Brent P. Newhall's Blog

I heard this in a recentl Manager Tools podcast: Until you’ve got something, you’ve got nothing.

It struck a powerful chord. As I chat with folks via Twitter and follow others’ blogs, I realize that I have little to offer. A bit here and there: a few written stories, some credits. But precious little accomplished, in either the real or the digital worlds.

So, how to accomplish things? Rid one’s self of distractions. Hole up with a bunch of food, severely limit external interaction, and work. I may not need to be quite that extreme, but I think it’s important.

Which is why, today, I switched off Twitter and FriendFeed, and I plan to keep them off until I actually produce something. A finished product or service of some sort.

Heck, I may keep them off until enough of my friends get on there. Just one more distraction, after all.

Why I Have a Productivity System

When I look around at friends and family who don’t seem to be accomplishing that which they want to, I notice a trend. They’re smart. They even know what they want, if vaguely.

But they don’t have a way of breaking down those goals into actionable steps.

Now, you can try to break down your goals into a complete, comprehensive list of steps. This will drive you nuts. This is what productivity systems are for, to advise you on how much you need to keep track of.

I’m a fan of Getting Things Done, which is just lightweight enough that I can stay productive without laboriously updating my system, while comprehensive enough to capture everything.

The core of GTD is a Projects list, a record of everything you’re committed to accomplishing. Big and small. “Write novel” to “Patch paint in kitchen.”

For each Project, you have to identify the next physical, visible action you need to take on it. Writing a novel? The next action may be to sit down with pen and paper and record those plot ideas spinning around in your head. And that’s all you need to plan out. You can plan more than that, but you only really need the next action; once you’ve finished it, the following action is almost always very, very obvious.

(Why not plan ahead in detail? Well, how often have you discovered something partway through a project that completely changed your next six steps? Yeah. I bet it’s more often than getting partway through a project and finding yourself completely unable to think of the next step.)

I keep a list of Actions on a whiteboard in my studio. Throughout my day, I refer to it frequently. As I make progress on a project, I update the whiteboard. It feels good to know that I’m accomplishing my goals. That I’m doing that which I set out to do.

Just finished a busy time in the kitchen. Made some icebox cookie dough (with lemon!), some udon noodles from a new recipe, and wine. Sort of ghetto wine, actually.

The recipes are from Instructables, a cool website with lots of offbeat how-tos, from How to Make an Easy Inverted Planter to Making realistic Steampunk Airship Goggles. I’ve spent a serious amount of time browsing it in the past couple of days.

The wine recipe is suspiciously simple. As I fiddled in the kitchen tonight, I refined it thusly:

Wine

1. Thoroughly clean a wine bottle. I washed it out with soap, then filled it with piping hot water and let it stand for a few minutes, then wrapped the top with aluminum foil while continuing with preparations.
2. Put a funnel on the bottle, and pour in 1 and 1/8 teaspoons yeast, and 1/2 a teaspoon of Early Grey tea (for tannins, ya know).
3. Put the bottle and funnel on a scale, and pour 260 grams of grape juice (or 1 cup) into the bottle. Swirl gently but firmly to mix everything.
4. Add 485 grams of water, or until it reaches the neck (not into the neck).
5. Lid with a balloon, and put it in a dark, cool place for 3-7 days, until it stops bubbling.
6. Take another (thoroughly cleaned) bottle and top it with a funnel, and lay a coffee filter onto the funnel. Pour the wine through the filter into the second bottle, and cork it. Enjoy at your leisure.

That’s it. I’m going to bed. My fingers feel like thick Viennese sausages, unable to type a single coherent sentence.

It’s late evening. I really need to write more articles for Your Online Life. But I don’t want to, and if history is any indication I won’t do any more work tonight. I’m used to winding down in the evenings.

However. My new mantra is “Evolve. And let the chips fall where they may.” (from Jim Uhls’ script to Fight Club, not the book). And so, I write.