Overwhelm After the Epic Trip, GTD, & Where God Fits In

For those of you that don't know; I just returned from a fantastic trip across 2 weeks, 8 states, 4 national parks, countless cities, and much more. We clocked 4,125.2 awesome miles and we are home!

I had an amazing time as my Mom and I traveled by car; camping, and moteling (thank God for the new. Amazing, and reimagined Motel 6) to the Hoover Dam, beautiful St. George Utah, Bryce National Park, Salt Lake City Utah, Pocatello Idaho, Jackson Hole Wyoming, the Grand Tetons National Park, Yellow Stone (amazing, amazing Yellowstone), West Yellowstone Montana, Pendleton Oregon, Portland Oregon (to visit my wonderful friend Heather), Coos Bay Oregon, Redwood National and State Parks, Eureka and Arcata California (the home of Humboldt Fog cheese! (I ate 6oz)), the beautiful Redwoods in Boulder Creek California (the home of my wonderful cousin Theresa and her husband Rich), and the fabulous journey home, down the coast through Big Sur, Pismo Beach, and Solvang (which was beautiful and interesting yet completely closed at that time of night).

And now I am home.

Where my life hits me like a freight train of bills (kept up with most on the trip but still need to do a lot of reconciling and planning for future stuff), responsibilities , roles (photographer, writer, student, future pastor, gamer, son, friend, etc), correspondence (with friends new and old), books to read (fun , gaming, and educational), shows to watch (evil, evil DVR), movies to see (Cowboys and Aliens, and Captain America (saw Harry Potter and Friends with Benefits on trip), friends to catch up with, hobbies ( gaming, photography, reading, personal studies, etc), hiking (like I didn't get enough on my trip but I could never get enough), exercise (2 mud runs to train for), blogs to keep up with (like this one and my Weight Watchers Blog), Online Communities (Facebook and the groups on there, GTDVSG (yes I am coming back), school (it only starts in two weeks), events and trips coming up (yes, I am planning on doing more stuff), household chores (the joy of moving back home), keeping up with people met on the trip and sending all the photos I took of people back to them (I collect photos of people taking photos, another hobby), and a slew of projects and ideas I am working on and/or plan on working on.

And this is just the tip of the iceberg.

If you became overwhelmed by reading the above paragraph, you can imagine what it is like for me, but fortunately I am not overwhelmed, overloaded or panicking because I have the tool of GTD. To save the time of explaining what that is to people who don't know, read about GTD here.

To sum it up simply, the joy of GTD is that it lets me collect all of my open loops into one place to get them off my mind; I spend some time gathering them into a bin, then spend more time processing through that bin to do, defer, or delete each thing one at a time. I keep my processed outcomes in a system (I use rmilk) that I trust that will be there to let me do everything at the best time for me to do it.

Is my life perfect because of GTD? No, not at all, it is just a tool I use to relieve the burden of overwhelm. I do let things build up and overwhelm me at times because I can't be perfectly in control all the time, I need flexibility to breathe within my system. A friend of mine asked me about it while I was on vacation and when I explained it she said, "It is like an obsession then?" A lot of people have brought this up to people who practice GTD and the answer is ultimately no. It may appear as an obsession to some but it is not that, but then what is it?

It is a discipline and it is a practice. GTD is a collection of methods aimed at helping people remove the junk from their heads to eliminate the stress of productivity and accentuate the product of that activity. David Allen (the creator of GTD, if you skipped the link I posted earlier) coined the phrase that it lets us win at the game of work and the business of life.

If you read my blog you may be wondering where prayer comes into the equation in all this. For me, nothing starts without God and GTD isn't any different. While overwhelm is starting to build, I am getting ready to collect open loops, I am processing through my inbox, I am planning projects, or I am doing the things on my various lists, God's embrace is right around me and I wouldn't be able to do complete my next actions without him.

My prayer this morning when the overwhelm became evident:

Father God, I really want to sink my teeth into this mess of stuff but I don't know where to start. I am completely helpless, unmotivated, overloaded, overwhelmed, and everything seems huge and unmovable. What do I do?

His answer for me was the immediate realization that I had to empty my brain onto paper and start collecting open loops and then to write and post this article. This post is part of my process. God brought the practice of GTD to me, I don't doubt it and when I need it he reminds me that I have the tools to be the captain and commander of my life

My prayer now:

Dear Lord,

I am a pitiful sinner and am completely unworthy of all the gifts you have given me. Due to the power of your love and your death on the cross I am worthy and able to be your child. Father, I pray to you to thank you for your love, for your creation, and for the ability to have a relationship with you. Thank you for my life, good and bad. As I collect my open loops, process through my lists, plan my projects, and complete next actions; please fill me with your holy spirit and give me the guidance to follow your will and the strength and courage to follow through with it. I love you Lord and I thank you again from the bottom of my heart.

Amen.

Why !daily works for me

Disclaimer - This article refers to terminology specific to GTD.

For about 6 months now I have had a daily checklist called !daily (exclamation point added to move it to the top of my lists in Remember the Milk). !Daily came from a project "Create a Daily checklist" that I set after listening to Barbara Bailey's interview on the @context podcast. Barb had mentioned that she had a Daily checklist and it worked wonders for keeping her on top of her day to day so I added the project and about 3 months later !daily was born.

I walked through the natural planning model to determine the Purpose and principles so I knew what would go on the list.

Purpose - to develop daily habits
Principles - flexible, friendly, positive. - I will not be dissapointed if I don't complete an item.
I didn't determine an outcome at this time:

What has the outcome been? I wake up every morning and start doing items on the list without even checking it!

Here is my list
01 Iaido
Minimum (usually ends up being more) Practice my circle Drill in Iaido (Anything labeled 01 is something I do every day, the other's I am flexible on)
01 Read physical Bible
Pull out my actual book bible (rather than read online) and read my bible.
01Yoga
Minimum, 1 set of sun salutations but it usually ends up being more.
@prayer
Pray for the people on my @prayer list
Check the calls context
Check my @calls list and schedule or defer all calls.
Cursillo Devotional
As part of Lutheran Cursillo of Southern California, we have a devotional in which we prayer for 2 team members each day, it includes a Bible verse as well. This task will run through October.
Google Reader
Read all blogs in my must read list on Google Reader that take less than 2 minutes. Send the rest to Del.icio.us for Read Later. These include but are not limited to:

• My Daily Devotion on http://www.lhm.org
• My Daily Bible verse on http://www.biblegateway.com
• Tara Rodden Robinson - The productivity Maven - http://zugunruhecoaching.typepad.com/
• The Entrepreneur Notes -http://theentrepreneurnotes.com

Gratitude Journal
A time to focus on what I am grateful for.
Pray a prayer of thanks first over the budget, then do today's budget balance
This one used to just be called Budget but changed recently after a reminder that all we have we owe to God in a sermon at Church.
Review your blogs
I open each of my blogs on a new tab, read my last posts and post something new if I either feel like it or it has been about a week since my last post.
Write one sentence in the Ballard Story
Here is where I work on Ballard.
Review New Posts on GTDConnect
Here I review GTDconnect's forum's new posts like an inbox.
Post To GTDConnect
This item is every 3 days - Post a new forum post to GTDconnect.
Add one photo to j:\digital Art
I added this recently to do every two days - Add a photo I have taken to my digital art folder on my computer. I added this after I found I wasn't doing it by habit anymore.
Review Readlater list on Del.icio.us
This is another every 3 days - all the websites and blog posts I added because I didn't have time when I found them. I usually process 1 or 2.