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Starting out with GTD
Pat Armstrong | Oct 26 2007
Hi everyone. I bought a paperback copy of GTD some time ago, flicked through it idly, and have only just got around to sitting down and reading it properly. I'm about halfway through, and have a question about fitting it to my situation. Some background: I'm a graphic design student, currently finishing my second-last year. I live with friends in a sharehouse, and will for the forseeable future. This means my bedroom is my main workspace for my coursework and odd freelance gig, and that I'm liable to move house once every year or two. I use the machines at uni quite a bit, but they're shared (so neither the space nor software setup is really customisable), and all my books/notes/reference stuff is at home. With my final year of uni starting in a few months, after the summer break (southern hemisphere!), I'm in dire need of a good, functioning organisational system: I'm easily distracted by all the other projects I have going at any one time, and deadlines often creep up on me. GTD seems like a good fit with a great community built around it. The thing that seems to be stopping me from getting through GTD, though, is the very corporate/business-y angle DA seems to be coming from. No-one I know my age has a filing cabinet, and the idea of a physical "inbox" on my desk makes me imagine fluorescent lights and beige cubicles. What do I need an automatic labelmaker for? I'd take less time writing out labels by hand, and prefer the look of my own handwriting to low-res thermal printer type. Anyway, you get the idea. Reading through the posts here, it seems you're all from quite varied backgrounds. So, my question is: How can I adapt the GTD system to my situation? Or do I just need to adapt to it? Thanks for reading! Love to hear your thoughts (or pointers to similar questions or issues that have been raised in the past). 6 Comments
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 GTD - One Tool To Examine How To GTD with GTDSubmitted by dr.marty on October 27, 2007 - 8:30am.
Many people, after first reading David's persuasive book is to get out of control and immediate way overdo everything. I view that as a vital, and meaningful right of initiation, a stage of life that shows you how much GTD as a concept can be necessary. Also, I have discovered that after the furor of the initiation period, many people feel burnt out and lost, and this is necessary too because it's the period when your supposed to take what became an elaborate goldbergesque system and piece out the habits that are most essential and internalize them. The problem is that when someone tries so many new behaviors, nothing really makes sense at the burnout, so what I want to do is point out to you a tool that might help you maximize the take-away from trying to GTD this GTD stuff. GTD is all about the commitments you make, so focus on creating awareness about your commitments. If people feel good after the first rush of GTD, I think it's because they feel good about honoring these commitments. So you would be wildly successful with GTD if you found the three best tools / technics / habits that helped you be most aware of and organized about your genuine commitments. Think of all the other stuff as fun. And then once you've internalized 3 essential habits, go find the next three if you want. » POSTED IN:
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