Month: September 2013

Creating sentences that you will never use… (why they told us that we shouldn´t be writers)

Who want to be a person that sit in a room for hours talking to imaginary voices that think that you are terrible at what you do.
Who want to be a person that spend months working on words that doesn’t ever feel really good.
Who want to be a person that may spend months working on a piece that maybe no one will ever read, even if published.

Most likely no one… but for many writers that doesn’t matter, because in general we think more on the following option:

Who want to be the person that spend many months working to change 1 person life.

I am not aware of many parents that tell their kids not to try to be a Doctor, Engineer, Lawer or a Business Mayor. Somehow doesn’t matter if you pick one of those “safe” careeers you will be ok. Even if you will be terrible at them, you will be OK.
Insterestingly enough, I know plenty of writers that got the opposite advise. “Don’t waste your time writing”, “You are not a writer”, “Pick a safe path” and many more things. My parents did it, as well as the parent of so many of my writers friends (and the parents of many that simply stop writing becasue of that)
I don’t think you pick to be a writer, in the same way that you don’t pick to be a doctor or a lawyer or a salesman. You are and you can train yourself to be better, much better.
Who want to be a person that sit in a room for hours talking to imaginary voices that think that you are terrible at what you do. Who want to be a person that spend months working on words that doesn’t ever feel really good. Who want to be a person that may spend months working on a piece that maybe no one will ever read, even if published.
Sales people make calls that never get anywhere, doctors had patients that die even when they do everything in their hand to help, business people invest months on projects that never accomplish anything… but somehow those are better bets… at least according to some parents.
If you ever dreamed to be a writer, then you need to write, spend the time, learn the craft, and discover that after many hours you will get a perfect sentence that you will never use…

Working with #OmniFocus: Using Perspectives as a Focus Changer on OmniFocus.

Perspectives are one of those things in OmniFocus that are really powerful if you know how to use them. I have been using them extensively for years and love them when I need to change Focus, because they can help me to re-focus or clarify the next set of actions in one movement.
Let me explain. We all change our focus, our location, our contexts if you will. The problem is how fast can you re-focus when you do this. In my experience it is in these changes that people waste a lot of time, we get distracted, we found little time suckers, and we think: “since we are going to do that, let me quickly do this…”
Many people can keep working trough their list for the simple reason that they follow step one, two, tree, and so on… but when they change activities, that trail is lost, and in many cases the productivity and more is too.
My day is full of interrumptions, between kids at home, calls for work, work per se, and other responsibilities… I start my day early, between 4:00 to 4:30AM because I have learn that the most important thing I have is the ability to focus on the next thing. If I miss those opportunities in wich I can concentrate and focus, in many cases I don’t find another one until the next day. Because of that I have come with some perspectives in OmniFocus that I open and check just before I am going to change activities.
We all have a lot of contexts, more than enough but in a way we need even more so we kept our lists in manegeable sizes. I have joke that I can really have 2 lists, @iPad and @iPhone. The problem will be identify what it is important if I do that. It is for that reason that I have plenty (and also because OmniFocus can remind me of certain context by location). The problem is we need more contexts to keep the size of our list manegeable, and at the same time we need a better way to access the important things on those lists, and give us crumbles to follow between activities so we don’t waste the time in general we don’t have.
For example, I have one for the Morning, that it is the first look at what I have for that quiet time before 7am when the kids begin to need my attention. This perspective show me a set of Contexts, that contain for things I need to rememeber, my affirmations, my goals and have also some things that I need to try to accomplish before the kids wake up at 7. This perspective make sure that I don’t waste time in my system on those two and a half or three hours that I have in the morning of quiet and focus time.
I have also one for every time I am going to leave the house, this perspective not only allow me to see my errands but things that I want to do (or take with me) before I leave home. Nothing worst that check errands on the go and discover that you forgot something because didn’t check the “before leave home list”.
I have more perspectives like this, like arriving home, the night routine, and more.
These perspective are really important to me because it is by the use of these that I can make sure that I can make the transitions with a minimum waste of time.
How do you handle transitions?

Working on my iPad: Where do you do work when you need to Focus.

I have learned over the years that I am not an Home-Office/Office kind of person. It is becasue of this that when I need to Focus there are two things I do. First is to grab my iPad. Second is to leave my Home-Office.
Some critics said that you can’t work on the iPad because doesn’t multitask, that it is exactly one of my favorite reasons to use it when I want to single task (or do focused work).
Having one application on the screeen force me to stay focused for a longer time, that at the same time help me to stay focused for longer time and finished the task in hand faster.
Where do you go/do when you need to focus?

Are you ready for Tomorrow?

I ask myself that question every night. Are you ready for tomorrow?
Before I got to bed I like to leave all the stuff I may need for tomorrow ready. I have over the years create a checklist that I revise before actually go to bed, just to make sure I am ready.
There is nothing worse that leave something for the next morning and then the next morning happen. You know, you wake up late, or discover that you don’t have this or that or the printer is not working or you are out of coffee or milk.
All this can be avoided simply be checking the night before. I sit in my office between 4:00 and 4:30AM to work. I love to work at that time, but I have learned that in order to get the most out of that there are a couple of things that need to happen. First I need to leave my desk ready. If I get to messy desk, I waste a lot of precious quiet time. I make the point to leave my desk ready the night before if I wish to be productive at that time, otherwise I simply waste those hours.
I also get my breakfast and my daughter lunch box ready. If I don’t have breakfast when I wake up what happen is that I need to choose between making breakfast and not working or skipping it (that it is what usually happen) and then I get cranky and hungry in the middle of the morning. When that happen, I never make good food choices, so I try to be careful about it.
Are you ready for tomorrow? Do you have a check list? How you get ready?

Don't call yourself an Aspiring Writer

Either you are a writer or you are not. There is no aspiring here. If you want to be a writer, then write, but aspiring will take you nowhere.
This is one of the common mistakes that I hear from many writers; they aspire to be a Writer. In my opinion this came out of inexperience, fears and insecurities. You are a writer or you are not.
There was a time in my life that I was also an Aspiring Writer. The difference then is that I wasn’t writing, I was just aspiring but not doing the job. I aspire to write that book. I aspire to come with the inspiration of a great book. I aspire to sell millions of copies. Guess what. I aspire to a lot but write little. I was spending an incredible amount of time aspiring to be a writer.
What to be a writer? Stop Aspiring and be one.

Working with #Omnifocus: Managing Your Attention

I have been a user of OmniFocus for a really long time. There are a lot of things I love about the platform and of course there are others that I don’t and even some that simply annoy me. I am planning to create some post on it, try to come every Thursday with some lines on why, what or even how get the most out of your OmniFocus.
Today I am going to talk about: Managing your Attention.
The reality is that many of us have way to many projects, agreements, dreams, hopes, ideas and tasks in our plates. We tend to take into much more than what we can do and process on a week (even on a month – and we do it daily). Traditional time management is failing because old ways to process and organized stuff can’t cope with the speed we are getting the information. Add to that the fact that in many cases, with the access of technology we have little (if any) physical contexts and most of what we can do happen @Anywhere.
One of the important things I have learned over the years is to manage my attention, and learn to identify where my attention actually is. It is not that there are not other important things in my plate, but many times my attention is really on something that it is not even important and relevant. There is nothing I can do about it, other than identify it so I can move on – or in many cases to act on it.
The reality is that sometime taking care of this little annoyances that are not important allow me to focus much more in the tasks that are really important. We don’t notice how much little things distract us, and sometimes it is easier, faster and more efficient to take care of them than allow them on our brain simply distracting us.
Part of my review on OmniFocus (that I will cover on a future post) I do this exercise daily.
Get a piece of paper (or a clean page on the digital device of your choice) and just dump everything that it is on your mind. I do this the first thing in the morning, as I begin to sip coffee.
Write everything, from that project that it is so obvious that it is in your mind because you are betting everything on it, to buy baby food and change bulb on the storage. Anything that have your attention at that moment should make it to the list.
After you do that, and nothing else occurs to you, you will see what really had your attention. The important thing is to notice patterns, if that bulb on the storega has show up more than once, it is time that you take care of it, even if it is not that important. If for nothing else, to clear your attention to stuff that it is much more important.
Also make sure that nothing in this lists isn’t on your OmniFocus. If there is anything, simply add it to the inbox.
You may ask, what did has to do with OmniFocus? Well you will discover that many of the things that your attention is focusing on are contain into your system, it is just that becasue your current setup you are not putting where you can execute them. My goal is over the next weeks show you a trick or two on how to accomplish that. In the mean time, continue trying to maintain your attention where your attention is. One trick in the mean time it is only to “flag” those items that your attention is. Continue reading Working with #Omnifocus: Managing Your Attention

The iPhone is not a Geek product anymore and that is a good thing.

After the Apple event some of my geek friends complaint (as they always do) about the new iPhone and why it was/wasn’t worth of attention. For many (especially us geeks, I like to think I am one) it is hard to understand that a device that was created for us is no longer a geek device and because of that it should evolve to a different kind of product.
The iPhone is no longer a geek product and that is a good thing. As Apple seems to be appealing to the masses and the people that need better security on their Phones we geeks hoped, for the iPhone to be that super geek phone, and it is no longer one. Apple had an incredible amount of technology on the iPhones and there are an incredible amount of users that even owning an iPhone don’t have a clue how to access it. This is the same people that IT needed to force to lock their devices with a 4 number password. The same people that their phone access all the mainframe and infrastructure of the business that don’t know how to back up or update an application. The new iPhone in combination with iOS 7 come to the rescue to some of those problems, in ways that no other OS is doing. By doing that they are keeping the masses hooked to their brand, phones and functionality. I know few non-geeks that after they had used an iPhone jumps to Android or BlackBerry. (Know many that jump the other way around).
The new iPhone5S it’s a really powerful mini computer, it will make happy any geek in the heart, but will also make any non-geek feel at home.
No one had put it better than Myke Hurley in my opinion when he said:

“The next time anyone complaints about the iPhone design not changing, point them to the Porsche 911.”

We Geeks want Apple to create another 911, every year and get disappointed when it doesn’t. Instead we miss the incredible innovation that comes under the hood and under those really familiar curves that continue giving you the sense of speed, performance, agility and luxury… Expect that I am not sure I am talking anymore about the 911 or the iPhone.

I choose not to follow my dream. (Instead of I don't have time to follow my dream)

You read it right, you choose not to follow your dream. The reason I said that it is because you had time to accomplish other stuff but not to make that next step toward your dream. You wish to write that book and you watch a movie instead of write another page. You want to learn to play the guitar, but instead of practice you choose to go shopping. You want to buy a new house and instead of saving those $50 you pick go out for dinner.
People make millions of excuses of why they can’t follow their dreams and in many cases the reason they are not following their dreams is not because they can’t (as they tell themselves) but because they choose not to. I am a writer and a speaker. When I don’t write I am not getting closer to my dream, but it has nothing to do with the excuses that I give myself, the reality is that in many cases I choose not to follow my dreams an instead convince myself (like many do) that there is no time right now to follow the dream.
It is totally fine to choose not to follow the dream, if you are making a conscious choice, it is really bad when instead of making that choice you allow your own self to convince you that instead of choosing you are just a victim of lacking of time…

Need to accomplish something important today? Unplug the Internet

Need to accomplish something important today? Unplug the internet. You read it right on the tittle, as much as the internet can help us to accomplish great things it also make us waste time that we don’t even noticed we are wasting.
I have mention many times that I wake up at 4:00AM because I have learned that if I do, I found time to Focus and Concentrate on those things that are really important to me. I also avoid the internet at that time in the morning, not for any other reason that my goal is to be productive before my kids wake up. I work from home, I have a toddler and a six month old baby; silence is a rare thing here.
The same thing happen to all of us with the internet, the internet in a way it is like a toddler running around shouting, happy, and make you pay attention to it constantly. Sometimes to accomplish that important task you need to get the toddler to take a nap and use that time to accomplish that important task. Unplug the Internet produce the same effect.
Don’t believe me, try the following:
– Pick one important task.
– Calculate how long it will be to finish that task.
– Unplug the internet cable.
– Discover that will take less time that what you normally will need to accomplish that task.