[wilsonng]

After struggling with priorities in previous systems such as my old beloved Franklin-Covery planner, I've found that priorities hinders me.

I used to think that priorities would help me "determine" or "wisely" choose the best next action for me to do. Anything that has a High ranking should be screaming at me to do it.

Yet, I decided that a C1 task is better suited for me. This was based on intuition, current energy levels, my time available, or location.

I remembered reviewing Chapter 9 of David Allen's "Getting Things Done." It's the chapter titled "Doing: Making the Best Action Choices." This should explain to you how to choose your best next action.

David Allen expands further on why priority labels just doesn't seem to really help you choose the best next action. Read his other book "Making It All Work." Pages 189 to 192 has a section labelled "The Priority Challenge." It is a more revealing statement.

Only "you" know what your priorities are at any given time. Not a computer. Often times, your priorities will change day to day or hour to hour. What happens if your A1 project gets cancelled by your boss? Then you'd have to take the time to resort all your priority labels on your task list or OmniFocus database. Sometimes you'll have to bump up a task/project to A1 status and essentially move everything else down one notch.

What David Allen is trying to say is that it is futile to try to track down something so superfluous and can change at any moment's notice.

Instead of choosing your best next action based on "priority" labels, choose the best next action based on:

Context
Time Available
Energy Available


I can have an A1 project screaming at me on my task list but if I have a 15 minute time window between appointments, I'll go ahead and do something small like a series of phone calls that I can wrap up quickly before the next appointment arrives.

Or I may have just finished a huge mind-draining task, I'll choose a lightweight task to do until I can recharge my mental batteries.

Or I might be at the grocery mart and my A1 project can only be done in the office. I'll go ahead and look at my task list to see if there is any tasks I can eliminate while I'm at the grocery mart.

I've been ignoring priority labels for quite a while now and I certainly don't miss it.

WIth that being said, I'd say go ahead and put a priority column in OmniFocus. I will surely hide it from view and never even touch it. That'll keep those priority folks happy. I wish them all the best of luck trying to track their "priorities."

I certainly am on the "priority-less" fence and I'm loving it on this side.