Life is so busy for everyone these days and as I dropped a bottle of fuel additive in my boot this morning so I would remember to take it to the field, I thought, I need things in front of me. I need reminders, otherwise things slip through the cracks. One of the ways I do this at home is to make sure that things are in front of me, such as in my boot when I go to put it on, or on the stairs next time I go up. How do I take this into ‘computer life’?
Well, I have my online To Do list (my favourite is Remember the Milk) and on there, as part of my GTD system I have “na’s” or Next Actions marked up so I always know what to work on next. (That doesn’t mean I always do it, but I know where I need to be headed).
Emails are another huge bug-bear of possible overwhelm. I sort mine into folders, so that my In Tray gets back to empty fairly regularly – at least once a day hopefully. I have an Action folder for things that I need to work on, a Dealt With folder for things that I have answered but I may need to refer to, and a To Read folder for things that I would like to read through but are not urgent.
I also have my browser set up to maximise my time. I am currently using Firefox which I do like because of all the useful little add-ons that come with it. However the way I have it set up you can do with any modern browser. I have several tabs set up so that when the browser first opens, it opens up all those tabs automatically. So I have tabs for my social network sites, LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook. In fact my LinkedIn account can update my Twitter account at the same time so I don’t really need both. Facebook I use for more personal posts than the business ones on LinkedIn and Twitter so they are slightly different. I also have a shetland pony and a carriage driving forum link open so I can see what they are doing, and the WiRE forum. Then I can flick through these and quickly update my status or make any comments, before turning them off and starting work. And I can feel happy that I have done my regular updates.
Finally I have Google Reader open up on one of the browser tabs, so I can again flick quickly through sites I have an interest in and see if there are any updates.
Oh, and one more thought, I write my blog posts as I think of them, and then schedule them to go up every few days. So long as I am a few days ahead, I’m winning – which is what I’m doing now!
What’s your system for putting things in front of you so you remember them? Do leave some comments.
