I've always been someone who has tried to follow the most productive way of working and its often led to less productive working.
I've tried systems, apps, notebooks, journals filled with thoughts, ideas and lost priorities.
Towards the end of 2020 I started to feel like none of these things were lasting because I was applying too much pressure and force to get an outcome from the systems.
I was rarely taking the time to actually look at what I was creating and how I was making decisions.
Everything during my day felt very reactive.
I would read an article and add it to my to do list as a thing to read later and action, which often never happened. It just built up into a never ending tabs list that I would then turn into a list of tabs that I might one day read.
I would see a course and add it straight to my to do list to start, any idea that came up, I would add it straight to my to do list to start.
I almost saw my to do list as this dump with everything that appeared to be useful throughout the day. The problem with this is that it was a scarcity mindset, it was steeped in anxiety that I had to capture, store and remember everything to stay ahead and be ahead.
It was exhausting and it started to build into this mammoth like feeling of pressure and force to be, do and act a particular way as prescribed by what I put into my to do list.
What I landed on at the end of 2020 was that my to do list then was just a never ending flow of nothing.
So my theme for 2021 has been taking the pressure off completely in any area I feel like there is more pressure and force being applied by myself from a scaricity mentality.
The act of bringing awareness of this aspect of life means that I am actively trying to trust in the moment that I'll find all the information I need to make creative decisions or life decisions. In short I decided to lead from my intuition more.
So what does it look like?
I still have a 'to do list’ for life admin and things that I really need to do like book my car in for a service or get my passport renewed.
I've cleaned out and been ruthless about what I add in. All of the noise around my maker work such as reading this, finishing that course, remembering this life quote, or a statement I copied from tweet has gone.
So that's the first point. Living life from a never ending to do list is not really living a life and I've found that living life from a never ending to do list creates this feeling of pressure and force.
At some point this builds up into something negative, such as feeling like nothing you do will ever be enough.
The core idea of what I’m sharing here is a way of thinking about how to approach what we consume online and in the world.
By creating a more expansive space in yourself it allows for more creative and divergent thinking from your own intuition.
This way of thinking has led to some much more creative ideas and better decisions on what I'm doing, what to do next and what's important right now.
I feel like my life has less pressure and less force.
I find that my projects are moving faster and with more ease. They are moving in a more streamlined way, when I'm not trying to do everything at once but only the most important things in that moment.
I think it's important to trust that you'll always know what is the most important thing to do in any given moment if you allow that to come through you.
The last point is that I'm actually now using a simpler to do list system, post it notes. They work really well. I start my day by writing out three to four, perhaps at the maximum six post it notes and try to get through them.
It's been a refreshing way of doing productivity that isn't so tech heavy.
In summary this year is about living life with less pressure and less force. It's not about doing less, but it's about doing less from a place of chaos and scarcity.
Find me on twitter @cameronjj__
I've tried systems, apps, notebooks, journals filled with thoughts, ideas and lost priorities.
Towards the end of 2020 I started to feel like none of these things were lasting because I was applying too much pressure and force to get an outcome from the systems.
I was rarely taking the time to actually look at what I was creating and how I was making decisions.
Everything during my day felt very reactive.
I would read an article and add it to my to do list as a thing to read later and action, which often never happened. It just built up into a never ending tabs list that I would then turn into a list of tabs that I might one day read.
I would see a course and add it straight to my to do list to start, any idea that came up, I would add it straight to my to do list to start.
I almost saw my to do list as this dump with everything that appeared to be useful throughout the day. The problem with this is that it was a scarcity mindset, it was steeped in anxiety that I had to capture, store and remember everything to stay ahead and be ahead.
It was exhausting and it started to build into this mammoth like feeling of pressure and force to be, do and act a particular way as prescribed by what I put into my to do list.
What I landed on at the end of 2020 was that my to do list then was just a never ending flow of nothing.
So my theme for 2021 has been taking the pressure off completely in any area I feel like there is more pressure and force being applied by myself from a scaricity mentality.
The act of bringing awareness of this aspect of life means that I am actively trying to trust in the moment that I'll find all the information I need to make creative decisions or life decisions. In short I decided to lead from my intuition more.
So what does it look like?
I still have a 'to do list’ for life admin and things that I really need to do like book my car in for a service or get my passport renewed.
I've cleaned out and been ruthless about what I add in. All of the noise around my maker work such as reading this, finishing that course, remembering this life quote, or a statement I copied from tweet has gone.
So that's the first point. Living life from a never ending to do list is not really living a life and I've found that living life from a never ending to do list creates this feeling of pressure and force.
At some point this builds up into something negative, such as feeling like nothing you do will ever be enough.
The core idea of what I’m sharing here is a way of thinking about how to approach what we consume online and in the world.
By creating a more expansive space in yourself it allows for more creative and divergent thinking from your own intuition.
This way of thinking has led to some much more creative ideas and better decisions on what I'm doing, what to do next and what's important right now.
I feel like my life has less pressure and less force.
I find that my projects are moving faster and with more ease. They are moving in a more streamlined way, when I'm not trying to do everything at once but only the most important things in that moment.
I think it's important to trust that you'll always know what is the most important thing to do in any given moment if you allow that to come through you.
The last point is that I'm actually now using a simpler to do list system, post it notes. They work really well. I start my day by writing out three to four, perhaps at the maximum six post it notes and try to get through them.
It's been a refreshing way of doing productivity that isn't so tech heavy.
In summary this year is about living life with less pressure and less force. It's not about doing less, but it's about doing less from a place of chaos and scarcity.
Find me on twitter @cameronjj__