David Allen (author)

Things hold your attention hostage until you give them the appropriate attention.

— David Allen (author)

Hold still enough to grapple w/the simple questions, & the complexities become clear.

— David Allen (author)

How can you justify keeping a calendar & still keep most of your other commitments w/yourself in your head?

— David Allen (author)

It's hard to say no when you're not aware of everything you've said yes to.

— David Allen (author)

If u magically had 0 emails, in 10 days you'd be back to what you had. Issue is not volume, but tolerance of backlog.

— David Allen (author)

The latest & loudest thing in your psyche is seldom the most important thing that should take up residence there.

— David Allen (author)

Being organized simply means that where something is matches what it means to you. No more, no less.

— David Allen (author)

Your mind doesn't have one. If it did, it would only remind you of something when you could do something about it.

— David Allen (author)

Pay appropriate attention to what has your attention, so you can pay attention to what really has your attention.

— David Allen (author)

Outcome/next-action thinking, before you must, prepares you for when you must. And that time will come.

— David Allen (author)

The balance you have between drive & patience may be your master key to success.

— David Allen (author)

Engaging in complexity is a key to simplicity. Fear of it will haunt your inner recesses.

— David Allen (author)

Your tools are only as good as they serve your intention. What do you want to have true? What Do you need to have viewable re: that?

— David Allen (author)

When you know you'll get email to zero, you're free to deal with the ones you choose, when you choose. Most productive.

— David Allen (author)

Even the smallest knoll to climb, to see a little more than the machine guns firing at me, is salvation.

— David Allen (author)

Changing what you want to get done takes a second. Recalibrating & getting the new thing to happen is a martial art.

— David Allen (author)

When you know how, any time, to get to the place where it's all sort of funny, you've mastered GTD.

— David Allen (author)

Freedom to give full attention to what you want (vs. It being held hostage by unmanaged stuff) is the GTD promise.

— David Allen (author)

Rivers of creative flow are log jammed w/ heads holding on to incompletions, old business, & avoided decisions.

— David Allen (author)

What would you do w/more space, if you had it? Without a good answer, you'll not have the juice to really do #GTD.

— David Allen (author)

Keys to getting things done: know what "done" means & what "doing" looks like.

— David Allen (author)

Meetings handled well reduce email. Email handled well reduces meetings.

— David Allen (author)

Organizing without first capturing & clarifying what needs organizing is simply rearranging your angst.

— David Allen (author)

The greater your confidence w/how to achieve control & focus, as needed, the wilder & crazier you can be.

— David Allen (author)

Are you overwhelmed pulling weeds, when you really just need to replant the garden?

— David Allen (author)

Collect, process, organize & review what has your attention, so you can stop half-trying to be doing all that, constantly.

— David Allen (author)

My daily meta-map lists: events coming up; major projects for me; emerging interests; my accountabilities.

— David Allen (author)

The purpose of a purpose? Tunes you to meaningful things you wouldn't be aware of, otherwise.

— David Allen (author)

Staying in control daily, weekly, & yearly requires different things for each. Handling one doesn't handle the others.

— David Allen (author)

What would your ideal exec ass't let you know - & when - & where? That should inform your best #GTD system.

— David Allen (author)

Great question to ask, to relax: What should I consider right now, decide what, and let go?

— David Allen (author)

Using your head to manage your life creativity constipation.

— David Allen (author)

The present-ness demanded by a crisis is possible w/out crisis. Understand the keys to appropriate engagement. GTD.

— David Allen (author)

If you're appropriately engaged w/your life, you don't need more time. If you're not, more time won't help.

— David Allen (author)

What maps do you need to review, to see where you are & what to do next? Core to self-management systems.

— David Allen (author)

Appropriate focus on the right stuff gives the freedom to not have to focus on anything, on a regular basis.

— David Allen (author)

First of all, if it's on your mind, your mind isn't clear. Anything you consider unfinished in any way must be captured in a trusted system outside your mind, or what I call a collection bucket, that you know you'll come back to regularly and sort through.

— David Allen (author)

When you "have to get organized," you're probably not appropriately invested yet in what you need to get organized for.

— David Allen (author)

What people call an "Interruption" is simply new input inappropriately managed.

— David Allen (author)

Freedom to create a mess is proportional to your ability to know what "no mess" is and how to get there.

— David Allen (author)

Does something have your attention because you want it to, or because you're avoiding it?

— David Allen (author)

Your attention will continue to be grabbed by anything until you give it the appropriate attention.

— David Allen (author)

A big surprise is coming toward you. How clear do you want to be about all your current commitments, when it hits?

— David Allen (author)

Your mind is for having ideas, not for holding them.

— David Allen (author)

Valuable thought occurred today to share. Obvious in the moment. Can't retrieve now. Didn't capture. I teach this. Damn.

— David Allen (author)

GTD essence: attention cleared of residue & distraction, pointed at the right thing.

— David Allen (author)

The coolest things I do usually aren't on my lists, but because of them.

— David Allen (author)

There is never enough time to do what you really don't want to do. Time managemet is really value management.

— David Allen (author)

Good ideas are infinitely available. We've just limited our availablitly to them. The music's not in the radio.

— David Allen (author)

Your mind receives, remembers, & reminds, & sucks at all 3, compared to an objective external system a la GTD.

— David Allen (author)

Secret to finding, quickly, the corner pieces, then the outside edges, to the jigsaw puzzle of life: GTD

— David Allen (author)

Over-prepare. Then go with the flow.

— David Allen (author)

Defaulting to ur psyche as ur system instead of an objective one makes maintaining the system too much trouble.

— David Allen (author)

I've never had to go very far to learn everything I have learned. I just had to care about something & pay attention.

— David Allen (author)

Get things under control first, then get focused. If your ship is sinking, you don't care where it's pointed.

— David Allen (author)

Trying to ignore secondarily meaningful things gives them more meaning than they deserve.

— David Allen (author)

Making decisions requires energy, but not deciding about whether to decide requires even more energy.

— David Allen (author)

Every thought deserves its own place in the universe. How & where do you capture yours?

— David Allen (author)

Eternal #GTD paradox: when you get the principle, the tool doesn't matter. But simultaneosly it matters so much more.

— David Allen (author)

Clearing the deck is great, but sailing adventurous waters is the real game. (Just can't do it w/out a clear deck.)

— David Allen (author)

Great news about lots of email is how consistently it forces you to get clear what's really meaningful to your work/life.

— David Allen (author)

GTD gives freedom to the right, structure to the left (brains, that is!)

— David Allen (author)

Organizations' problems can all be traced to someone not telling the right someone what had their attention, when it did.

— David Allen (author)

If you figured out why making a list reduces overwhelm & confusion, you'd keep nothing in your head the rest of your life.

— David Allen (author)

GTD supplies the reset button for all parts of life & work.

— David Allen (author)

If you admit your wildest dream & uncover why you want it, you have a big key to make tomorrow a better day.

— David Allen (author)

Simply ask & answer: if we were being wildly successful in fulfilling our purpose, what would it look, sound, & feel like? #SmallBizChat

— David Allen (author)

You talk to yourself 50,000 times a day. What's 300 emails? #SmallBizChat

— David Allen (author)

If u can't see everything you've committed to, at all levels, you'll be driven by latest and loudest. #SmallBizChat

— David Allen (author)

A commitment kept only in your head will be given too much or too little attention.

— David Allen (author)

Your system is not your tech - it's the nature of the content & the behavior w/which you engage with it.

— David Allen (author)

Resistance to deciding the next action (before we have to) stems from how it exposes the vulnerability of our intelligence.

— David Allen (author)

The nature of creative thinking runs counter to the nature of dealing w/its output. Ability & system to do both is freedom. GTD.

— David Allen (author)

Being in control isn't forceful manipulation but rather highly cooperative engagement w/ what's really going on.

— David Allen (author)

Making decisions when you can vs. when you have to makes for better decisions.

— David Allen (author)

Not stopping to really catch up (Weekly Review, GTDers!) means trying to catch up constantly & never getting there.

— David Allen (author)

You don't have to like your life to get it off your mind. You DO have to renegotiate your agreements w/yourself about it.

— David Allen (author)

Your ability to deal w/surprise is in inverse relation to the amount of your backlog of "stuff".

— David Allen (author)

Whether you know what you're doing or not, efficiency & style are your only improvement opportunities.

— David Allen (author)

Maximizing is not optimizing. Sustainable engagement wins, in the end.

— David Allen (author)

Top need for top professionals: psychic space. Fewer distractions & more contexts for thinking. Not more time.

— David Allen (author)

Is what you're about to do more likely to expand or limit your ability to get what you really want? Executive intelligence.

— David Allen (author)

How much attention have I given what really deserves my attention today?

— David Allen (author)

The less you are driven by what goes on in this material world, the more you will pay attention to its details.

— David Allen (author)

You'll be motivated to exercise the #GTD method to the degree you really care about what you're doing.

— David Allen (author)

Perfection is graciously dealing with imperfection.

— David Allen (author)

Living life in "emergency scan" mode self-perpetuates instead of self-corrects. Deal w/a non-emergency before it is one.

— David Allen (author)

If you could stop thinking, letting go of trying control your world w/your mind, where would your attention go?

— David Allen (author)

#GTD 2.0 what to do with your head, once it's clear.

— David Allen (author)

"Organization" for most people is simply an incomplete list, or amorphous piles, of still-unclear commitments.

— David Allen (author)

What do you want to have true? Pick something between total fantasy & 51% believable, get going, & readjust as you learn.

— David Allen (author)

Point of in-box empty: having a complete, current inventory of what matters, so you deal clearly with what's new & what's now.

— David Allen (author)

How, and how often, you relate to your system is an essential part of your system.

— David Allen (author)

Am working as hard as I can to find out what it's OK I'm NOT going to be dong, this weekend!

— David Allen (author)

When "this isn't right" changes to "this isn't optimal" in your vocabulary, you've moved up the food chain.

— David Allen (author)

Cool how many layers of my mind there are to clear, each time I do it...& how different my world is then.

— David Allen (author)

Only issues in life: u know what u want, but not how to get it; or u don't know what u want. Solution: #GTD

— David Allen (author)

An overwhelming amount of potential work to do is cool. Otherwise people would never go to a gym.

— David Allen (author)

You've really done your job when what's true? (Challenging question for all of us!)

— David Allen (author)

If your backlog of stuff isn't zero'd regularly, you're hostage to your own incessant angst that you should.

— David Allen (author)

Productivity requires expansiveness & spontaneity as much as structure & control.

— David Allen (author)

If you're already in a mess, you're not free to make one.

— David Allen (author)

To be free to be spontaneously & creatively shallow requires depth of character & a disciplined focus.

— David Allen (author)

It takes a healthy sense of self to feel OK with nothing happening in your head.

— David Allen (author)