I think people resist establishing a system because of the amount of work that it will take to get it set up. There can also be hundreds of actions hidden in a pile of stuff, as you mention, so this creates another point of resistance.

The thing I've discovered, however, is that maintaining a system is easier than setting one up. It was much more difficult for me to spend days processing everything that had built up in my life than it is now to collect and process new inputs on a regular basis, now that I have an established system.

So to answer your question, I think people resist setting a system up rather than having and maintaining a system.

Because without a system, you never have to acknowledge the fact that you aren't accomplishing everything you ever thought you would. You can just throw the old commitments/dreams/potential in the trash, a pile, or the filing cabinet. If you never need to look for them or see them again, then you win.

I totally agree with you, Kelly. My feeling is that once you really do get better at Getting Things Done you need to also develop the discipline to say "no" to Getting More Things Done. Otherwise, you feel that your system is not helping alleviate the workload at all. In fact, the system IS helping you alleviate it, it's just that now you're taking on more and more stuff because you're more effective than you were before. Does that make sense? That's what I'm beginning to realize anyways.

It's a total accountability issue. No system then no accountability to myself or anybody else. No accountability then no chance of failure which is real comfortable for most people. I would suspect that most people using the system aren't afraid to lay it on the line and realize that failure is part of the road to success.

I think most people want to take the easy route.

Even if you wanted to do the basics of GTD, you would have to read your Book, buy the labeler and set up some sort of filing system. It does take a little time to do. However, when you are running late returning home from a meeting, and need to catch a flight, explaining to your wife that your passport is in the filing cabinet in a folder called 'passport' saves a whole lot of hassle...and arguments! Or when you need to cancel a contract due to poor service, and you know a copy of the contract is filed.

How about the times you lie in bed with your head spinning full of 'stuff.' To me, GTD says 'Stuff in your head equals angina, stuff in a system means a good night sleep!'

Guy Levine

Having no system means your stuff controls you. I remember my pre-GTD days feeling oddly secure knowing that all these stacks on my desk protected me in some weird way. In reality, they didn't. I hid behind them---literally. The scary thing about a good GTD system is that now you get to decide what's next. Once it's all out there, you're in charge of what matters to you. That can be intimidating to say the least, but in fact, it's truly liberating.

GTD is vitamins. Not having a system but reacting to the latest emergency is pain killers.

I tell interested friends that they should expect a few days of setup to make the transition, but that after that it's pretty easy. Most people don't want to put a few days into *anything*, so they continually defer it to the future.

In the simplest case they see the effort required to maintain the lists, but not the benefit. They really don't get in what way the lists help them save time.

But some are also deeply anti-reason. They rebel against anything related to reason, such as 'effectivity', 'system' and 'organizing', as they want to be 'wild', 'free' and 'spontaneous'. Reason to them is just cold and boring.

Of course, in reality they will spend more time doing boring stuff without a system. It's more on an emotional level to them, 'system' and 'organizing' and all that just *feels* wrong to them, and so they start to construct 'arguments' against GTD (and anything that sounds too 'cold') driven by that feeling.

Wow--what a rich thread of posts. THANK YOU all.

Please note: I will be offline from the 10th through the 16th. All comments posted here during that time will be held for review before publishing. When I come back online I will post your comments (otherwise you would all be assaulted with hundreds of spam comments on the site which I'm sure you'd rather not wade through!)

Cheers,
Kelly

I think people resist a system for the same reason they resist going to the doctor.

Ignorance is bliss. If I don't go to the doctor, I'm not sick. If you don't have a system, you're not aware of how many thoughts, actions, goals, dreams you're throwing down the drain.

For most people (including my pre-GTD self) sitting down and thinking of EVERYTHING I have to do is really scary, because then I have no more excuse for not doing it.

My difficulty is maintaining two offices in different cities. I tried to set up a reference filing system for all my processed stuff, but then I always need something from one place when I'm in the other. I ultimately start carrying all folders with me and then eventually have a major load to carry to and from. I do keep my lists with me, but now my brief case has become the in box, filing cabinet and waiting for reference material. Any suggestions?

Hi Jeff

I wish I had an easier answer, other than "you need what you need." Short of duplicating everything in both places, which wouldn't even be possible with some of it, I don't see another way except to haul the stuff around if you need it. If you don't need it, I would only shuttle the pertinent stuff, the rest would stay parked in a Pending box in the office I'm not at. In a sense, I work that way. I've got my home office and then my office o the road. When I'm on the road I only carry the essentials that I'll need when I'm away in the office.

Hope this helps,
Kelly

well, I'm not in the GTD community, I just came across your website via a link, but let me state, that my whole life, I've found people who organize things into lists, to be unproductive people, and the most productive people to be action oriented.

So I read your article with some interest, and thought about it for a bit. Does the lack of a list cause re-work?

I conclude that, it does not. Probably its more accurate to say, that people these productive people are making lists, in a sense. They just make them instantaneously, in their head, with little fuss. I guess it shouldn't be a surprise, that someone with that kind of skill is also highly productive.

My issue with lists, is its a kind of trick. If you write a list and don't do it...that doesn't help. So, you write it as a way of trying to force yourself to do it, and you become a slave to this list...otherwise, whats the point. But things change, priorities shift...if one then takes more time to rewrite a list.

Well...and so on. Maybe this is why you invited GTD community members to comment.

heh :)

Hi Robert,

Glad you stumbled here. I think you'll find the GTD method to be quite more than lists, so I hope your opinion and experience with lists and list makers in the past doesn't stop you from learning more about what GTD is all about.

To give you a little more background, and for others reading this as well, here's David Allen's take on lists, as I've heard it:

The purpose of lists is not to create the lists, be a slave to them and do nothing else in your life. The purpose of creating lists is to let go of the stuff that has your attention so that you can do what you REALLY want to do in your life...and do it with 100% of your energy, focus and attention.

Studies have shown that the average adult can only hold about 7 things (+ or - 2) in their mind at one given time. Given many of us have far more to do than that, and many things cannot be done the moment they show up, the lists give a practical storage place to defer those items until the next opportunity to review or do them.

I'm not sure what you're work and life are like, but perhaps you are one of those rare people who has very little to do in your life and the type of things coming at you can all be done in short cycles of completion. In that case, you'd probably be served well with a trusted calendar showing you a very short-term glance at what's next.

The GTD approach tends to attract people that are highly creative, have lots on their plate and are juggling shifting priorities and interests spanning beyond what's next.

And hey--GTD is for anyone, but not everyone! If you've got a system that works, it may be that GTD and the way David Allen suggests using lists is not for you.

I wish you all the best,

Kelly Forrister

I think people's resistance is highly related to current expertise vs. new skill. If you are highly literate in one form of organisation (even disorganisation!), there is a significant cost to learning a new skill (eg. GTD). As an analogy, if I want to learn to play the piano, the first skill level is the hardest (lots of work with very little competence/performance). As I improve, I see the benefit/outcome and thus am more willing to invest the energy.

So people don't want to start GTD because they see all the initial work with no benefit (eg. apparently GTD at 40% proficiency is far more work than GTD at 80%)

People like me, brought up by a perfectionist father, are sometimes so anxious about failure, that they avoid lists as another thing for which to be responsible . . . and responsibilities are always fraught with the danger of failure, a big no-no in my family or origin and in my gut to this day, at 63. However, the GTD approach is the only approach I have found that actually reduces anxiety, chiefly because of penchant for getting everything down and listed in contexts, and thus under control.

Some people who want no lists want less anxiety: the GTD approach delivers just that.

There seems to be a base assumption in most GTD circles that having a system = productivity.

The simple fact is that, if your goal is simply to become more productive, you don't need a system at all. You don't need to bend your life around a complex algorithm that needs to be learned and enforced over months of study and application.

Instead, you just need to pick up a pencil and get on with it.

I speak as someone who bought into systemised productivity over 5 years ago and has since given it up, only to find that I'm far more productive without enforced rules and systemisation.

Yes, people will benefit from having some structure in their lives, but they don't need to bend their ways to fit someone else's blueprint.

The productivity industry is leaning dangerously out of control, selling the false dream that you require rules, habits, software, hacks, tips and tricks to help accomplish things. The simple fact is this: if you want to get things done, just get on with it.

Hi Nick,

Thanks for your comments. Have you read David Allen's books? Because what you are describing is a belief that GTD is about creating lists and doing nothing else in your life except maintaining lists. It's so much more. There's a great essay in Ready For Anything called, "You are not your work" that talks about why David Allen creates lists.

And yes, having a trusted system outside of your head is fundamental to GTD. There is no question about that.

Kelly

Hi Kelly

Yes -- I've read David's books and attended several GTD seminars over the years. I even started tutoring others in GTD at one point after several years of adhering to it.

I am a big believer in simple paper-based lists, but now no longer see the need for all the sub-systems, step-by-step processes, tickler files, lifehacks, new 'habits' and software that those who depend upon GTD are often so fond of.

So, while I think you're right in saying that "no system is still work", I think there's also truth in saying "no system is less work". From my experience of many productivity 'systems' (not just GTD) and from conversations I have with very busy professional web workers every day, the initial investment of time and energy is rarely repaid in the long-term.

As an aside: I appreciate that this view will be somewhat mis-aligned from your own, and want to thank you for publishing it anyway! I am sure you meet people in your day-to-day work who hold a lot of praise for GTD -- it seems the adoption of a 'system' is a very personal thing!

Hi Nick,

GTD is for anyone, but not everyone.

I wish you well in your approach.

Kelly