Peace of Mind Organizing

Excited about my to-do list

9 February 2009

Last week was one of those weeks I wasn’t at my desk much and when I was I had to be focused on urgent items. I’m not sure I actually looked at my to-do list all week, except to add to it.

This week I have much more discretionary time. When I woke up this morning, I was actually excited about looking at my to-do list. Now that’s a change of pace. In the past, I probably would have just started a new one, not trusting that a list that was a week old would do me any good. Plus, the old one would probably just make feel cranky about what I hadn’t accomplished.

Why the shift? It’s called Autofocus, baby. It’s the task-management system invented by time-management guru Mark Forster and launched in beta testing at the beginning of the year. I signed up the moment I heard about it and have been using it faithfully since January 5.

I was delighted to discover this morning that Mark is including instructions for Autofocus on his website now (rather than requiring registration as a beta tester to get it). So go read those instructions and then come back here to learn seven reasons why I love the system and what it’s doing for me.

Because Autofocus provides a framework that balances the rational and intuitive parts of the brain, it’s unlike any system I’ve worked with before. Here are some of the things I love.

1. It puts me in the driver’s seat. I’m in complete control of what I do, I get to work on only what I want to, and I have the freedom to dismiss items the system makes me realize aren’t really important.
2. It’s fun! I actually look forward to doing things on my list, probably because I get to let my intuition call the shots.
3. I get so much done. Because the list requires me to start at the beginning, I’m tackling older tasks, rather than letting them just molder away at the top of a list, never to be addressed unless they bite me in the butt.
4. It’s simple. Simple is good.
5. It forces me to make decisions about my tasks. If I get to the point on a page where’s nothing I want to do, the system requires me to either do something or dismiss it. No more just ignoring the tasks I’ve been procrastinating on.
6. I don’t have to rely on my memory. When I get super-busy and have to ignore my list, I know all the tasks are safely waiting for me when I can get back to the system. Since I add every task to the end of the list, I don’t have to worry about remembering them. Such a relief.
7. It’s a procrastination buster. All I have to do is a tiny bit of a task and then I can cross it off (and add it to the end of the list). This encourages a little and often approach to getting things done, which is so effective.

Honestly, the more I use it, the more I like it. Please do go check it out. And if you try it, come back here and tell me what you think!

Tagged with: autofocus, mark forster, procrastination, productivity, task management, time management

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