Getting Things Done

This book hardly needs an introduction, it is the bible of productivity.
He has sold over 1.5 million copies of his simple, yet effective productivity system.
The book has been revised and updated in 2015 to reflect the changes in technology, since it was originally published in 2001 over a decade ago.
This system has always been timeless, though.
You could do it on paper, online, or now on your smartphone, the second you put down the book.
I wont be able to portray the system in full detail here, but since thats been done all over the internet, Ill happily take my top 3 lessons:
Use a collection bucket to store things outside your mind and stay focused.
Create a next actions list for all your projects to avoid thinking in the moment.
Do a weekly review of everything, or else!
Ready for productivity made simple? Lets go!
Lesson 1: Use a collection bucket to store things outside your mind and stay focused.
This ones been a major game changer for me in 2015.
Theres a reason it made #1 on this list.
You know that horrible feeling you have once you remember you have to buy milk?
You cant seem to un-remember it and it keeps nagging you, while all youre trying to do is work.
Your collection bucket can be a simple piece of paper, a notebook or note inside a note on your phone, or even a physical bucket in your office.
It serves as a means to collect all interruptions, whether they come in the form of thoughts in your mind or to-dos handed over to you by coworkers.
Whatever lands in your brain or lap while youre busy working (for example during a back time block), goes in there.
This lets you deflect interruptions as they occur and keeps your mind from derailing, while youre on a productivity roll.
Of course this system is only good if you empty your collection bucket or buckets regularly, he suggests weekly.
Your brain will only get a feeling of relief from putting something in your collection bucket when it knows that whatever lands in there will be taken care of sooner rather than later.
Lesson 2: Create a next actions list for all your projects to avoid thinking in the moment.
Heres the major problem with to-do lists: They trick you into thinking you can know in advance how much youll be able to achieve.
The bad news is, you cant.
Sure, you can make a list with 17 items, but none of that accounts for interruptions, crises, delays, other people or, and this too happens, a simple lack of energy where youre just not able to do as much.
He suggest you do this instead: Create a next actions list, where you list out all the specific tasks (= takes less than 30 minutes) of your current projects.
That way you always know what to work on next, when you have the time and energy to work, meaning you just pull out the list, pick a task and go.
You can even have multiple next actions lists and sort them by project or location of where youre able to do the tasks on it.
For example you could make these lists: laptop with wifi, laptop without wifi, phone, notebook.
Now, when youre at the airport and your flights been delayed, but theres no wifi and your phone is dead, you can still pull out your notebook list and do something on paper.
Note: The next actions list was a major part of the beautiful productivity system for essentialists I described here.
Lesson 3: Do a weekly review of everything, or else!
Theyre only as good as theyre up to date.
Empty your collection buckets on Friday afternoon, for example, and then update all your lists.
Youll get a birds eye view and make sure everything is complete.
This is the part that makes the whole system stress-free and if you slack on it, youll pay the mental price.

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