[abates17]

Originally Posted by BwanaZulia

1. Priority IS in GTD
2. Priority is too FLUID to capture in tool
3. Brain can do priority FASTER than tool.

I know I’m dredging up this old thread, but I have heard this repeated time and time again (while reading all 21 pages), and I have to respectfully disagree. Let me give you an example of how I use priorities in Life Balance, and how the tool calculates priorities faster than my brain can:

I have tasks to do around the house. Some are daily, some are weekly, some are monthly, and some are yearly. I have them all assigned to a House context. They all have their own recurrences, and appropriate lead times (i.e. hours for a daily task, a month for a yearly task).

The nice thing about Life Balance is that priorities for repeating tasks are adjusted dynamically, based on the time until the task is due. So with this system, I can look at my list and quickly see which items are red (past due), which ones are orange (less than one lead time until they are due), and which are green (more than one lead time until they are due). And they are all sorted accordingly.

Furthermore, Life Balance can handle those fluid priorities. Which is more important: doing a monthly task that was done three weeks ago, or doing a weekly task that was done six days ago? I don’t have to worry about it, because LB does all the calculations on the fly, and sorts the list.

I can hear the protests now: “But that is not GTD! You should just have a list of tasks and browse through them to pick the ones that are the highest priority!” That’s true, I could do that…and with this method, I still can. Nothing says I HAVE to do the top item on the list; but if I absolutely want to do the task that has been done the least recently, I know exactly where to look.

And note also that I did not set a SINGLE priority for a SINGLE one of these items! The priorities are adjusted dynamically based on due date and lead time, which I set once and forget about. If (for example) I wanted to prioritize “Wash windows” as more important than “Clean garage,”*I could do that too. And the amazing part is, if both items are due, “Wash windows” will show up first, but if I have washed the windows recently, then “Clean garage” will show up first. It does the work for you, and adjusts priorities dynamically on the fly!

Now, can you tell me that you can look at a list of repeating tasks and completion dates and repeat periods, and tell me on the fly which one was done the least recently?