Over the past two weeks I have been reading Todoodlist, an e-book by Nick Cernis of Put Things Off (the laid-back productivity blog). It took me two weeks for three reasons:
- it was a spare time activity (and I did not have a lot of spare time)
- I couldn’t wait to start todoodling and sudoku calendering
- it inspired me to re-read Zen To Done again
Although Nick mentions Leo Babauta of Zen Habits and his ideas on productivity, he doesn’t tell you to read Zen To Done. But Nick’s ideas on productivity and the simplicity they radiate, really reminded me of Zen To Done and the message it brings across (in a word: simplify!).
Now I have to tell you that I was already a little biased. At the end of last year I wrote about my switch back to paper, after trying several electronic devices and various online services for dealing with my to do’s, notes and appointments (the Getting Things done stuff).
One of the things I rediscovered is that I really (I mean really!) like to write stuff down by hand. And after some time I found myself drawing more and more in my little black moleskine and little red calender. Now why am I biased because of this? Well the tagline for Todoodlist is: “Technology is great. Pencils are better.”
Todoodlist
The e-book consists of three parts. The first part is a series of essays with funny titles like “Parrots in Space”, “Einstein Shaving” and “Zen Kitten in a Box”. The essays are an introduction to the ideas behind going back to paper and pencil.
Those ideas are presented in the second part of the book. You’ll learn about how to make todoodlists (yes they are special to do lists, and yes they kinda incorporate GTD’s projects and Next Actions), what Sudoku Calenders are and how nice it is to write on a banana. Allthough the last part is better performed with a ballpoint pen, instead of a pencil. All of them are rather simple ideas that make things easier and more fun (Sudoku Calenders are a lot easier than actual sudokus).
The third part of the book deals about how to embrace simplicity using several concepts. To be honest, most of these concepts I was familiar with (so I skipped some parts of that particular part of the book). Some of the concepts I have written about myself, and if you read The four hour work week by Tim Ferriss, you’ll recognize some of them too. Don’t get me wrong, they are valuable ideas and if you haven’t read about it, they’re simply gold.
I loved reading the first part of the book. I started reading it as a relaxing activity in spare time, and that part perfectly fit the need I had. I had some laughs, and some stories to help me in explaining concepts (thanks Nick!). The second part was so inspiring that I often stopped reading to get my moleskine and a pencil to start using it. And the third part I was skimming for the most part. All in all a very valuable e-book, well worth the $14 it sells for.
Zen To Done + Todoodlist = ZenToDoodlist
So it took me over 500 words to get to explaining the title (but you probably figured it out already). Why ZenToDoodlist? Because they are perfect additions to eachother. Zen To Done is a series of habits that will lead to a simple and effective productivity. The 10 habits are:
- Collect
- Process
- Plan
- Do
- Simple Trusted System
- Organize
- Review
- Simplify
- Routine
- Find Your Passion
In habit 3 Plan, one of the things to do is to plan your Big Rocks for the week. The Big Rocks are the things you really want to accomplish in that week. The same things goes for the daily schedule, but then they’re called MIT (Most Important Tasks). I find myself working with projects (GTD-style) as Big Rocks and the Next Actions in those projects as MIT’s. And the Todoodlist is the perfect tool to divide a project (big rock) into smaller actions and decide on the Next Action. And as soon as the context of these projects and actions is clear, planning them is a lot easier.
Habit 5, Simple Trusted System are my two little moleskines (black notebook and red calender). Black works as my ubiquituous capture tool, and it contains my todoodlists. Red has my appointments (and soon my sudoku notes and glyphies) and it contains my scatter-to-do’s (the random stuff that’s not project related). They simplify my system tremendously (to hand - pencil - paper). The only downside is that there are still two moleskines. So there’s some area of improvement is left…
If you follow Todoodlist closely, you’ll also find several tricks (with sticky tabs) to speed up your review process (I haven’t implemented them yet). Then go back to Zen To Done again and adopt the habits. The most important one: habit 4 Do. After that, look into habit 9 Routine. These will really get stuff done, the others are just there to help you not lose time on stuff that doesn’t matter.
Conclusion
Both Todoodlist and Zen To Done are valuable e-books, well worth the price the authors are charging for them. The combination makes it even more valuable, because they really go hand in hand in creating a simple trusted paper based system that will boost your productivity, simplify your life and inject some more fun into it.
PS: My own e-book Personal Core Values can help you with habit 10: Find your passion. You’ll discover what your personal core values are, and how you can use them to build a personal mission statement.
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