Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity pdfdrive com

The Real Work of Knowledge Work
Welcome to the real-life experience of “knowledge work,” and a profound
operational principle: 
You have to think about your stuff more than you realize
but not as much as you’re afraid you might
. As Peter Drucker has written, “In
knowledge work . . . the task is not given; it has to be determined. ‘What are the
expected results from this work?’ is . . . the key question in making knowledge
workers productive. And it is a question that demands risky decisions. There is
usually no right answer; there are choices instead. And results have to be clearly
specified, if productivity is to be achieved.”
The ancestor of every action is a thought.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson
Most people have a resistance to initiating the burst of energy that it will take
to clarify the real meaning, for them, of something they have let into their world,
and to decide what they need to do about it. We’re never really taught that we
have to think about our work before we can do it; much of our daily activity is
already defined for us by the undone and unmoved things staring at us when we
come to work, or by the family to be fed, the laundry to be done, or the children
to be dressed at home. Thinking in a concentrated manner to define desired
outcomes is something few people feel they have to do. But in truth, outcome
thinking is one of the most effective means available for making wishes reality.

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Why Things Are on Your Mind
Most often, the reason something is “on your mind” is that you want it to be
different than it currently is, and yet:
• you haven’t clarified exactly what the intended outcome is;
• you haven’t decided what the very next physical action step is; and/or •
you haven’t put reminders of the outcome and the action required in a
system you trust.
That’s why it’s on your mind. Until those thoughts have been clarified and
those decisions made, and the resulting data has been stored in a system that you
absolutely
know you will think about as often as you need to, your brain can’t
give up the job. You can fool everyone else, but you can’t fool your own mind.
It knows whether or not you’ve come to the conclusions you need to, and
whether you’ve put the resulting outcomes and action reminders in a place that
can be trusted to resurface appropriately within your conscious mind. If you
haven’t done those things, it won’t quit working overtime. Even if you’ve
already decided on the next step you’ll take to resolve a problem, your mind
can’t let go until and unless you write yourself a reminder in a place it 
knows
you will, without fail, look. It will keep pressuring you about that untaken next
step, usually when you can’t do anything about it, which will just add to your
stress.
This constant, unproductive preoccupation with
all the things we have to do is the single largest
consumer of time and energy.
—Kerry Gleeson

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