dealing with massive backlog - hard truths
As I think about my absurdly long to-do list, I realize that I need to spend some time doing some serious thinking about what I will spend time on and what I will have to let go. Here's the fact:
For various reasons - partly procrastination, partly health problems - my backlog is staggering. If I had been fully functioning, using my time well, for the last five years or so, I would have spent maybe a full year of time doing tasks (this doesn't count sleep, job, etc.) This is just a low-ball estimate of the amount of time I've wasted/lost in the last five years. Frankly, it's probably double that.
So the hard fact is this: I have lost this time - this 8760 hours (or more). I will not be able to do everything I could have done if I had used my time well. There are some things I will have to let go of.
There is a price to pay for procrastination: opportunities are lost, time is lost. Procrastination fritters away the precious time of your life, and that time is not infinite. Once it's gone, it's gone, and you have to start from where you are.
Some of the things on my to-do list are urgent (like back taxes). Some of the things on my to-do list are things I really wish I could do, but simply can't do because the urgent things take so much time and have to take priority.
So where to start? Not sure. I think I need to make a to-do list, and then think very seriously about which of these tasks are truly urgent and must be done. Then figure out how much time it will take for those tasks, and decide which of the tasks left on the list I truly have time to do and which I must let go.
This is very difficult for me - I wish I had a coach here helping me.
- By pro at 19 Jul 2008 - 9:37am
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Step 11 and my to-do list
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looking for outside help with backlog
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Journey 9:30
OK, I have totally fallen off the "20 minute start" wagon. Once again I read the news online BEFORE getting to work, although I was at my desk a few minutes early. It's not like I didn't hear the news at home and again at the gym already. Doh! I'm re-commiting to 1) arriving at work (or home office) precisely when I planned to and 2) getting immediately to work and working for at least 20 minutes before doing anything else.
A recap for the newer folks: I'm following the Zen To Done plan by Leo Babauta of the Zen Habits blog. It's kind of like GTD, but simpler. Leo recommends building new habits one at a time, and taking 30 days to build each habit. It's actually taken me more than 30 days per habit, but after ?? years of being totally off track, I'm cool with that! Whatever it takes.
So far, I have built the habits of 1) collecting all my to-dos in a trusted system and 2) Setting MITs every day. Now, I'm working on the 3) getting to work right away habit. This one is a particularly difficult one for me; as I'm a slow starter, an anti-morning person, and chronically late. But I'm working on it, one day at a time.
So, bookending 20 minutes of getting started time now, then I can have coffee.
Jo
P.S. I went back to yoga class this morning after my little back injury 10 weeks ago. Man, the older you get, the longer it takes to recover from a minor injury. But I'm completely back to normal now! (or as close to normal as I ever was lol)
"In our minds, we seek to be divine; but in our hearts, we know it's party time." - Rondo Bros in Aquarium Dreams
Journey 10:00
20 minutes done! coffee time now. And, I was hard at work when my b.c. (brilliant coworker) came in to chat. I hate it when she catches me goofing off, because she NEVER goofs off
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"In our minds, we seek to be divine; but in our hearts, we know it's party time." - Rondo Bros in Aquarium Dreams
a plan for the backlog that might work
I'm in a cafe, reading and thinking. Specifically, I'm thinking about the circumstances in the past in which I was able to work on the things I'm now avoiding. Those structural circumstances no longer exist, but I can recreate the key features to a large extent by getting up at 5am and working for 2 hours before doing anything else, even breakfast. In fact, this is the only circumstance in which I was able to do homework in high school. It's morning, when I'm freshest, and it's guaranteed time-limited because I have to go to work (I'd only do this on weekdays).
So tomorow morning, I'll try it - set my alarm for 5am. I think this may work. And if I spend 2 hrs a day on my backlog, I will get through it before too long.
And in the meantime, I will enjoy the rest of my Sunday without guilt!
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Procrastination is the grave in which opportunity is buried.
you morning people amaze me
The only way I get through the mornings is to have a set routine. I don't start thinking clearly until about 10 am. I used to be a night person - but now I'm more of an afternoon person lol. I get my best work done from 2 pm - 6 pm.
I am married to a morning person. He is so cheerful in the mornings that I could just shoot him. One morning I heard him telling a joke to the dogs.
Jo
"In our minds, we seek to be divine; but in our hearts, we know it's party time." - Rondo Bros in Aquarium Dreams
the early morning theory intrigues me, too.
I am a morning person. I used to get lots done in morning around 5:00 AM.
Then I got in habit of being online -- just reading websites -- first thing in morning.
I will have to look at this, because I really am most productive from 4AM to 7AM.
Thanks!
you can become a morning person - and it pays
I was a morning person for most of my life, and then I got into a different habit - staying up late, getting up late - and it made everything worse. I've had to force myself back into the early-rise pattern (and I'm currently trying to force and even earlier rise). When you make yourself get up early, you get tired early and then it becomes easy to get up. Your body is freshest when you first get up, and I think it's the very best time to get stuff done - especially hard stuff like backlogs. I exercise in the morning before work, too.
Plus the world is most pleasant in the morning. The air smells nice (or in NYC, at least nicer), in the summer it's not too hot yet, the crowds aren't out yet, etc. I love getting up early, and I'm always happier when I do it.
Try setting the alarm for a 2-3 weeks (the time it takes to form a habit) and see how it works for you. You may be surprised - you can be a morning person, too.
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Procrastination is the grave in which opportunity is buried.
morning people
I do get up early, usually by 5 am. But I don't like it.
"In our minds, we seek to be divine; but in our hearts, we know it's party time." - Rondo Bros in Aquarium Dreams
got up at 6am to work on pile
I set my alarm for 5am, but I didn't go to bed early enough for that - I was too tired. I reset the alarm for 6am. Now I'm sitting at the desk and coffee is brewing. Starting on papers now...
I have to leave in an hour, so that's a built-in time limit - how I work best.
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Procrastination is the grave in which opportunity is buried.
Congratulations pro!
I know how hard it is to prune commitments, even ones you're behind on. Congratulations on pruning some of those tasks you don't really need to do, and I'm wishing you the best on those others.
You've also come up with a good plan for dealing with it.
It actually reminds me of Mark Forster's processes - he wrote "Get Everything Done & Still Have Time to Play", and "Do It Tomorrow".
Basically, he doesn't like Todo lists. They grow out of control. He suggests having a Will-do list for a single day.
In general, he suggests you take a really hard look at your workload, and make sure that you can, on *average*, get an incoming day's work done in a day. If you can't, you need to prune back commitments til you can - that's why it's called "Do it tomorrow", it sounds weird, but ideally, you're keeping on top of everything that comes in today by being up to date on it by tomorrow.
He suggests for backlogs, that you draw a line in the sand, and make sure you keep up with all the *new* incoming work each day, ie emails, phone calls etc (and if you can't, prune commitments etc), and when you have a backlog, work on that for the first 2 hours each day.
I was just interested to see that that's what you'd decided to do anyway.
So, good luck!
Forster's plan for backlogs
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prune commitments
so i feel like if i were to follow that, i would have to bow out of my church commitments. If house maintenance is a non-negotiable (it is currently and frequently negotiable in my current approach ;) ), and if i'm not going to cut out my family time, i think i would have to tell work that i'm going to 1/2 time. Then, at my current level of efficiency, i could keep up with the mail, house clutter, inside and outside maintenance, car maintenance, etc.
But, just thinking here, if i did that, if i suddenly felt like i HAD ENUF TIME to get things done. What would i do? I know my self. I would say, "i have enuf time, i dont have to start right now." In fact it is BECAUSE i am behind that i came to this site, and that i keep working on this problem.
Of course the other thing is if i really went down to 1/2 time at work (assuming they were not so generous to keep paying me my full-time salary ;) ), then i'd need to move, which would ADD things to my list, so i'd have to tell work that i had to go down to 1/4 time for a few months. ;)
I think that may have sounded more contrary and critical that i meant it to. I really am just trying to see how to apply this idea. And wondering, maybe i'm the only one who feels this way, or maybe others do? I'll be interested to see how (if) people respond.
cluttered time
posting this as it's relevant to the topic, and I sure need to read it myself, today.
sigh.
http://www.clutterersanonymous.net/literature/timing.html
long to do lists
You're so right! One thing I'm learning to do is start my todo from scratch each day.
I can't just forget about all those things I want and need to do though. I keep a long-term todo list (what GTD calls a "project list"). Those things that I want to do, but don't plan to do today, get moved to that list. I'm serious about keeping that list up to date and backed up, so that I know all those things are somewhere and I can stop thinking about them for now.
Then I try to just focus on the things I want to accomplish for today. Unless I get distracted by important things . . .like the lives of Donnie and Marie Osmond. Or Madonna's on-again off-again divorce.
Jo
"In our minds, we seek to be divine; but in our hearts, we know it's party time." - Rondo Bros in Aquarium Dreams
how to prioritize
well, when you figure this out, let me know. My on-line task list has 148 items on it. I've turned my back on it and just made new list of "next actions". Now that has 45 on it, and growing. See that? It's really time to turn my back on that one and have a "really next actions" list. Each revision is giving up things i really want to do or feel like i need to do. But i dont really give them up, i keep them hanging around, haunting me.
One thing i feel is that we procrastinators really care about a lot of valuable things. While other people seem to be able to jettison items from their to-do lists with regularity and indifference, we pro-ers tend to feel strong attachments to things & see great value in them.
And feeling deeply is something i've always admired in people.
That said, pro, when you figure out how to do prioritize your task list, do post so i can learn.
I think an overly long to-do list encourages procrastination
I think that when a to-do list gets too long, it encourages procrastination by discouraging prioritizing. If we were, for example, to limit our daily list to 5 tasks (not counting getting dressed, etc.), that would force a kind of focus that a very long to-do list avoids. If I have a huge to-do list, I'll do the least unpleasant task rather than the most urgent task.
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Procrastination is the grave in which opportunity is buried.
too long to-do lists
I would have a problem selecting 5 tasks out of 145. The "next action" list is probably a bit misnamed. It started out with < 10 things on it. Some days (maybe 20% of the time) i would get to all of them. But some days i would get to only 8, or 5 or some days none. And things are always coming up. So the list grew.
Upon re-reading the previous paragraph--i'm not sure that's how it happened. Maybe i need to observe myself (w/o being obsessive) to see what really is the dynamic there.
One other thing that happens, is if i work-binge for a few days, other life task build up.
Maybe it is just too hard for me to say goodbye to tasks i feel are non-negotiable.
I dont mind a list of 100s of things that i hope to get to eventually. I think i can do that.
I think i need a list that's shorter than my 145 item list to look thru for my "today" actions.
struggling with hard choices
I need to give some hard thought to my to-do list, as I said, and I'm feeling very avoidant about it. It's so painful to really think about my life and what's important to me, and to take responsibility for my choices. It's almost easier for me to float and let life happen to me - at least then I don't have to take responsibility for my choices. Or so I unconsciously think - of course the decision to not decide is a decision.
And life continues to pass me by.
I need to move today - take action! Maybe leaving my apartment would help? There would be less distractions if I went to a cafe to think. I could even do stuff - I've got the email backlog from hell.
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Procrastination is the grave in which opportunity is buried.
pro's prioritizing
I know what you mean. I figure I have 1000 good weeks left - that's about 20 years. After that I'll be in my 70's! Although I'll probably do some stuff in my 70's, I figure most of my major accomplishments will be behind me. When you look at it like that, each week seems even more precious. Alkthough I'd like to think I'm going to be able to do everything, learn all those skills, read all those books, etc.; it ain't gonna happen. I must prioritize too!
Jo
"In our minds, we seek to be divine; but in our hearts, we know it's party time." - Rondo Bros in Aquarium Dreams
936 weeks of life left
Exactly!!!! Both my parents died at 70, and I'll be 70 in 18 years. That's 936 weeks away.
Life is finite; time is finite. It's the most precious thing we have, and to squander it is the biggest waste of all.
We have to choose how we spend our time on this earth - choose very carefully, make sure we do what's important because we can't do everything.
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Procrastination is the grave in which opportunity is buried.
task 1 shed - I can't be the one to broker P.A. meetings!
I can't imagine why I ever thought I could (or should) broker P.A. meetings across the country and world. Insane! People need to find each other.
THis has been of my backlogs, and I'm shedding it. I've edited the text on the Contact page, and I'll post this same info on the face-to-face meeting board.
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Procrastination is the grave in which opportunity is buried.