Kelly,
Nice post. I have been wondering the same thing. An interesting story to share. When I first started implementing GTD, I carried around a Moleskine Pocket Book to jot down notes whenever they came to me. The funny thing that always happened was people would always ask me "What are you writing down?" People started to get suspicious when I would take notes! So one comment that I would make is that (at least in my experience) there is some kind of stigma to stopping and jotting down notes in public. There seems to be an unspoken rule that if you are writing it down you MUST be too dumb to remember it... which we all know to be false... So yes, in my experience it seems to be that people are worried what other people would be thinking.
I have since ditched the Moleskine for 3x4 note cards... people seem to be less threatened by them!

Hmmm! Hi Kelly. :)

I've been thinking on this a lot lately. Last year when I got my Tungsten E I was devoted to it and was highly organised as a result following GTD principles. I never kept anything inside my head and I had my system down to a pretty comfortable pace.

This year - A change in physical circumstances led to my PDA not be "required" quite so much for a period of time. The "habit" of recording things slipped. Consequently I now struggle immensely to use my PDA as effectively as I did last year. I have lost trust in my lovely little hand held device and it HURTS!

But...how to gain that trust back though? It's almost as if I need to switch to an entirely different kind of system to get back into the habit of merely transferring unprocessed items out of my head before I can go back to using the PDA! IOW - find another external source to trust to keep my unprocessed stuff instead of trying to re-invigorate trust in my PDA. Ouch!

Most frustrating this. :)

On another note Kelly. There is ONE argument I've heard a few people (all men strangely enough) who have suggested that GTD is not "useful" because it de-trains the brain to remember things! Their premise is that a brain "needs" to remember stuff to flex its memory muscle so it can retain more. How does one counter THAT argument?

Regards
"Mitch"

The memory issue is one I hear often, too, Kelly. How do the folks at GTD counter the "loss of memory" argument? My guess is that we can probably remember MORE now that our minds are clear and our work is entrusted to a reliable system.

Hi Folks,

Well, interesting discussion on this one! I have heard this question on having a clear head (or not) before and in my personal experience with GTD over the past 15 years, the productive experience I get from having a clear head far outweighs any benefit (of which I am not aware) that flexing the brain muscles would serve by trying to remember everything I need to do. Sure you can use your brain to remember every detail of everything you need to do, but why wouldn't you want to use it for the most creative, highly functioning things possible? There's a great David Allen quote around this that says, "Use your mind to think about things, not keep thinking of things."

And just so you hear it from the master himself, I posed your questions/comments to David on this one and here is how he replied on email to me:

Kelly,

Well, the best analogy I have is this:

Walking (or running) are a lot better for keeping your body in shape and strong than driving a car. So, do these people who want your mind to be "strong" drive cars? Why? (leverage, obviously).

And, as Einstein says, Why should I remember my phone number? I can look it up. There are a lot better things to think about...

I'm frankly too lazy for memory techniques...

And, do these people use ANY reminders? Calendar? Anything on any lists? Address/phone book? If so, why? Hey, there's a fun thing to do - let's spend a few weeks memorizing every phone number, address, appointment, thing to do, someday/maybe, and cool restaurant we might ever want to go back to...! What fun!

I'm tired already....

DA

Okay, this is one that bugs me a bit, so I'll bite. People who drive cars do themselves a large disservice if they don't also keep in shape in some way (Totally apart from the simple joy of walking, or perhaps of being being able to recall a phone number). It would be more accurate to say that the body needs to stay healthy and fit, you just don't have to drive a car to get that done! By the same token, perhaps those who have lives or jobs which require them to constantly think about things, love the freedom that a "trusted system" gives them to not have to think about the very important but "non-value adding" details in life. These are people who drive their car to work, but their job requires some jogging.

There are others, however, whose lives and jobs are fairly mindless or repetitive to begin with. Remembering appointments and phone numbers might be some of the little exercise their mind gets. Perhaps they are better off not setting up a "trusted system" or perhaps they need to find ways to stimulate their human creativity! What I have found for myself is that at one time digital seemed to engage me more, hence it was a mentally stimulating way to track the "no-brainers" in my life. Over time I have found that my brain has gone numb to the data, and that paper seems to have become more engaging. So I have switched my trusted system over to paper.

Whatever the reasons, people I think have a innate sense that it is healthier to "use" your mind than not to, just as it is healthier to use your body, whether for work or play, than to let it atrophy. I don't think too many people would respect Einstein's comment if he had not already demonstrated his well-developed practice of using his mind productively to think about other things beside phone numbers. No matter how you package it, people value a sharp mind, and remembering things is one way that ability is often demonstrated. By the same token, David has been able to get a lot done, and think through a lot of things. His comment about being lazy is more witty than true. If he was truly lazy, he wouldn't have a system, and no one would respect him for its absence, either. :-)

Thanks for the question Kelly,
Gordon

Thanks for the input Gordon.

Thanks, Kelly and David!