UncannyCreativity

The system shown here helps with my graphic design work as I decide how to accomplish all of my daily priorities. At the same time, when thoughts drift to personal tasks and ideas that could be distracting I can quickly make a note on my shopping list.

I’m a big fan of Getting Things Done by David Allen and base some organization ideas on that. One of the main ideas of Getting Things Done is to write down anything you think of. Then put it in a place where you can remember it. The other principal is separating an actionable task from reference material. Actionable items are broken down into small tasks and included on project task lists.

A trigger list is a short list of keywords that helps with brainstorming even more thoughts. It reminds me to write down ideas I may not have written yet: Boss, Painting, Bills, Important Dates, Weekly Events, Projects, Unfinished tasks. The words themselves jog memories. I jot down any and all thoughts that come to mind when reading my list. Then organize them into the above systems

In a recent episode of her podcast Happier, habits researcher Gretchen Rubin suggests to instead not organize and get rid of clutter. Some ideas may never happen or won’t be useful. Learn when to let them go as your going through this whole process. If any ideas are timely or have a shelf life, make that clear in your system.

Try this: Copy your role models and leaders. Thinking of leadership as an innate trait and not as a learned skill causes anxiety according to research reported by Psychology Today. The study concluded that people only benefit from role models when they acknowledge skills as learnable. Recognize that talents are learnable skills.

Try this: Recognize your accomplishments. Lack of confidence in your ability to succeed often creates a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Agree to disagree. A cool thing about respect is that it’s okay to disagree! Close friends don’t agree on everything. We don’t want to walk on eggshells feeling like we can’t be ourselves. Especially not around our friends who are supposed to be a positive force. Awesome friends are people who will say “I totally hate tennis, and I get why it’s awesome and fun for you!”

Experiment. Experiment by bringing up subjects with waiters, customer service workers, and coworkers. You’ll get to see a variety of reactions. Some individuals will be delighted to jump on a subject. Others will be uninterested. Many will be less excited to talk one day and in a better mood the next.

Have various activity partners. Some are friends who just like to get together for a certain activity like for a painting class. You might just have a dinner a few times a year or every year and catch up. You both love the renaissance festival and that might be the one time you hand out.

Rather than suffer, accept vulnerability as a reminder to solve one’s own problems and develop self-reflective awareness Rather than lash out, accept the priority of casual clarification and direct assertiveness without blame, criticism, or accusation. Rather than play hero, accept the skill of showing concern without fixing. Encourage others to develop and practice their own life tools.

Your audience, fans, and clients can be informed of what you will and won’t do. Clients can be asked to do deep proofreading of your graphic design work, for example, leaving you to concentrate on the design.