Deliberate Practice | Just Seven Things

Archive for the category “Deliberate Practice”

Thinking a lot about the apparent contradiction in the following: Is the best way of being truly mindful, creative and in the ‘here and now’ to be continually running a slot management and priority review system?

I know I’ve read about it many times in David Allen’s (see links in right bar) work, but it’s been difficult to make stick previously. Something’s definitely shifting. Again, I think it’s a left brain/ right brain thing. Let me explain.

My left brain, in Taylor’s words ‘chatters’. It’s continually raising into my awareness my commitments, to do list, undone business etc. It’s function as an awareness system has shortcomings. Dragging my focus onto those things that my other-than-conscious cannot currently sort on it’s own doesn’t help if I can’t consciously act now to sort those commitments or issues. They end up bouncing round my head and weighing heavy on my chest (at low moments)

So what to do? Accept that mindfulness and the ‘here and now moments’ are paid for by lots of little actions. These actions are normally dismissed: ‘I’ve only got 20 minutes, I’ll start thinking about that big project that’s been on my task list for weeks in that big slot I’ve got tomorrow afternoon’

Wrong. Why? Because 1. You’re already thinking about it. Have been since you committed to do the task and put it on a list. You can’t stop (consciously or otherwise) until you’ve started the momentum towards a goal you’re crystal clear about. 2. Why not do 20 minutes now? Pen to paper and start to list everything you can think of that you’ll have to do to achieve your goal. End the slot with a time commitment to just another 20 minutes tomorrow. (in that big slot tomorrow afternoon that will probably suck in loads of distractions, so you’ll only have another 20 minutes anyway)

Repeat the above every day for a week and you’ll have given the project that’s been hanging in your thoughts and on your chest 100 minutes intense focus. Set a deadline and you’ll be near completing it.

Do the above across all the things in your task list. It may cause a balloon of work (and make it seem you have even less time in the here and now) – but it’s a hump you’ll overcome to achieve efficiency.

If you notice, it’s virtually accidental. An afterthought to use a 20 minute slot rather than re-reading the emails that have been squatting in your inbox (which you never get round to because you’d never get anything done in 20 minutes, would you…….)

The point of the above in relation to a contradiction between a system and creativity?

We’re using our logical left brain to accept the shortcomings of it’s chatter, to then accept a system that it doesn’t believe in, to facilitate something at the polar opposite end of logical and analytical.

Posted in Action Orientation, Conscious and Unconscious, Creativity, Deliberate Practice, Focus, Game Playing, Habits and Routines, Mindfulness, Successful Outcomes, Vision and Goal Setting and tagged Goals, GTD, personal effectiveness, Time Management

25 Sep 2008

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The Role of Reading and Knowledge in Personal Development

My thoughts keep occasionally swirling back to this topic. A number of reasons:

1. I’m always interested in further developing my knowledge

2. I’m always seeking the most effective way of doing things, including (1) above

3. I’m always challenging myself on how I’m currently approaching things.

I’m trying to put the deliberate practice into my own self development.

In the series of talks that I’ve been doing at Madgex for the ideas and learnings programme, I’ve had a purpose or focus for my learning. The research and knowledge gathering that I’ve done has been done against an operational need.

There seemed to be a view that it was possible to get too big for reading that has gnawed at me since I wrote the post. I’m still hoping that I misinterpreted the article I read.

All of these things together have lead me to wonder two things:

1. Do the consumers of information always need an ‘operative or operational purpose’ to maximise the effectiveness of their consumption and subsequent usage. Knowledge in advance of need being an inefficient use of time?

2. Does the nature of both academic and mainstream publishing mean that to have a chance of being published there has to be a niche focus or positioning? That the lack of breadth to subject matter is a direct result of a bias for differentiation? (with due reference to a conversation with C. Turner for prompting this thought)

The impact that this has on learning and personal development is interesting. Does the effort that we have to put into assimilating the pockets of information aid learning by increasing engagement through the value add of linkage?

To be frank, I think I might be off on one ;-)

Posted in Deliberate Practice, Knowledge Management, Learning, Psychology and tagged Deliberate Practice, Information bias, Knowledge Management, Learning, Personal development

15 Sep 2008

Time Management Progress in Action

I was prompted by a comment on one of my posts from June (J7T was just 19 days old) about how hard time management was. It made me stand back and evaluate how far I’ve come in just over three months (and particularly after a 7/10 level day in terms of stress and task bittiness as I travelled between appointments):

I feel more relaxed control (and a clearly ring-fenced idea of where there is a diminishing pile of ‘stuff’ to clear through the GTD system
I am significantly better at locking down my focus to a task in hand. To switch and give it my full thinking attention. Ironically, writing this blog (with the aim of posting at least 5/7 days a week) has improved this ability
I have a more flexible approach to prioritisation based on trust of my systems and reaction to a gut response. This opposed to the constant prioritising and re-prioritising trap that it is sometimes easy to get into
My sense of ‘someday/maybe’ or just ‘ruthless task deletion’ has improved. I feel like I know myself better and cull those things that will just sit for years on front-of-mind task lists and create noise.
I (as posted on recently) am a lot better at just doing the action. Just getting on and starting without messing around.

And the main area for improvement?

As WorkLoadMaster states in his comment to my post on the ‘Stress of Time Management’ above: it’s all about keeping on top of the system. I feel like my report card would say:

‘Si has shown much improvement over the term. With continuing effort and focus he should continue to improve……’