2011 Reading Goals and an Update

Last year I had pretty ambitious reading goals for 2010.  I was going to read all the books I own that I hadn't read yet and read all the books on my to-read list that had been on there since before 2010.  I think I finished about 25% of my goals.  I read all the books that I owned, but then Andy brought all his books from his parents' house and I never got around to reading the ones he owned that I hadn't read yet (the entire Tennis Shoes Among the Nephites series).

And as for getting mostly caught up on my to-read list?  Well... let's just say it didn't happen... or come anywhere close to happening.  I am firmly stuck in 2008 (with a few leftovers from 2007).  Try as I might, reading over 100 books in one year is just too much for even me to handle.

So this year, I thought through my goals for reading before I made any.  I didn't set any grand goals to get completely caught up with my to-read list.  I didn't vow to read the entire College Board reading list (way too many books that don't look interesting).  Instead, I set what I think is a fairly achievable goal.

While at a recruiting dinner for my husband fall semester, I talked with the campus recruiter about books.  She mentioned that a few years ago a friend of hers challenged her to read a book a week and that she's kept that challenge ever since.  I was shocked.  Here I was complaining that I never had time to really read a book, when she was able to read a book a week with a super busy schedule.  I decided then and there that if she could do it, so could I.

So there you have it folks.  My goal for this year is to read a book a week.  Theoretically it's going to be the next 52 books on my Goodreads to-read list, but we'll see how that goes.  I'm already failing miserably, so if you want a bit of a challenge for yourself, I'd encourage you to join me.  If you can't commit to a book a week, try a book every two weeks, or a book every month.  You could pick a topic that you want to learn more about, read the classics, or just pick up books at random from the library shelves and read them.  You could read them on your computer, your Kindle, in paperback, or in hardback.  Whatever you do, just read.

What's your reading goal for 2011?

Getting Things Done vs. First Things First

So... I'm actually going to talk about two books today: Getting Things Done by David Allen and First Things First by Stephen Covey.  They are both time management books, but they approach the topic of time management very differently.  First a little about what I considered to be the pros and cons of each approach.  Hopefully this will help someone else out there.

Getting Things Done
I was actually surprised at how much I liked David Allen's approach to time management.  He has a very "bottom up" approach.  Meaning, he believes in focusing on the immediate tasks at hand and then thinking about long-term stuff once you have the day-to-day things taken care of (at least that's what I got out of it).

Pros

• He emphasizes writing EVERYTHING down.  Whenever you think of something you need to do or might want to do sometime, you should write it down.  His reasoning behind this is pretty sound.  If you try to keep too many things in your head, your brain can't handle it.  You will constantly feel like you're drowning because you can never accomplish everything.  If you write it down your brain will give you permission to forget about it.  He recommends having at least 3 lists: a Next Action list (where you put the specific next action you need to take to accomplish any given task), a Someday/Maybe list (to store all those thoughts about classes you might want to take, books to read, etc), and a Waiting For list (to record packages you are waiting for or tasks you are waiting for other people to complete).  [Note: I think this applies to emotions and journal keeping as well.  If you're trying to work through a problem or you're really upset about something, I've found that writing in a journal is an incredibly powerful way to get over the issue and move on without blowing up at someone.]
• He emphasizes keeping a running to-do list.  Rather than putting non-date specific items on a to-do list for a certain day, he recommends keeping them on a separate list.  That way you don't have to keep writing them down and transferring them  when you do not accomplish that task  the day you wanted to.  Allen likes this concept because you are less likely to get discouraged by how much you don't do and you can focus on the date-specific tasks instead of putting an equal claim on the things you can do any day.  I like it for the practical reason of only writing something down once.
• Since it's a fairly new book, he has solutions for people who like to plan in any way, and he makes it simple to implement his strategies.

Cons

• He doesn't believe in putting anything down on a daily to-do list unless it is mandatory to do it on that day.  Personally, I feel like this takes away some accountability for how well I'm managing my time.  If I have "buy socks" on a list of things to do at some point in time, then I'll never buy socks unless I'm forced into the store by some other urgent task.  I'll never call anyone because they're not on my list of things to do that day.  Sometimes it's good to create artificial deadlines.  Having to re-write tasks each day creates a sense of accountability.  Each day you're having to look back on what you didn't accomplish the day before and that gives you a chance to think about how you can improve your time management skills for that day.
• He doesn't believe in putting too much of an emphasis on values or prioritizing things.  Throughout the book I got the feeling that he doesn't believe in putting priority on certain events or values.  In some spots he even says specifically that he doesn't really see the value in writing a mission statement or judging some goals or "to-do" items to be worth more than others.  I guess his thinking is that if you are able to do everything on your list then you'll hit all the important things.  The whole time I was reading this book I had the following quote from Sister Beck's talk at General Conference running through my head: "A good woman knows that she does not have enough time, energy, or opportunity to take care of all of the people or do all of the worthy things her heart yearns to do. Life is not calm for most women, and each day seems to require the accomplishment of a million things, most of which are important. A good woman must constantly resist alluring and deceptive messages from many sources telling her that she is entitled to more time away from her responsibilities and that she deserves a life of greater ease and independence. But with personal revelation, she can prioritize correctly and navigate this life confidently."  There's no way I have time to do everything I need to do, so if I put everything onto a list (whether it's a Someday/Maybe list or a to-do list) then I'm only going to do the things that seem fun that day and I'll put off doing the important things.'
• It seems like it would be easy to go overboard and have too many different lists and then you're back to where you started.  

First Things First
This book was a LOT like The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.  A lot of the same stories, advice, etc.  So I skimmed it quite a bit.  If you're looking for specific strategies for how to implement things from 7 Habits, this book is a good one to read.

Pros

• Covey and team encourage you to first figure out where you want to go with your life before you start filling it up with activities.  They recommend first figuring out what your values and priorities are, then writing a mission statement which reflects those values, and then set goals for how you're going to achieve and live those values.  Then you make sure to schedule those things first before you add anything else in.
• Weekly review.  They encourage you to set aside some time each week to review your week, see what you want to do better and plan for the next week as a whole.  I think viewing the week as a whole unit would help to eliminate a lot of the need to transfer things from day to day. 
• It seems fairly easy to adapt the principals of the book into whatever phase of life you are currently in.  I was able to picture myself applying these principles as a student, a professional, and as a homemaker.  
• Very in line with gospel principles.  You can definitely tell he's LDS by the emphasis he puts on knowing what direction you want to go.

Cons

• There are no Franklin Covey planners that actually fit the format described in the book.  Which is just disappointing to me because it means they don't really practice what they preach.
• There's a lot of "prep work" before you get down to actually planning out a week.  Not good if you're looking to do this quickly.

Conclusion
Time management is a deeply personal thing for people.  No one system is going to be a perfect fit for anyone... the same is true for me.  There are definitely aspects of Covey's method that I love (having a plan for your life, planning a week at a time, reviewing the past), but there are also aspects of Allen's method that I already use and love or would love to use (writing everything down somewhere and having a running to-do list).  So what am I going to do? 

Well... that's a good question.  I'm still working on that one.  Once you have a clear idea about what you need to help you with your time management it's a lot harder to find exactly the right thing, but I'm sure that once I figure it out... it will be so, so worth it.

MUST READ!!: Stephen Covey's The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People

Note: In order to do this book justice I think I would almost need to write a book about it.  In order to preserve my readers' I've decided to just write about the impact the book has had on me.  If you've had a similar experience with this book or another book, please share!  If you're interested in reading it, go reserve it at your local library!

I don't know where to start with this book except for to say that it honestly changed my life.  This book goes right up next to The Feminine Mystique in terms of books that have dramatically altered my approach to life (which is saying quite a bit).  If it helps to give you an idea of how much I loved this book: I started reading this book as a checkout from the library, but about halfway through it i just had to go buy my own copy.  I went and scoured the DI looking for a copy of this book (I would've gone and bought it from a bookstore, but I was already at the DI looking for something else so I figured I might as well look for it).  It was actually good enough that after having read it I decided I wanted to own a copy... that rarely happens.  With most of the books I read I'm just fine reading it and then returning it to the library (I don't know how many books I've bought from a bargain book bin, read, and then given away... growing up my sister Allie would inherit loads and loads of books from me each year).

A little (or maybe a big...) back story as to why this book had such a big impact on me.  I love organization, I love efficiency.  Every year since I came to college I've worked on developing a time management system that worked for me.  Now that I'm out of college--for the time being-- I'm finding that my planner needs have changed.  I no longer faced with pressing deadlines or long lists of things that need to be read or researched in the near future.  My planner has a lot more carry over each day because it's more of a "holding place" for ideas for things to do eventually by the time I get home from work I'm too lazy to pull out my planner and actually look at what I wrote in there.  As a result, finding my planner for the next year has been much more important to me.  I've already started looking all over the internet for planners; I've drawn up a list of things I need/want in a planner; I've made lists of the pros and cons of going digital... I've done it all.

As I did research on-line I came to realize that there were 2 schools of thought when it comes to time management and productivity: the Covey method (as outlined in 7 Habits and First Things First--which is now on my to-read list) and the Getting Things Done method (from David Allen's Getting Things Done--my next read!).  So, I decided to read the books that have inspired these two methods of time management to see of they could help me figure out what I need.

The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, did just that.  It didn't answer my question at all of what type of planner I should buy, but it DID answer my question about how to set up my planner to make it work the best for me.  Some of the highlights of this book for me were the concepts of writing a personal mission statement, planning on a weekly basis instead of a daily basis, and spending an hour a day on your "Daily Personal Victory."

Personal Mission Statement.  I don't know why I hadn't thought of this before (well I kind of did, but not really), but the concept of a personal mission statement really resounded with me.  It makes perfect sense to me to spend a significant (several hours, days, or even weeks) amount of time reflecting on what you want to accomplish in life and what you want to be remembered for.  Covey emphasizes working backwards when coming up with your personal mission statement.  Begin by thinking about your funeral.  If you had one speaker from your family, one speaker from the community, from your job, and from your church, what would you want them to say about you.  What qualities or achievements would you want them to mention?  Once you know what you want said about you, you know where your goals and values truly lie, and then you only have to go back and figure out how to achieve those things. 

Plan on a Weekly Basis.  When Covey finally started talking about time management in Habit 3, he recommended something I had been thinking for awhile.  Planning for a week at a time makes a lot more sense than planning for each day.  He recommends sitting down at the beginning each week and deciding on what your goals are for that week, and what things you need to accomplish that week.  Once you have a master list of things you need to do, you can go through your calendar for the week and plug those things in.  When you look at the week at a whole and plan accordingly, your daily to-do list is going to be a lot more manageable.  This is something I really find applicable to me.  I have to write everything down on my to-do list as soon as I think of it or else I'll forget it.  As a result, on days when I'm really on top of writing everything down I'll end up with 20 or more things to do that day, because I just plug things into that particular day.  What if I were to set some time apart each week to do that?  Then I could actually plug things into the day they're actually going to get done rather than having that feeling of failure when I have to transfer things from day to day until they're finally done.  (This is actually something I love about 2-pages-per-day planners... you have a whole blank page for writing down all those things you suddenly think of and then at your weekly planning session you can look through the last week to see what you need to put on your plans for the next week).

Daily Personal Victory.  In essence, this is your personal enrichment time.  Covey recommends spending at least one hour each day improving yourself physically, mentally, socially, and spiritually.  I love the thought of this and really want to try to implement this!  It goes hand in hand with the two other things I mentioned (which makes sense since the daily personal victory is Habit 7).  If you know what your personal mission statement is, and if you're spreading out everything you need to do throughout the week, you're more likely to take the time to put yourself first for some portion of time each day.  Spending one hour a day on ourselves equates to 4.17% of our time, but what a difference that time makes!  If you think about productivity in terms of how much output you get for your input, then that hour each day is going to be your most productive hour of the day.  By exercising you get all sorts of benefits (more energy, more endorphins, a higher immune system) that will allow you to be more productive throughout the day.  By spending some time reading or studying something each day you will keep your mental faculties sharp and learn new things which will greatly improve your situation in life (if you let them).  By spending some time each day studying the scriptures, praying, or meditating, you'll gain a new sense of peace and purpose that will carry you through even the most stressful times in your life.  By spending some time each day focusing on building your relationships with other people you will have a network of people who will be there to help you through the hard times.  Isn't it amazing to think about what 1 hour a day can do for you?

So that's my challenge for today.  If you haven't read The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People yet, read it.  If you've read it, but it's been awhile, read it again.  No matter what though, search the book for one or two things that profoundly touch your life in some way.  I bet you won't stop at just one or two though...