In full obedience to David Allen’s teachings (there might be taller or stronger firemen, but he is the one who took me out of the flames), I periodically review my medium and long term goals. I have them written down in a list with a deliberately conventional, impersonal format, using infinitive verbs: “work as…”, “live at…”, “become…”
Etc. My regular reviewing method consists in reading all those goals aloud one by one, and as I do it so, I take them into the first person of singular and present time (”I’m working as…”, “I’m living at…”, “I’ve become…”) This active work of turning the sentences into first person on the go is useful to keep words from becoming “rusted”. Speaking aloud also makes things a little more tangible. And of course, the old trick, talking about all those goals in present time, as already accomplished, is better to improve the visualization.
This list has been with me for some time now and, as any work-in-progress, it has evolved and changed in many ways, and it surely will do in the future. But there has been a fixed element in it all the time, and an element that it is very unlikely to be modified: the last one. I will reveal it partially: “Not experiencing feelings of (…) in my time of dying”. On its turn, when read aloud, it makes: “…in my time of dying, I did not experience feelings of (…)”
It is always a weird moment of the review, making the postmortem summary of one’s own achievements(!). No matter how many times I’ve done it before, talking about how “I felt” in the moment of my death always fills me with vertigo and wonder, and sheds a different light upon the rest of plans, lists, goals, you name it. It is not just because of the impossible exercise of abstraction; simple as it seems, a sentence like that assumes a lot of wishful thinking that maybe is not a bad idea to reinforce (the moment wasn’t violent, the biological and active lives both had the same length, there was enough consciousness to witness the whole process…)
I know the concept is not new. There is, for example, this film, “The bucket list” (I didn’t know the expression, but I guess it refers to this kind of whole-picture lists). Stephen R. Covey also proposes visualizing one’s own funeral: what will people say, how one would like to be recalled… I am aware, too, that I might be dealing here with one of my tribe’s taboos, but I find this practice really helpful and even soothing, and that’s why I wanted to share; maybe it could be helpful for others too. Productivity is about making the most of one’s time, isn’t it? And besides, I don’t think this is really macabre. It sets a fixed reference: talking about thirst makes us value water more.
Oh, and one last but important detail: my goal review, after the aforesaid, always adds a little remark, very short but very important, that I do my best to speak out very clearly: “…BUT OF COURSE THIS IS A REALLY, REALLY, REALLY LONG TERM GOAL…”
Of course…
Do you use any technique of this kind in your everyday organisation? Which is your favourite “shot of perspective”?
Related posts:
Ask and thou will have: creating a vision board
The GTD First Aid Kit (and 4)
The GTD First Aid kit (Part 3)
Why we need assholes
GTD for writers