The Cult of Done

I printed this poster out and put it on my wall:

I love the spirit of this because of its emphasis on *finishing* projects
so that you can move on to the next. I don't really understand #1 or #11,
but I like all the others, even the ones I semi disagree with.

In text format:

The Cult of Done Manifesto

1. There are three states of being. Not knowing, action and completion.
2. Accept that everything is a draft. It helps to get it done.
3. There is no editing stage.
4. Pretending you know what you're doing is almost the same as knowing
what you are doing, so just accept that you know what you're doing even if
you don't and do it.
5. Banish procrastination. If you wait more than a week to get an idea
done, abandon it.
6. The point of being done is not to finish but to get other things
done.
7. Once you're done you can throw it away.
8. Laugh at perfection. It's boring and keeps you from being done.
9. People without dirty hands are wrong. Doing something makes you
right.
10. Failure counts as done. So do mistakes.
11. Destruction is a variant of done.
12. If you have an idea and publish it on the internet, that counts as a
ghost of done.
13. Done is the engine of more.

How to Nap

I've discovered naps! (when I told this to a female friend she rolled her
eyes and said, "every man I know says that at some point. What is it with
men and napping?") When my head is drooping down to the keyboard, instead
of forcing myself to go on I have a nap on our great lab minicouch,
and leap up 20 minutes later as my watch alarm goes off, totally
refreshed.
It's all thanks to these tips my man Jim sent, source
http://longevity.about.com/od/sleep/a/napping_tips.htm

* Nap Time: Prime nap time is from 1:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m., when your
energy level dips due to a rise in the hormone melatonin at that time of
day.
* Darkness: Use a face mask or eye pillow to provide daytime darkness and
make your nap more effective.
* Not Too Late: Napping within three hours of bedtime may interfere with
nighttime sleep.
* Quiet Place: Assure that you will not be disturbed for the duration
of your nap.
* 30-Minute Maximum: When taking a nap longer than 30 minutes, you run the
risk of heading into deep sleep, which will leave you feeling tired and
groggy. Naps as short as 1 to 2 minutes could be effective for some
people.
* Set an Alarm: You will eventually train yourself to nap for the
amount of time you set aside. Until then, set an alarm or ask someone to
wake you up.
* The Caffeine Nap: Some people claim that drinking coffee and then taking
an immediate nap works well. The caffeine kicks in somewhere between 10
and 20 minutes, waking them up. They feel extra energy from both the nap
and the coffee. Researchers in Japan found that subjects using a caffeine
nap rated highest in decreased sleepiness and increased productivity when
compared to subjects taking a nap and washing their face, or taking a nap
and being exposed to bright lights.

One more thing I like about naps: as my conscious mind releases, I often
have bizarre, dream-like thoughts, which I love - it's a surreal break in
the middle of a mundane day, like an episode of The Office had a few
minutes of Yellow Submarine spliced into it.

Mastering My Email REVISED

Since I wrote the post about Mastering Your Email, I've made a significant
change to my system. It's to do with that problematic email folder
Deferred, where I would put things that I couldn't deal with in a few
minutes. It kept getting bigger, and causing more subliminal anxiety.

I've eliminated that folder, in favour of *actually* dealing with every
item in my inbox as I process it. If it really is going to take more
effort, I add a to-do item for it. Which means I have to have my palm
pilot every time I process my email, which is a good thing. Sometimes the
email itself contains stuff that I will need for the to-do item, but not
afterwards (I would have no reason to file it away for reference). For
that I've created a folder called TS, for temporary support. (I also now
use this instead of Deferred for my harddrive system and physical paper
system)

This has been a big improvement, because it now means that only my todo
lists have to be tamed and managed, and not the contents of Deferred as
well. It also means I decide what actual action needs to be taken as soon
as I encounter the email.