So it was really nice to get a lesson in gratitude from someone who might appear to be a lot less fortunate than I. My work has put me in contact with the Ann Arbor Center for Independent Living lately, and being around people with disabilities who are happy, productive, and working hard to make their lives better has been really inspiring. However, just by chance I found myself sitting next to a guy who is completely paralyzed from the waist down, and overheard him say this to the woman sitting next to him, also in a wheelchair (he talked for about 20 minutes, so I’m doing my best to share the spirit of what he said in a few words):

“The number of blessings each of us has is virtually unlimited. You can breathe, right?” The woman nodded. “When you’re relaxed, you breathe gently, right? When you exert yourself, you breathe more deeply? When you reach your physical limits, your lungs burn with the exertion, and it makes you feel excited to be alive, doesn’t it?” She agreed, looking him right in the eyes. “You’re looking right at me, and you can see who I am, can’t you? You can see color, light, texture, distance, shapes, the smiles of happy people, the fresh skin of children and the skin of the old, etched by time. Your hands can grasp, shake hands, hug, caress, use silverware, and handle a paintbrush. Your mind can plan, imagine, decide, analyze, understand, and wonder. And your heart can feel all the emotions, from anger and sadness to joy, exhilaration, and love.”

She was dabbing at her eyes by the time he stopped talking, and I was so moved by his words that I approached them and introduced myself. It turns out that she was new to the world of disability, and he, being much more experienced in it, was helping to guide her. I think the lesson is one that we all can be taught!

I received that lesson in a powerful way in marriage. About three years into my second (and last!) marriage, I remember what a shock it was to realize that I was having some of the same disagreements with my wife that I had with my first wife. Here I was, madly in love with this woman and fully aware of her many positive traits and her wonderful, womanly radiance, and, having carefully considered all the aspects of marriage and compatibility, and having decided to marry her and to spend the rest of our lives together, and yet absolutely, positively convinced that I was right about such and such a point and doing everything to convince her of my rightness in a not very productive manner.

It hit me like a dope-slap from the Jolly Green Giant – I was creating the same sorts of conflicts in my new relationship as I had done in my first marriage! Two different women, same dude. Two wonderful, talented women, same unpleasant Mr. Grouchy-Pants. Hmmm. There was no denying it, darn it, I was causing the problems. It’s been humbling, but truly helpful in getting me to question the validity of my crankiness. I don’t recommend that you get divorced and remarried just for the sake of self-improvement, but are there any situations where you’ve had the perspective to realize that you might be the cause of inter-personal conflict?

But after much figurative and literal head and hand bashing, we hit upon the keen idea of simply exchanging emails with the simple topic heading “One Thing I know about ….” Each person states in 2 – 4 sentences a single concept found in our activity, in as simple language as he is capable of using. When the others read that email, they respond to all with another single, simple idea. And so on.

Using this method, we’ve already come up with a rather long list of core concepts. In a month or two, we’ll organize the entries, edit them, and decide whether they make sense as a manual for our art, or if we need to take other steps to sharpen them or make them more useful for our potential readers.

Do you have any tasks that could be conveniently dealt with using this email method?

What I mean is that we should all find out what approach works best for us, and for most of us, including myself, contrast is at least as important as consistency. Use whatever approach works best for the personality of the task at hand. If you always work with no expectations, you indeed just might get what you expect! But if you work with low expectations when the challenge is great, it may help you get through the tough work of doing one incremental task at a time without stressing about achieving the greater goal right away.

When the goal is in sight and it takes a big dose of motivation to push through to the end, that might be a great time to have high expectations. And when you absolutely at all costs have to get though the stack of to-do notes on your desk, even though they don’t significantly help you get closer to that lofty set of lifetime goals you set for yourself during that visualization session with the Tarot reader, that might be a good time to dig in with a ginormous pot of Paul Newman’s French Roast Coffee, get to work, and have no expectations at all!

Thanks to the wonderful and talented Jean Stranquist for providing the inspiration for this post!

I’ve been a bit overwhelmed lately. If you’re a regular reader of this blog, you’ll know that I own all or part of roughly seven businesses, and it’s easy to find my to-do list getting a little out of control. So, more than ever, I’ve been trying to find not only a good system for organizing my tasks, but also an over-arching theme or set of themes to help me keep focused on the big picture. The theme is still a work in progress, but I think I’m narrowing down the sorts of task management systems that work for me, and I thought I would share a few in case you find any of them helpful.

What used to work was just to dig in, start working, and do whatever came to mind. When I was running a single business, that actually worked pretty well, as long as I had enough caffeine in my system! But as I get busier, I find that I not only forget about a lot of tasks that, while they may not be five-alarm fires, are still important for the successful running of the businesses, and also that I also run of out time to do the things I actually remember.

When I ran just two businesses, it was enough to keep a simple to-do list. I used the list iCal and combined that with making sure to get all my appointments on the calendar. I’d review the list each day and prioritize each task, and usually that was enough to keep me on track. Even if I skipped a task or overlooked it, I would find it the next day and definitely get it done.

Then, up until recently, I was using a really primitive system that worked well. I’d just write each primary task on a sheet of paper, and make a note of what I got done that day on the sheet. After a task, the sheet would go on the bottom of the stack, and I’d do the task that appeared on the next sheet. What worked well about this was that I could instantly see what I’d done previously, and that helped inspire whatever had to be done next. However, there were two things about this system that didn’t work very well. One was that I didn’t find it very helpful for organizing and prioritizing tasks. And the other was, it just didn’t inspire me to want to dig into the business of getting work done … which I happen to think is a very important part of any task management system.

I’m experimenting with two systems now without having decided which one is going to be best in the long run. The first is a system designed by Ian, and since I don’t want to take away an opportunity for him to discuss his own creation, I’ll just say that it contains a general list of tasks and ideas along with several other lists of higher priority and long term projects. I’ll try to convince him to describe it in a future post unless he tells me it’s a secret that can make him a ton of money!

The other system is simple, but it’s working well. I use it both as a Word document on the computer and also print it out to give me a change of perspective. On the first page I list my businesses along with a check-off box on the left of each one. On page two, I list the primary aspects of the first business in a graphical box, along with a check-off box on the left of each larger box. I limit myself to no more than ten primary aspects, because (1) everything can be categorized within one of those ten aspects, at least in my businesses; and (2) that’s all I can fit on one page and still read! In each box where an aspect of the business is listed, I add bullets with a short description of tasks for that aspect. If an aspect is complex enough, I create another page of subject boxes with check-off boxes next to them, and fill those in with the individual items that make up each subject, again limiting myself to ten subjects.

So I first look at page one and find a business that hasn’t been checked off. I then locate the pages for that business, go to the first aspect that hasn’t been checked off, and do the work. If I complete the work, I check off that box. If not, I add notes in the subject box to clue me in next time I visit that subject.

I then make a judgment about whether it makes more sense to check off that business on page one and go to another business, or do another aspect of the same business. It all depends on the urgency of the tasks, how much stuff is coming at me in the form of meetings, phone calls or “real” work (like teaching martial arts or mastery lessons), and how much my head is spinning from trying to juggle so many different kinds of work.

When the head gets to spinning, there are a few really good ways to get it back where it needs to be. A 20-minute nap works wonders, as does 45 minutes at the driving range or an hour of intense sparring with another high level black belt.

Are there any task management systems that work particularly well for you? Did you find them somewhere, or make them up yourself? What works great for you, and why do you think it works?