Getting better - tips and links to improve one's life

Once in a while I read about things or tips or gadgets where I think they could improve my daily life.
On this page I will share my most interesting finds with you - read it, adopt it, ignore it, laugh about it.

As usual: your mileage may vary

Basics Monday, September 08, 2008, 11:58 PM On www.imgriff.com there is a series about basics: http://imgriff.com/serien/das-kleine-einmaleins/ (in german). I will summarize them here in english in short paragraphs for you and me in the following weeks.

Everything gets a timestamp Every note that you make (on a piece of paper, in your moleskine, in your software tool, PIM, mobile phone) gets a timestamp. Many times you won't need it but in those rare cases you will be lucky that you wrote it down. So just get used to it.

The famous 2 minute rule Whatever is on your todo list or needs to be done and takes only two minutes: do it now! Watering your flowers, answering an email (a short answer!) - do it immediately. Don't waste time to put it on a todo list or schedule it. Just get it done immediately and forget it. That also implies that you should take your time for all things that take longer. Plan them, find time slots when you can do those tasks without being disturbed or distracted. This helps you to stay focused.

Do similar jobs together Do phone call after phone call, email reply after email reply. Simply try to batch process tasks that are nearly identical. That should help you to stay more focused and get faster on each single task.

Quiet, please! Switch off all disturbing noises that you can control (don't try to stop the caterpillar in front of your house, except when your name's Arthur Dent!). Whenever you need all your concentration switch off your mobile phone and normal phone, your "you have mail" tone, your bell at the front door and other disturbing noises. If it doesn't disturb you let the music play - at least you can control the kind of music and the volume.

Singletasking Negotiating a contract with your mobile phone in your left hand, doing online banking with your right hand, use eye contact with an office mate to agree on a meeting date - that's busy. But is it productive? If you're trying to get a job done that needs all of your concentration - then do only this one job. Multitasking at work is a myth. Of course you can put a chewing gum into your mouth while reading emails but trying to work on two jobs that both require your full concentration? Come on. That will never work. Oh, and while we're at it: to get a difficult single task done well, read the paragraph above this one once more.

Salami tactics "How do you eat an elephant?" "Piece by piece." If there is a huge overwhelming project ahead of you how can you deal with it? Right, piece by piece (or to stay with our salami, slice by slice). Try to separate the project into many reasonable and precise steps or tasks and finish them one after the other. This approach comes with several advantages: you'll constantly progress and you'll get faster results. The huge impregnable project shrunk into a pile of smaller tasks you can cope with.

To be continued More to come in the next time.

Pushups Monday, September 08, 2008, 11:42 PM Three months ago I discovered the site http://hundredpushups.com/. There is this guy who promises that you (or me) can do 100 push ups in one go after six weeks. Muhahahahaha. To be perfectly honest: I am a couch potato. I did sports (skateboarding, badminton, table tennis) until I was around 20. But then university and job and all the pubs in Berlin and girl friends and such did their job: I became a lazy chair guy. Three years ago I started to ride to work by bike (bicycle). Unfortunately not every day (yet). But I'm getting better. This year I will improve my bicycle work days and reach at least around 120 (currently I'm at 90) days out of 220 working days. But I'm drifting away Beginning of August I read the ludum dare blog. It's about a 48 hour game coding contest that takes place two or three times a year. And one guy mentioned the http://hundredpushups.com/ site again. I got hooked. So I printed out the complete program and took it with me into my vacation. And I started. In my initial test I managed 12 push ups. Stop laughing, down to the ground and do it better! After two weeks (you train 3 days a week and rest in between) there is another maximum test. This time I managed 30 push ups. Now I finished my third week and I'm doing around 70 push ups in one training session (takes around 10 minutes). I doubt that I will manage 100 push ups after six week but I'm pretty sure it will be more than 50. But I will continue the training until I can do 100 push ups. You'll see when I add the badge on my website Positive points are: I don't need to go to a gym I only train three days a week Each training session takes max. 10 minutes I do improve I feel good It's fun Will you give it a try?

Getting things done and Zen to done Monday, September 08, 2008, 11:29 PM Yup - it's the famous stuff by David Allen (Link here http://www.davidco.com/). It's pretty much all about getting organized in your life and keeping track of lists, organizing those lists and so on. To be honest: It's way too complicated for me to live it. But at my favorite "Getting better" website (www.imgriff.com, a german blog) I found a much simpler version: Zen to done. Here is a link to the german article of www.imgriff.com: http://imgriff.com/2008/01/09/zen-to-done-teil-1-das-ultimativ-einfache-produktivitaetssystem/ The german link also offers a downloadable ebook version - very nice For all you english readers: the original version can be found here: http://zenhabits.net/2007/04/zen-to-done-ztd-the-ultimate-simple-productivity-system/ Of course you don't have to follow all those guide lines. At least I don't and won't. But it's a motivating read and I think even adopting one or two habits is already an improvement. And that's what it's all about, right?