time.

Lesson: It's all about chill time.  Being productive, getting tasks done should make you feel relaxed as your reward.  As you are rushing about, crossing off your action items, remember to not only enjoy the moment of closing the open loop, but also consider that the elegant, efficient execution of tasks CREATES space for pleasure-centric activities!

So when your work for the day is done, don't seek out more work.  Enforce a quota for "work time" with yourself, and protect and defend your pleasure-centric hours of the day, however you choose to spend them.  Is there a switch to turn off hyper-productivity and multitasking anxiety? Yes. It's the same switch that turns on your thoughts of pleasure and leisure.

Here is Carmen's "Optimal Mindset" "License to Space Out" recipe, this is what I use to unplug and fall back into full possession of myself:

1. Stop all action.
2. Be alone in a room.
3. Lock the door.
4. Close the laptop.
5. Turn off the phone.
6. Hide the clock.
7. Drink some water.
8. Lie on the floor and be still. Stare at the ceiling or close your eyes.
9. Take 10 deep cleansing breaths.
10. Don't move until something really COMPELS you to move. Observe what motivates you to get up, besides eating and going to the bathroom.

Be still for as long as you can until something COMPELS you to movement.  What's compelling? It's what YOU want to do. It's what you WANT to do.  Not because it's expected, or you're obligated, or you want to prove something. 

This is how I sort my priorities.  By reminding myself how I choose my Next Action, based on what is important to me, and how I want to do things that concern what is important to me.

My new Habit - Day 4

Woke automatically at 7.30 a.m. this morning. Opened eyes and rolled out. Sat up. Contemplated the inviting pillow, still warm from sleep.  Inward groan.  I check for headache, just a dull throb.  Drank water, cold shower, got dressed.

Now I am awake, fully dressed, and daydreaming about a nap.

GAMBATTE!

Day 3 - A Limecat Morning

This morning I woke up and did my roll and stretch, and sat for a moment with a very surly and grumbly feeling and a bad headache. I had my stretch, which made my head go waaaawaaaa wwaaaaa waa and I had some water, too. Technically, I don't need to be up right now and my brain is fighting for one more hour of sleep, which my schedule can well afford this morning. 

I am grumbly but I'm up. I will do some meditation exercises. I may fall asleep during this.

Day 2 - Gravity wants my Eyes

This morning the struggle took place in my mind first.  The desire to remain in dreamland was strong, the pull of gravity on my eyes is something that I'm fighting even now as I write!

I woke half an hour earlier than needed, and just wanted to continue sleeping.  But something inside me asked "What did we decide?" So I rolled to my side, sat up and stood up and had a nice big stretch.
Did a few more stretches for my arms and legs and back and neck.  Plopped down and my eyes just closed.  Tis a struggle to be sure.  Sleep is sweet.

But I keep waking myself back up to shake it off.  Could be so easy just to get back into blanket burrito right now.  But that's the power of a choice - the decision to change - once made, wants to support itself.  And I must support it, too.

Going for a very short, brisk walk.

Choose a New Habit Day - Day 1

The beginning of a habit is like an invisible thread, but every time we repeat the habit we strengthen the strand, add to it another filament, until it becomes a great cable and binds us irrevocably, thought and act.  - Orison Swett Marden

Screw New Year's Resolutions. And even Lunar New Year's Resolutions.  Too much pressure to make a change.  So I am choosing a random day - February 7, 2006, to install a new habit for myself! It doesn't have to be something I have to think of as a sacrifice ( although those who enjoy self-denial might enjoy that ) but rather, just some new string I am adding to my overall instrument. 

Today I will take a first step in manifesting something new in myself.  A new habit to affect my life in unforeseen beneficial ways.  It's sounds like an ambitious goal, but if I do it each and every day, it will become part of me, my ritual and routine. 

Today I take a vow to fight gravity in the mornings. In the mornings only.  At all other times, gravity may have it's way with me. 

As I did this morning, when I feel myself awake, I will immediately roll to my side and sit up and put my two feet on the floor and stand up.  That's it.  With this movement, which I expect to become automatic within 21 days, I will commit to BEING AWAKE, even though most oftentimes my own excuse machine can give me split second rationalizations for going back to dreamland just a little while longer.

That's it.  My new habit is a movement.  Open eyes, roll, sit up and stand.  Whatever else comes after that, we will see.  Not quite as ambitious as Steve Pavlina's Polyphasic Sleep Schedule - just a simple change in physical action.  That doesn't seem so hard, although part of me (the loves-to-sleep part) is trying to tell me it's going to hurt.

I expect great things.  And will update this each day, for 21 days.

Why Habits are Hard to Break

  Visualization under hypnosis is crucial to changing habits and habit control, and especially repeated exercise of the visualized new habit.  Habits can't be eliminated, they have to be replaced - not just on the conscious level, but the subconscious level - and here in MIT's research it is proven that visual cues trigger the old neuropathways of habits.  How do you desensitize yourself from those visual cues? By creating new associations/neuropathways for that visual trigger!

Old habits don't die. They hibernate.

Habitual activity--smoking, eating fatty foods, gambling--changes neural activity patterns in a specific region of the brain when habits are formed. These neural patterns created by habit can be changed or altered. But when a stimulus from the old days returns, the dormant pattern can reassert itself, according to a new study from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, putting an individual in a neural state akin to being on autopilot.

  "It is as though, somehow, the brain retains a memory of the habit context, and this pattern can be triggered if the right habit cues come back," Ann Graybiel, the Walter A. Rosenblith professor of neuroscience in MIT's Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, said in a statement. "This situation is familiar to anyone who is trying to lose weight or to control a well-engrained habit. Just the sight of a piece of chocolate can reset all those good intentions," Graybiel said.

MIT explains why habits are hard to break.