How to organize life? A bunch of specific details

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  1. How to reinforce behavior?
  2. How should I deal with Not urgent, not important goals? I am thinking of letting the 'quest' appear for a specific time duration on the list and if not completed in that time, it disappear. Any other ideas?
  3. How should I deal with Urgent, but not important task?

  4. Tell me how should I manage the flow from conception to execution.

    I imagine a typical modification plans should go like:

    • conceive: set yourself a reminder.
    • continue working the old schedule till you find time to re-plan your activities.
    • re-plan activities and change to the new system.

    However, this again falls back to question 2, as I might get stuck in the planning phase.

Thanks!

Inspired_Blue

Posted 2014-12-13T14:01:36.923

Reputation: 153

Question was closed 2014-12-15T15:54:16.067

@moderators: if you feel I should edit the question to make it more suitable for the forum, please suggest specific edits. – Inspired_Blue – 2014-12-13T14:30:10.917

There are many questions here. I would suggest you split them up, focusing each question on one particular problem. – THelper – 2014-12-13T15:00:13.680

@THelper: I made some changes. Is it better or worse? – Inspired_Blue – 2014-12-13T15:42:30.753

Slightly better, but the main problem is that it's still a wall of text, addressing multiple questions which aren't necessarily related. I doubt anyone is going to address all questions here in one answer. You're more likely to get better answers if you seperate the questions over multiple posts. – THelper – 2014-12-14T08:30:59.790

1@Inspired_Blue, first three questions do not require any background - they are quite valid by themselves. Moreover, you should be able to find answers for them on the site already. Question 4 seems too broad - would you expect a different flow/system altogether, or you want to stick to your current approach? Question 5 also has quite interesting existing articles on the site already (with specific personal experience). Question 6 is more or less a duplicate of #4. – Alex Leonov – 2014-12-14T19:37:27.473

@Inspired_Blue, take a look at these: http://productivity.stackexchange.com/questions/5246/how-to-control-or-change-habits , http://productivity.stackexchange.com/questions/2478/important-long-run-goals-vs-urgent-tasks , http://productivity.stackexchange.com/questions/829/how-to-improve-self-discipline/891#891 , http://productivity.stackexchange.com/questions/2972/gamification-to-improve-myself/4463#4463 .

– Alex Leonov – 2014-12-14T19:37:56.820

As Alex and THelper have stated. Ask the questions separately, and forget about all that background - it makes it impossible to read. Alex has also pointed you in the direction of some useful posts - the search facility works okay here. Closing. – Rory Alsop – 2014-12-15T15:54:12.547

Yes, I will rephrase the questions. Thanks. – Inspired_Blue – 2014-12-15T18:39:32.297

Actually I found most of my answers in Alex's useful links. So should I delete the question? – Inspired_Blue – 2014-12-15T19:04:30.113

Answers

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You're living out the Seven Highly Effective Pomodoros of Getting Things Done.

With color coding. :)

That's a facetious way of saying that you're trying to optimize everything at once in addition to juggling (at least) three different management systems.

Evidence of this is the sheer number of questions you're asking here.

I recommend picking one thing from the list, and work on that. Don't worry about the others.

Take the journaling, for example. This was the first one you mentioned. Take a look at the Pomodoro Technique. Get a timer of some kind, and like Dr. Pavlov, train yourself to journal each burst of effort when the bell goes off.

If you focus on that one thing, and cut yourself a lot of slack for every other piece of tracking you want to do, you'll have a better chance of making it habit.

Will that be a perfect match to what you need? Probably not, but once you do it a few times, you'll find what things you want to keep, and what things you want to do differently. In either case, the benefits/drawbacks are evident and clear. You won't have as much nagging in you gut as to whether your gains are due to your journaling, or your color coding, or your to-do lists, etc.

John

Posted 2014-12-13T14:01:36.923

Reputation: 3 631

Thanks for clearly understanding my situation! It's very hard to ask precise questions when one is seeking wisdom. – Inspired_Blue – 2014-12-15T19:06:54.613

You're welcome. :) Sometimes I miss really badly by answering the question I think needs an answer, rather than the one they actually ask, but I'm glad I didn't in this case. – John – 2014-12-15T19:12:27.233

I have another question: Sometimes while I am middle of something I come up with a thought I would like to remember - say, I should work my communication skills or that a friend once observed this flaw in me and I should work on that. I often miss those for not systematically tracking them. Any help?

Of course now that I am aware of this problem, I think I will come up with a fix. Still wanted to ask. – Inspired_Blue – 2014-12-15T19:14:20.770

Carry around a few index cards held together with a binder clip, and a writing instrument. When something occurs to you, write it down. That way you have a record, and when you get a handle on a larger system, you can funnel those captured ideas through it to decide if/when/how you want to act on them. – John – 2014-12-15T19:46:29.790

Asked: 2014-12-13T14:01:36.923

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