Making it all work | David Allen

"For a long time it had seemed to me that life was about to begin... but there was always some obstacle in the way, something to be gotten through first, some unfinished business, time to be served, a debt to be paid - then life would begin. At last it dawned on me that these obstaces were my life - Alfred Souza"

Following the quote from the book your entire life needs to be managed and the book "Making it all work" will help you to do so. Basically all of us look for similar set of goals:

- Reduce stress
- Cessation of procrastination
- More balance
- More energy, vitality, motivation
- Greater Focus
- More freedom
- etc.

So let's see what this book has on offer.

Basically what we need is a "mind like water" (an image taken from a karate metaphor used to describe the state of clarify and openness). We need a mind free of distraction, stress or strain. To achieve that he firstly introduces structures for your life with pointing out six horizons of focus:

1. Purpose and principles (50.000 feet) - major defining matters of your life experience
2. Vision (40.000 feet) - level of vision or images of long term success, major and obvious issues etc.
3. Goals and Objectives (30.000 feet) - first jump into the future, something pushing and pulling on you right now that you have to face for at a longer horizon
4. Areas of responsibility (20.000 feet) - job description, what are you supposed to do at work, and also view across your entire life, eg. finance, self-development etc.
5. Projects (10.000 feet focus) - next holiday, work project for next 3 month, setting up summer plan for kids, etc.
6. Actions (0 feet) - day to day actions, getting food, seeing a doctor etc.

Then you need to have a perfect workflow to get all inputs in to these horizons of focus. His workflow consists of five stages:

1. Collect (Capture)
2. Process (Clarify)
3. Organize (Organize)
4. Review(Reflect)
5. Do (Engaging/Actions)

With the first step he collects all inputs (it usually requires an hour a day just to stay current with the typical volume of incoming information) mostly in lists somewhere on a computer or in an own folder system, then he processes the information everyday form the "In-Basket" (TIP: Keep a physical in basket on your desk) in to different lists (Today, Tomorrow, Next, Someday/Maybe etc.). Once Organized you should review your list every week to keep your mind informed. Then you are able to do everything which is important. He also states that it is important to ALWAYS have an capture device (pencil and paper/Iphone whatever with you), because the best ideas you will not likely have in the heat of the battle of day to day activites. The creative out of the box thinking can occur on a beach or anywhere else. Any ideas put them immediately into a list.

Remember: Your mind is for having ideas not for holding them!

I can only point that out as well - you can be as productive between planes and waiting in dentist foyer as at work or at home. Therefore having a virtual desk is a necessity.

Some other qoutes I captured and were interesting for myself:

"Lack of execution is often cited as one of the top reasons for the failiure in start ups"

"When hire people let them know how you fell about work, I have been in to many situations where topics never discussed lead to mismatch of standards which only become apparent later on when it is to late to negotiate or navigate them easily"

"For the first 25years of my life i wanted freedom, for the next 25years of my life I wanted order, for the next 25years I realized that order is freedom - Winston Churchill.

tj