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Disorganization Persists Until Pain Forces Systemic Change

Being organized is not a personality trait. It is a response to sufficient pain. I spent years assuming that people who managed their commitments without dropping things were just wired differently. Then in 2010 I hit a wall. Too many projects held in memory, too many promises made to too many people, and eventually I could not work properly. Antidepressants, colleagues propping me up, the full embarrassing picture. The common factor was not stress. It was a complete failure of system. Getting Things Done was basically a life raft after that. Not because it is a perfect framework, but because it gave me somewhere to put things that was not my own head. Stop holding everything in memory. Put everything in one consistent place. Triage what comes in rather than just reacting. Three ideas that barely qualify as ideas, but apparently I needed a crisis to implement them. What I have noticed since is that people stay disorganized for exactly as long as they can get away with it. The pain of muddling through has not yet exceeded the pain of building a proper system. The moment it does, they find a way. If you are dropping things regularly, missing deadlines, or feeling permanently behind, you are probably not a disorganized person by nature. Your current situation just has not been uncomfortable enough yet. Which is, come to think of it, a slightly grim thing to wait for. #Productivity #GettingThingsDone #ConsultantLife