DrJJWMac,

Thanks for the Goalscape idea. It helps a lot to visualize. It just lacks so many options... I tried to figure out this idea in the past. So simple... just a circle. I wanted to figure out in the past, how to manage my limited free time to achieve maximum in the areas I care about the most. I haven't found anything which would answer my question the way I want. I have spent too much time trying to figure this out, or rather waisted. If they would apply options like, instead of %'s to see actual time I have. It would be so much easier to plan realistically.

Maybe you have any tips to do that and don't spend a day on trying to figure that out.


I have a major problem with balance. If I try to push too hard towards my passion, my school suffers. If am focused only on school and I try to do as much these small tasks as possible, than I have no progress towards my dreams and getting better in my craft. That's when OF and GTD is not perfect solution for me. I can manage school, work, responsibilities very efficiently, but I don't do anything to be the best in my area I want to work in the future. I know it sounds like I don't know by myself what I want...

I even don't have an idea what I'm writing. I should better go and kill myself (I'm not serious).

Thanks for sharing this approach. I have been using GTD and OF for several years and since the beginning of this year its just not been cutting it. What changed was that my workload exploded and I've been so overloaded that the actions I have in my trusted system have just become overwhelming. I spend all my time either moving things around (rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic), or just giving up for a time and working from my email inbasket and white board. I was talking to someone about Kanban in software development, and that led me to the Personal Kanban book. Simple concept, but just what I needed.

So this thread was the rest of the story to help put put this to action right away. I have initially adopted most of what is in the first post and loving it. I had tried several different approaches to Contexts, the latest being to separate my actions by work and home, and then by thinking or quick. That wasn't helping me get work done at all. And each day I went through the same search to find things important, and just ended up flagging everything.

I'm finding after just a few days that the Kanban approach gives me a better visual look at what I'm working on, vs. contexts with 100 actions in them. And, the pull system helps me avoid multitasking too much. Time will tell, but I am hopeful this will work. I'll try to remember to post back if I make any changes to the approach.