"GTD Lite"
Submitted by Chrome47 on January 11, 2006 - 7:16am.
is there a "GTD Lite" out there, for applying the GTD method without going overboard with the whole thing? i think to some people it's so enormous that it's un-doable, or too complicated.
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I don't know of an...
I don't know of an official beginner's version, but my usual advice is to really take the time to build it up gradually. Things like:
- Start with plain paper or plain text files, and only add gadgetry when something isn't working. I've tried a zillion different organizers and outliners and sketched out designs for a few new ones. It's a great way to make no progress.
- Really make a habit of collecting everything before you worry about building the perfect taxonomy of @40MillionDifferentThings. When you've got a hardwired instinct that never lets you say "oh, I'm sure I'll remember that later", then you can move on to the next step.
- The above is not a license to not do any actions. But the power of actions (in The David sense) is that they're tiny things. Sorting everything immediately into six-level-deep hierarchical nested structures is another good way to not get anything done. Focus on developing good (small-scale, with verbs) NAs and work from the NA list until sorting them out further feels like a natural thought process rather than like homework.
- Do today's review, and schedule this week's, but put off the higher-level stuff until the day-to-day feeling of overwhelm is under control. Likewise, write down the Someday/Maybes as a way of getting them out of your head, but don't look at them again until later (if you're really dying to do it, it'll pop up in your mind again).
- If it's going to be a lifetime change and not a band-aid, it's okay to spend days or weeks or months at each stage rather than putting the whole thing in place in a single weekend.
- There is no One True Notebook.
(EDIT: That is, what stevecooper said much more succinctly.)