Month 3, day 2

It seems it has been a long time since I last posted here. Work has been heavy, and Gettting Things Done has redirected some of my priorities. My weight has stalled, but recently began to turn downwards. Lowest morning weight is 20 Stone 4.5, today I was 20 stone 5.5

My feelings about Getting Things Done are that its a good system, but quite rough around the edges. One could conceivably fill their entire day doing Getting things Done, and never actually DO anything. On the other hand, it is keeping large chunks of my life in check. Possibly I need to work more on becoming motivated to do things, and less on keeping track of the things I have to do.

In short, I'll be keeping up Getting things Done at least until the house move and the wedding are over, because it proves to be a good way of knowing what I haven't done yet.


On to Month 3.

In the last month I have felt stressed (because of the house move), frustrated (because of the house move, and because of the lawyers I'm using), dispondant (because the house move didn't happen when I was expecting it would), and annoyed at myself (because I hate making telephone calls, so I hated talking to some of the contractors and lawyers involved in frustrating and stressing me about the house move). The wedding isn't much better, but its further away, and the hotel people are very nice (if French railways would let me book train tickets more than 90 days in advance, everything would be perfect. Sort of.)

Most of this is the fault of other people. As Yoda might say "House moves lead to other people. Other people lead to stress. Stress leads to pain. Pain leads to suffering".

Does pain lead to suffering? According to the people behind ACT (Acceptance Commitment Therapy) apparently not. What ACT (pronounced "act" not "ay-see-tee") says is that while everyone feels pain (and that the pain can be useful in guiding us in our lives), we don't have to suffer. The techniques it uses are based on the far eastern technique of Mindfulness, but using short-cuts around some of the decades of meditation which Buddhist monks put in (if only those Buddhist monks knew about self-help books, they could spend their time doing useful things like kung-fu and, um, Falling long distances (near walls) without getting hurt. For shame, Buddhist monks!)

ACT is a genuine development of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy which is being developed by leading researchers right now. When I was last in Addenbrookes in Cambridge, I saw signs up on the walls talking about their mindfullness groups for psychiatric patients. So there could well be something in this, somewhere. But can a self-help book convey it all to me, and turn me into some sort of emotionally intelligent superhero? One month... lets see how it does.

Month 2, Day 19: Still here

Weight: 20 Stone 8.0 lbs
GTD: In 0, todo 70, Someday 45, Done 92

I missed the last few days of blogging. My weight has remained the same, but I managed to sort out a lot of the other issues that are on my plate, including getting quotes for work I need to do on the new house. I still don't have a moving date, but it can't be long now.

I have had several experiences of my appetite being reduced - or at least of feeling full far sooner than I would have done previously. So while I'm plateauing at the moment, my faith in the shangri-la diet is currently remaining.

I've noticed a flaw in GTD though. Some tasks simply are not getting done. I can't get motivated to do them, because they are so large (in particular processing rooms in my house). I'm probably going to change those tasks into projects, and choose particular areas which need to be processed, then set about them instead.

Month2, Day 15: Too much, too soon

Weight: 20 Stone 9 lb.
GTD: In 1, Processing 84, Done 76, Someday 44

Last night I ate too much. Or that is how it felt. In fact I only ate four slices of pizza. 12 hours later, and I'm still feeling satisfied. So for all I suggest that the Shangri-la diet isn't working any more, it clearly has some effect on my appetite, I'm just eating less than I w2as, so I don't notice. For reference, in the past, I could have wolfed down a large pizza and garlic bread and still debated about desert.

I also found a problem in how I am organising Getting Things Done. At Remember The Milk, you can set due dates for tasks. I'm using these as a sort of tickler / priority system, so things I have to do soon get nearer the top of the list. RTM also has a system whereby you can tell it a task repeats every week, month or year. When you complete the task, it then places a new one, due the requisite period of time later, at the appropriate place on the list. While this increases my number of done tasks, it doesn't remove things from my task list. As I add more and more annual tasks to my system, the number of due tasks will get greater and greater... And frankly, it isn't worth me knowing about things I need to do in a years time, it's just worth knowing they are safely recorded somewhere in my system.

So today I added a new list 'tickler' to RTM. Any task that has a next action which needs to be done after a due date more than 1 week in the future will go here, and only put back into rotation during my weekly review. Unlike someday/oneday, these tasks are next actions, and have definite dates attached to them.

This should mean my task lists fall in size quite a bit. But also that they become more useful.

Month 2, Day 14: Lovin' It

Weight: 20 Stone, 9lbs
GTD: In 0, Processing 78, Done 70, Someday 44

Actually I'm going to Pizza Hut tonight, not McDonalds, but it's all junk, and none of it will help my weight, which is making me feel down. My current feeling is the oil increase isn't helping, and might be getting in the way. I'll give 4 tablespoons until the end of February to convince me they are worth it, before reverting to 3, and seeing how that works.

GTD continues to work, and today it reminded me of something I had forgotten, which is good. At the moment, it makes sense to keep it up.

Month 2, Day 13: Getting Purer Things Done

Weight: 20 Stone 7.5 lb
GTD: In 3, Processing 72, Someday 51, Done 61

I didn't feel hungry yesterday, but did eat a large lunch (a steak sandwich and a beer, as a mini work celebration). With a Valentines meal tomorrow (quite why Herself chose Pizza Hut, I'll never understand, but its cheap... if you ignore the cost of me driving to and from Yarmouth to be there), its going to be a bad week for food. My body will be less of a temple, and more of a run down strip mall.

I discovered a 100 point check list of things to achieve if you are integrating GTD into your life. My initial urge was to treat is as a purity test (do people even know what purity tests are these days?) I'm current 33% of my way to being a GTD master. I jotted down some things I think I need to look up in order to improve:

Learn about Master Projects List
Instigate a waiting for list
Instigate a loaned/borrowed list
Check office supplies against list in book
Reread higher altitudes section of book
Reread natural planning model section
Reread 3fold model for evaluating daily work
Reread 4 crietrea model for choosing actions
Listen to 43 folders podacasts

These are all going onto my to do list.

Month 2, day 12

Weight: 20 stone 8 lbs
GTD: In 2, Processing 71, Someday 50, Done 50

This marks the first time I managed to get my number of processing tasks done. Mainly because i worked a lot over the keekend geting a work related project finished.

I've been feeling far more hungry than usual recently. The SLD seems to have stopped working, even with my higher oil intake. I'm now feeling quite hungry a lot of the time, and the appetite suppression that I noticed has gone: On Saturday I ate a whole baguette without problems. It is a bit disheartening. Still, GTD seems to be keeping me organised (despite the best efforts of certain conveyancing lawyers to overload me with stress due to their inability to do anything).

I'm going to keep on with the Shangri-la diet until the end of march, but currently it is falling out favour with me as a long term diet mechanism.

Month2, Day 11

Weight: 20 Stone 6.5 lb

Hungry, and stressed. Sometime I think self help doesn't work that well.