When you feel like you are losing control & lacking perspective

A Community Contribution from Augusto Pinaud, a GTD enthusiast and long-time GTD Connect member

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As GTD implementers, the goal for many of us is to increase Control and improve Perspective.  That will bring you to the place that David Allen calls ” Captain and Commander.”  But what what happens when you are suffering from the opposite– you are losing Control and lacking in Perspective?

We all lose control and perspective.  What a true GTD “Black Belt” (in my case a Brown Belt with Black Stains) can do, is to identify that stage and do what we know to do to get back in control and perspective. The challenge of course is to notice that you are losing control and lacking perspective in a moment, and make the correction.  Often we notice in the chaos stage, not at the beginning.

It took me a really long time to give myself permission to handle my personal life in the same way I handled my professional one.  Over the years it had been easier for me to notice when I am lacking perspective and control in my professional life than my personal one.

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Last night when I arrived at home, and all the lights were off, for a second I noticed that I had again lost control and was lacking perspective in my personal life and my personal projects.  This morning, beginning with coffee, and this entry as a reflective journal piece, I realized that I am not the only one that loses control and lacks perspective once in a while. Here’s what I did to get it back:

I must say, that my tools are mature from years of using GTD.  So I knew that my was not a problem in the flow of the tools. The first thing I did was collect.   I spent some time collecting everything.  I did a “RAM” dump based on pages 114 to 117 of the paperback book.  I gave special emphasis on pages 116 and 117–the personal aspects.

After I collected everything, I made a great effort not to run out– the pile was huge!

I knew that after this collection process the next step was to work through the GTD workflow process: What it is? It is Actionable? In other words, process every piece of paper on that pile.  I followed by a collection of projects and next actions in OmniFocus.

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This whole process took me a good 3 hours. At the end, my desk was clean, my inbox was in zero, and I had some time to get some control and a little bit more perspective.

One of the most challenging things to do, when we are busy and feeling that we are losing control and lacking perspective, is to stop, regroup, and move forward.  I wish I could stop more often, specially when need it, but I don’t often notice until I am in the chaos stage.

If you feel you are losing control and lacking perspective, stop, collect–spend all the time you need to collect–then process and organize into your trusting system.

Things may be hectic as before, the control may not be absolute, the perspective will be just a little more, but trust me, you will feel great, and will believe again that you have a chance to conquer and command that place of Control and Perspective.

This is a Community Contribution from Augusto Pinaud. If you have a personal GTD story you’d like to contribute to GTD Times, send it along!

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12 Comments

  1. Thanks for sharing your “perspective” Augusto. 🙂 It is good to hear from another long time GTDer about how to get back on the wagon. Reminds me that it’s good to re-read the book every 6 months or so.

  2. Thanks for a great post! I too have had difficulty implementing my system in my personal life – it’s good to know I’m not the only one!

    Your post (and particularly your second photo) have inspired me to try to get my home system into better order.

  3. Sarah, Thanks for your comment.

    I am glad I was able to inspire you, I work hard on keep myself moving forward, but I continue choosing this alternative to the one I had before I discover this one.

    best,

    Augusto

  4. Hey Augusto, I’ve been listening to the gtdvsg podcast and always am impressed with your analysis and the tools that you use. It’s nice to read something by you and when I went over to your blog, i found more nice things to read. Keep it up! 🙂

  5. Thanks Augusto for putting yourself out there so honestly. Your photos were/are very inspiring. It helps put a real face to this GTD process and how it will always be a “process”, and never a completed task.

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