The Simplest Thing You Can Do To Ensure Progress

In How to Become a Straight-As Student, Cal Newport introduces readers to what he calls a Work Progress Journal. Quote: 

"Buy a cheap spiral notebook, and keep it near your calendar. Each morning, when you work out your schedule for the day, quickly jot down in the notebook the date and the most important tasks that you are scheduled to get done. At the end of the day, if you’ve completed all of these tasks, simply jot down 'all completed'. If you failed to complete some tasks, record this, along with a quick explanation."

This is amazing advice. Though a difficulty arises in distilling an answer to the question: what is the important task to do today? The difficulty stems from one of two scenarios, depending on the day:

1. Having too much to do, or
2. Having too little to do. 

Dealing with the first is easy. Pick one task, complete it and move to the next. The second is a bit tricky. It's tricky enough to be called dangerous because it's an illusion (it seduces you into thinking there is nothing to do). There is always something to do (you are either adding words to a book-in-progress or you are sleeping, either way you are doing something). Being unable to figure out what to do results in putting everything that one might consider important on hold. 

David Allen, bestselling author of Getting Things Done, writes about the first step to getting things done. He calls it collecting. An important part of collecting involves pulling from what resides in our minds. Quote:

"You'll want to collect anything [.] that may be residing in your psychic RAM [...] I recommend that you write out each thought, each idea, each project or thing that has your attention, [...], go for quantity. It's much better to overdo this process than to risk missing something. You can always toss the junk later."

It's important to note this because we get from it that much of what results in doing relies upon having database of retrievable items. That getting to the point where we do requires mulling over data we've come across and what our minds make of it. 

This brings me to the simplest thing you can do to ensure progress: take notes. It's the best way to collect what you come across and what your mind makes of them. Timothy Ferriss, three time bestselling author, calls it one of the most important skills for converting excessive information into precise action and follow-up. The only requirement is that you do it in a way that is simple and effective.  

One concern that makes note taking seem like an unnecessary chore is the lack of a trust-worthy system to retrieve what we put down. As a friend and BasicPulse reader put it: 

"What happens when what we've written becomes too much? It becomes difficult to trace things and recollect things we had once written."

To address this concern consider these two tips:

Use appropriate notepads

I use three. They are:

A pocket size note
A palm size note and 
Evernote. 

A pocket size note is useful for collecting to-dos as they come throughout the day and storing what I like to call stray thoughts - thoughts that come at inappropriate times but ring like ideas that might change the world (or at least my own). I also use this to hold questions that I think might never get answers to but keep them open just in case mystical forces choose to be kind and grants me access to such knowledge. 

A lot of mulling goes into the palm sized note. With the help of what I discuss in tip two I elaborate on ideas, or iron out issues that might be bothering me. 

As an alternative to using a Palm sized note, I use Evernote. Because it can be inconvenient to guide a pen on paper when in motion. Evernote is a digital note taking tool, it requires that I use my mobile device. I do all my major writings on Evernote. And when things like a drained phone battery gets in the way, I reach for my palm sized note. 

A recent addition is a large notepad for brainstorming/editing write ups. I had initially began note taking using large notepads but had to abandon them due to the difficulty of having to read through numerous words to retrieve stored items. This brings me to the second tip. 

Use an Index 

It's wonderful what the combination of a hash tag and a page number can do. I got this indexing idea from Maria Popova's method for retrieving ideas from reading a book. When it comes to filling a notepad, here is how to do it:

1. Create an index on the first page of your notepad, preferably on the inside of the notepad cover. 

2. Every time you fill a page, number it and attach a hash tag to the content of what makes up that page. If you fill a new page with fresh content, number it with the number that follows what lies on the previous page and add a corresponding hash tag (you might find it useful to have hash tags or titles before you begin filling in content). 

3. Add the hash tag and it's corresponding page number to the index page you created. As you include more content the index page will grow. When the index page is full, go to the next blank page on your notepad and create a new one. 

Using these two tips allows you to trace ideas and follow-up on projects that would have otherwise fizzled into nothingness.

Because a lot of what we may want to accomplish today depends on what we were able to see yesterday and all the days before it. In working out what is important to us it's useful to be able to pull from the lessons and insights we've gathered as we thredded along. For some, a superhuman mental memory bank does the trick. For the rest of us, it’s helpful to heed to an old Chinese proverb: the faintest ink is more powerful than the strongest memory. Heed to wisdom. Put pen to paper and distill progress. 

Enjoy! 

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Post Author: P. W. Uduk 
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Photo Source: www.spiraljournals.com

Question of the week: What tactics or tricks do you deploy to get yourself to do what you need to do? Please let me know in the comments. 

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