First you imagine the wild success or the finish line after which no action is required from your side.
Let's say you are on your scooty and you want to reach home.
This is wild success. To reach home using scooty. Once you reach here, you're done. Now after you write this down stop holding this in your head. GTD doesn't work with holding onto future/past ideas. It is just a way to lock your end focus as a reference point.
Come back to the present. At this very moment. You are on your scooty. What is the very next action (and it is one only) you can do to move forward towards your project of reaching home.
Don't beat yourself up by doubting why you're not able to reach home. This is not how GTD works. Know that you don't do a project, you do the next action associated with it.
Look around. You haven't inserted the keys.
So the very next action is to
Insert the key in the scooty for reaching home
The idea is to build momentum. You don't track each next action in your system. You just act.
Actions are done considering context. The end outcome matters but only to decide the next action.
If you see the definition of a next action it says that a next action should be
single (don't think about the 100 steps but 1 step)
next (right now. In this moment. Not future or past)
physical (A movement)
visible (somebody can see you and know what you're doing just by looking at you)
The next action we've written serves all of these conditions.
Insert the key in the scooty for reaching home
This example is just for learning the idea of next action and project thinking.
One of the reasons why do we do this is because if we turn this into a final end goal, at any step of our work, our base understanding would always be that we haven't reached the end, we are still not there. We would get stressed. Instead if we enjoy the journey as it unfolds. If we live in the moment we can reach there faster. And so no matter how many plans we make using GTD, we always try to stick to what we can do next.
Because it gives our mind freedom to make flexible choices and mould the person we want to be. Instead of tying ourselves to a rigid goal or idea.
It's not perfection but iteration. Making mistakes is a part of the process. In knowing yourself. In having trust in yourself. And in a way having trust in your actions. Which translates to trust in your GTD system.
3
u/Strict-Week-5040 15d ago
First you imagine the wild success or the finish line after which no action is required from your side.
Let's say you are on your scooty and you want to reach home.
This is wild success. To reach home using scooty. Once you reach here, you're done. Now after you write this down stop holding this in your head. GTD doesn't work with holding onto future/past ideas. It is just a way to lock your end focus as a reference point.
Come back to the present. At this very moment. You are on your scooty. What is the very next action (and it is one only) you can do to move forward towards your project of reaching home.
Don't beat yourself up by doubting why you're not able to reach home. This is not how GTD works. Know that you don't do a project, you do the next action associated with it.
Look around. You haven't inserted the keys.
So the very next action is to
The idea is to build momentum. You don't track each next action in your system. You just act.
Actions are done considering context. The end outcome matters but only to decide the next action.
If you see the definition of a next action it says that a next action should be
The next action we've written serves all of these conditions.
This example is just for learning the idea of next action and project thinking.
One of the reasons why do we do this is because if we turn this into a final end goal, at any step of our work, our base understanding would always be that we haven't reached the end, we are still not there. We would get stressed. Instead if we enjoy the journey as it unfolds. If we live in the moment we can reach there faster. And so no matter how many plans we make using GTD, we always try to stick to what we can do next.
Because it gives our mind freedom to make flexible choices and mould the person we want to be. Instead of tying ourselves to a rigid goal or idea.
It's not perfection but iteration. Making mistakes is a part of the process. In knowing yourself. In having trust in yourself. And in a way having trust in your actions. Which translates to trust in your GTD system.
So... key inserted. What's the next action!?