miniGTD: GTD but smol
It's no Mind Like Water, but it'll clear out most of the mud!
After many (many!) attempts at GTD, I ended up with this:
That’s my whole system. No, there isn’t more. That’s it.
I rewrite this from scratch every morning in a small notebook.
It takes two minutes.
Life is good.
miniGTD is battle tested. I improvised it, in the middle of a crisis, when my nth GTD system collapsed under its own weight, because I needed something I could use to keep me sane. Afterwards, I kept using it, because it worked… weirdly well. (And probably because it was so damn easy, and had such a high payoff!)
I ended up not going back to Full GTD. For my purposes, it turns out this is enough!
Now, this is no GTD, of course! (“Eh close enough” won’t give you Mind Like Water! But it will clear out most of the mud :) But I’m finding it surprisingly pareto-optimal. In literally a minute or two, I get almost all the value that I was getting out of my full GTD system.
In fact, I get more:
Rewrite from memory acts as a natural sorting and prioritization function. (I always recommend starting with your Most Disgusting Task, without hesitation!)
Seeing too much stuff on a page (or worse, endless scrolling lists!) melted my brain and made it harder to make decisions. Here, everything on the page is something I actually want to move forward on, today.
Most importantly: it only takes 2 minutes, so I actually do it.
The GTD veterans among you will be saying: But Neko! How dare you use the name “GTD” for something so disgustingly lossy? You are using your memory! The whole point is that nothing must fall through the cracks!
To which I say... I simply turn the page :)
When I’m done writing my list, I flip to the previous page to see if I missed anything.
[insert the sound of your mind being blown]
I encourage you to try it, right now.
(Knowledge without use is a vain and foolish thing!)
It’ll only take a minute. Literally. And it gets easier every time!
But Neko! I can’t Just Do Stuff, I need it spelled out for me!
OK fine:
Write today’s date
Write your goals for the day
For each goal, write at least one Next Action
That’s it! Really! Now go do your stuff!!!
p.s. What? You want me to tell you about the “Waiting For” section? No, that’s for the Advanced Students, you don’t need to worry about that ;)
Also stay tuned for my upcoming post about how Frictionlessness is Satan and Analog is Jesus