Joining the cult

So I believe I left you with an iceberg analogy – something about stocking the life-boats before the next disaster? I’m going to have to say goodbye to that analogy now. There’s no way I can say all I want to say and make it nautical/survival-oriented and keep a straight face. Especially since the first change I made to make my life more disaster-resistant was joining an (organization) cult. I consider myself fairly creative, but even I can’t figure out a way to make that life-boat-relevant, so you’ll have to live with plain, old-fashioned exposition.

I’m kind of embarrassed to admit this, but my cult? You know, the one that revolutionized my work life and gave me a feeling of security about weathering all my family health crises? It’s all about To Do lists.

You heard me: To Do lists.

Its holy book is organization guru David Allen’s Getting Things Done. Allen argues that people have only so much mental “RAM,” and when we use up all of it trying to keep track of our projects, we have less available to devote to actually completing the projects. If, however, we have an organization system in place that captures all our projects and the next actions associated with them, we have more RAM available for creative and energetic work. Ideally, this system includes space for thinking through why we’re doing what we’re doing – big picture-wise, what purpose does this project serve? It also includes the very next thing we’re supposed to do on every project we’ve got on the table – from writing a novel or dissertation to scheduling coffee with a friend. Any goal that requires more than one action is a project. Everything’s written down, and tracked. There are multiple lists, and tags like “Easy” or “Challenge,” @phone or @computer. It’s like a little bit of OCD heaven. The very basic nature of the system makes it easy to jump around between multiple projects in one day – making progress on all of them, keeping track of that progress – without experiencing that distracting schizophrenic-feeling so common to multi-taskers.

Okay, so I actually received the book as a gift several years ago and rolled my eyes. I certainly never intended to read it. I thought the idea of a whole system of To Do lists was a little too anal even for me – and I have all my books arranged by color on the shelves, with their locations noted in an ISBN-centered database. Label makers make me giddy with joy. I am not adverse to organization.

Then my dad died, and I maxed out my mental RAM in a big way. I did what I had to do, had a good work year all things considered, but I was so focused on making sure I didn’t lose track of what was coming next that I never found the time to enjoy what I’d just finished. I was quite miserable, and the pace I’d set myself was unsustainable.

I am many things, but I’m not a masochist. When something is obviously not working for me, I change it. My system for approaching my life wasn’t working, so I did some research. I remembered that book I’d gotten a few years ago (it’s on the orange shelf). I pulled it down and started to read. His argument made sense, and I was desperate enough to try it. It took me a month to get all my projects captured in the system, and then another few weeks to let go of the constant anxiety that I’d forgotten something so I could just trust the system.

Pretty soon I felt better about my work, but I was now concerned that I was now doing nothing but working. I wasn’t really sure how GTD – henceforth referred to as The Cult – was helping me in any way other than feeding my need for control. Great! I’m on top of writing and researching and cleaning my bathroom! What about the rest of my life?

And then one day I was running errands, researching, writing – generally having a crazy day – and one of my friends had a crisis and needed to talk. I didn’t even have to think about it. I knew exactly what I had to do that day, and I knew how much time it was all going to take, and I knew none of it was more important than my friend. I don’t mean this in a general, people-are-the-most-important-thing way. I mean I knew in a practical, self-care, not-screwing-yourself-over kind of way. Nothing I had to do that day couldn’t be easily delayed or shifted.

My friend apologized for calling when I was so busy, for asking to meet.

“Don’t worry about it,” I said. “I don’t have anywhere else I need to be.”

After a year of struggling to balance work and family, grief and worry, I can’t tell you how much contentment it gave me to be able to say that. That sense of contentment has spread out from similar small moments to pervade my life. My dissertation is coming along nicely. My fellowship is running smoothly. My relationships are healthier than they’ve ever been. Best of all, even after a bad week (and this week wasn’t great), I’m able to appreciate all of that big-picture awesome. I’m not going to credit all of that to The Cult. I mean, you’re supposed to get smarter or more philosophical or what-have-you after Great Badness, right? It’s the trade-off for all the wrinkles.

I will say, though, that joining The Cult – thinking through all my projects, writing down all the things I needed to do to complete them, re-evaluating why I’d agreed to them in the first place and whether I still wanted or needed whatever purpose they achieved – re-grounded me in my life. I wish I’d done it earlier. I really wish I’d done it earlier in my PhD program! I’ve since proselytized my colleagues, my committee, my friends. Now I’m proselytizing you!

You don’t have to join my Cult (although if you do, tell me so we can compare label-makers). I’m not really trying to recruit any more To-Do list fanatics. I’ve come to feel very strongly, though, about the need to stop every once and a while and take a snap-shot of your life. What’s working? What’s not? Are you running your projects or are your projects running you? When was the last time you had a sincere, fully engaged conversation with a person that you care about? Is there anyone you miss, and need to make more time for? When you say yes to things, is it because you want to do them, or just because you don’t remember how to say no?

When I got a handle on the minutiae of my life, I started taking a good hard look at the big picture, and how all those little things related. I asked some hard questions. I made some additional changes. I got happier.

So if I gush about my To Do lists, it’s only because I’d like you to find some of that happiness too.

Tagged as: David Allen, Getting Things Done, The Cult