Ask HN: Best books for designing a weekly schedule?
1 comments
< Not book recommendations as you requested, but rather questions and direct ideas and suggestions, from my own GTD-informed experience, that may help you arrive at a satisfactory solution … >
- Only a small fraction of everything truly matters. This applies as well to the body of projects, tasks, and activities that you believe to be the small fraction of those that truly matter.
- Do you want to complete these projects and tasks, or do you want to have completed them?
- For each project, consider whether you can define (and whether you have defined) a clear rubric for completion. What does "done" mean?
- The foregoing question might lead you to distinguish ongoing, deepening practices from finite projects and tasks. (Cf. the idea of infinite games versus finite games: book by James P. Carse.)
- For each project, consider whether you can quantify (and whether you have quantified) the value of satisfying your rubric for completion.
- Time spent capturing, clarifying, organizing, and prioritizing (even time spent creating rubrics of completion) is time not spent speed-running the satisfaction of your projects' completion rubrics. Same goes for all reading and thinking about how to complete your project and tasks; how to further improve your process; and so forth.
- Consider selecting the three projects that feel like the ones you should speed-run to completion. Try cycling 15-minute (or 30-minute) blocks of time on those projects, one after the other: 15 minutes on Project 1, then 15 on Project 2, then 15 on Project 3, then back to Project 1. (Use the Pomodoro Technique if you're into that.) When you satisfy your completion rubric for one of them, substitute in the next one.
This has the benefits of focused work on only a few strategic goals at a time; not having to constantly evaluate the priority of all projects against all others, yet having some good but minimal prioritization scheme; and not having to prioritize one mid-dependency-path task against all others. Moreover, the short, cycling work periods keep the mind interested and engaged, while also allowing the subconscious mind to do what it does best (finding elegant and efficient solutions to problems by operating in the background while you work on other things). It also allows problems to solve themselves or otherwise disappear while you work on other things.
> What books fixed this for you?
No book will fix anything for you without action on your part. Motivation tends to come from action, not vice-versa.
- In short, pick 3; start cycling them; stop trying to prioritize between all next actions instead of by ultimate goals/values of the projects themselves; and only clarify and prioritize within the project during your time for working on the project itself.
- Throw in periods for daily routines at set times (at 7 PM every day I take care of basic household chores: dishes, garbage, tidying the living room). The rest of the time, vehemently attack your 3 projects with the goal of getting them satisfactorily done ASAP.
- This will mean most things won't be your best work or the best completion of those particular things possible in the universe. In other words, perfectionism must die. Look at it this way: you'll recognize the rare situation when doing your very best matters, and as a trade-off you'll end up with sufficient time to make that happen.
- You'll get to a point every day when you can just feel that your day's energies are exhausted and additional work will be fruitless and/or time ill-spent. You're not a robot and that's as it should be. That's the time to knock out routine tasks (teeth-brushing; buying groceries) or just resting and having fun. Rest easy in the knowledge that you've worked your tail off; you've done more in a day than most do in a week; and your subconscious is still working away tirelessly to give you more solutions and inspirations in the morning.
Good luck!
- Only a small fraction of everything truly matters. This applies as well to the body of projects, tasks, and activities that you believe to be the small fraction of those that truly matter.
- Do you want to complete these projects and tasks, or do you want to have completed them?
- For each project, consider whether you can define (and whether you have defined) a clear rubric for completion. What does "done" mean?
- The foregoing question might lead you to distinguish ongoing, deepening practices from finite projects and tasks. (Cf. the idea of infinite games versus finite games: book by James P. Carse.)
- For each project, consider whether you can quantify (and whether you have quantified) the value of satisfying your rubric for completion.
- Time spent capturing, clarifying, organizing, and prioritizing (even time spent creating rubrics of completion) is time not spent speed-running the satisfaction of your projects' completion rubrics. Same goes for all reading and thinking about how to complete your project and tasks; how to further improve your process; and so forth.
- Consider selecting the three projects that feel like the ones you should speed-run to completion. Try cycling 15-minute (or 30-minute) blocks of time on those projects, one after the other: 15 minutes on Project 1, then 15 on Project 2, then 15 on Project 3, then back to Project 1. (Use the Pomodoro Technique if you're into that.) When you satisfy your completion rubric for one of them, substitute in the next one.
This has the benefits of focused work on only a few strategic goals at a time; not having to constantly evaluate the priority of all projects against all others, yet having some good but minimal prioritization scheme; and not having to prioritize one mid-dependency-path task against all others. Moreover, the short, cycling work periods keep the mind interested and engaged, while also allowing the subconscious mind to do what it does best (finding elegant and efficient solutions to problems by operating in the background while you work on other things). It also allows problems to solve themselves or otherwise disappear while you work on other things.
> What books fixed this for you?
No book will fix anything for you without action on your part. Motivation tends to come from action, not vice-versa.
- In short, pick 3; start cycling them; stop trying to prioritize between all next actions instead of by ultimate goals/values of the projects themselves; and only clarify and prioritize within the project during your time for working on the project itself.
- Throw in periods for daily routines at set times (at 7 PM every day I take care of basic household chores: dishes, garbage, tidying the living room). The rest of the time, vehemently attack your 3 projects with the goal of getting them satisfactorily done ASAP.
- This will mean most things won't be your best work or the best completion of those particular things possible in the universe. In other words, perfectionism must die. Look at it this way: you'll recognize the rare situation when doing your very best matters, and as a trade-off you'll end up with sufficient time to make that happen.
- You'll get to a point every day when you can just feel that your day's energies are exhausted and additional work will be fruitless and/or time ill-spent. You're not a robot and that's as it should be. That's the time to knock out routine tasks (teeth-brushing; buying groceries) or just resting and having fun. Rest easy in the knowledge that you've worked your tail off; you've done more in a day than most do in a week; and your subconscious is still working away tirelessly to give you more solutions and inspirations in the morning.
Good luck!
The problem is scheduling: I don't know when to tackle those actions, nor how long to spend working through my next actions list. And while I can prioritize these next actions to decide which one is the most important/urgent that I should tackle next, I don't know how to balance this "productive" time (next actions work) with time for other things that I don't want to let go of, such as: gaming, hanging out with my girlfriend and friends, watching movies or TV shows, going out to try something new, or just doing nothing (rest?).
What I've been doing so far is to have no weekly plan/routine whatsoever and just do whatever I feel I should be doing at any given moment, but lately that's not working out so great (either I spend too much time on fun/gaming/social, or I spend too much time doing productive things and start burning out). So I'm looking for good books/methods that specifically tackle the allocation side – that is, that teach you the skills and philosophy for designing a realistic weekly routine that balances productive work (as in personal/life work, not day job), admin, fun, and rest.
What books fixed this for you?