
The power of a 'not-to-do' list - jv22222
http://www.bbc.com/capital/story/20170919-the-power-of-a-not-to-do-list
======
navalsaini
I had a 'not to do list' a few years back and it helped me immensely.

* Don't step on someone's ego (people are very egoistic and I have or had a habit of cracking worst jokes, without an ounce of remorse)

* Don't get emotionally involved with takers (there are givers and takers in the world... it's so much better to give to givers)

* Don't make important decisions when tired (prevented me from sending emails when I was too tired and silly ones)

I have been a freelance developer and an entrepreneur for last few years. They
might seem silly but did help me out become better at managing things. :-)
Does anyone else wants to share theirs.

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siscia
What are yoir definitions of "takers" and "givers"?

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yasserkaddour
There is a bestselling book "Give and Take: Why Helping Others Drives Our
Success" about these concepts by Adam Grant[1]. From the description:

> It turns out that at work, most people operate as either takers, matchers,
> or givers. Whereas takers strive to get as much as possible from others and
> matchers aim to trade evenly, givers are the rare breed of people who
> contribute to others without expecting anything in return.

[1]
[https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0143124986](https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0143124986)

~~~
antisthenes
Sounds like pseudo-science and arbitrary categories defined by the book
author.

I wonder how that's defined at work, considering intellectual knowledge work
isn't something you can physically give, match or take.

~~~
loco5niner
Actually, I have a co-worker (database guy) who is very much a giver of his
intellectual knowledge. Awesome to work with.

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rcy
Skip reading this article and go straight to one referenced within it
[https://medium.com/@awilkinson/the-power-of-anti-
goals-c38f5...](https://medium.com/@awilkinson/the-power-of-anti-
goals-c38f5f46d23c)

~~~
ourmandave
Original article is much better. The "Not To-Do" List was inspired by Charlie
Munger's idea of inversion.

 _“Problems frequently get easier if you turn them around in reverse. In other
words, if you want to help India, the question you should ask is not ‘how can
I help India,’ it’s ‘what is doing the worst damage in India and how do I
avoid it?”

“A lot of success in life and business comes from knowing what you want to
avoid: early death, a bad marriage, etc.”

“It is remarkable how much long-term advantage we have gotten by trying to be
consistently not stupid, instead of trying to be very intelligent.”_

~~~
goodJobWalrus
where is this quote from? I want to learn more about Charlies thoughts. What
should I read?

~~~
3chelon
Surely you need to ask what you _shouldn 't_ read?

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rezlov
Crappy article, but the concept is powerful and particularly relevant for
startups.

Prioritization is key for making meaningful progress every day. Your list of
'to-dos' will seem endless so you must learn to pick and choose only the most
valuable activities. And sometimes that means saying no to other valuable but
not as critical ones.

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barbs
"Focus is a matter of deciding what things you're not going to do." \- John
Carmack

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adamkruszewski
Not really anti-goals but I think one of the great side of David Allen's GTD
is that you are reviewing things you are not doing but you would like to
(someday/maybes, incubation) on a consistent basis. So you won't feel bad
about it and can be conscious with not doing.

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themodelplumber
I like the idea of anti-goals, will have to try that. So far I've had a lot of
luck with the following:

\- Recognizing "anti-matter-blocks" on my calendar: Letting go of blocks of
time in which I _should_ be productive and constructive, but am not. I kept a
log and found that the 1-3:30 p.m. time block was ridiculously unproductive
and typically filled with high self-pressure, so I decided to completely let
it go. Now I use that block as a rest period and do whatever I want. Watch a
movie? Great. Two-hour hike? Done, many times. This is still an experiment to
which I make little tweaks (going on about 3 years now) but it taught me to
accept my roadblocks for what they are and use them to some other advantage
(in this case, mental health / recuperation). To top it off, as a stress
response I was feeding a bad habit during that block of time for about 10
years, and as of two years ago, it's completely gone.

\- Intuitive task priority. I fill my to-do list with fun things and not-so-
fun things, and start with whatever "speaks to me." If nothing on the list
speaks to me, chances are I have neglected to add fun things. And if my work
items do not seem fun _ever_, I need to alter my work and seek out different
forms of work or set firmer boundaries. This latter fact is difficult but
worth facing up to.

\- Verbalizing my problems with the day to other people. This is hard for me
because I don't want to sound like I'm whining, but has worked surprisingly
well. Sometimes I get feedback like, "well, why don't you just do X instead,"
where X is an idea I hadn't considered. Other times there's no one around so I
consult with a person I deeply respect as if they're present & ready to help
me (the cabinet of invisible counselors idea) or even say a prayer. I've had
amazing results with these last methods, somehow even better if I'm typing
them out as I experience them.

\- Blocking in things I really look forward to. This is mentioned in the
article. I enjoy achievement and find that it helps reverse feelings of
exhaustion. For me, little achievements peppered in here and there throughout
the year are where it's at. I blocked in the ARRL amateur radio licensing
exams as a personal challenge and downloaded an app to help study. I blocked
in a couple of conferences that are outside of my field but very interesting.
I block in webinars in various fields and even ended up pursuing and earning
certificates in those fields. I built a new website to help those who are
interested in one of those fields and challenged myself to add 1,000 new items
of content before the end of the year. I'm at 250 so far after 2 weeks (I
count links! The currency of the web...but it's a niche field so it's still
hard).

Well, this went longer than I thought. But with some serious achievements
finally under my belt, with bad habits conquered and work going better than
ever, I figured it might help someone to share.

~~~
Derbasti
Another technique that helps me is always holding back a few smallish
productive tasks that you can do if you are stuck on another project. More
often than not, switching projects for a few hours clears my head for the
original project and accomplishing a small task reduces my frustration level
significantly.

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hawski
Wouldn't meeting only with people that one likes lead to reinforcing one's
echo chamber?

~~~
kintalo
Is that always bad? People often advise to be around people with the same
goals and ambitions as you to keep you motivated and on the right path.

It's that echo chamber of "you can do it" that often leads to people actually
doing it.

~~~
indigochill
The situation I see this happen the most is Company wants to encourage high
morale with positive internal messaging, which gets the echo chamber treatment
from management. This messaging minimizes self-critical/negative feedback,
which results in problems going unhandled, which results in them developing
into worse problems until Company becomes embarrassed into taking them
seriously.

But I can see how a positive echo chamber could help get something off the
ground.

------
5_minutes
So it’s really about setting clear boundaries.

Contrary to the Medium post, I schedule each meeting as first thing of the
day, so it’s out of the way and doesn’t cockblock deep work I want to do. Even
better is no meetings, but sometimes they’re just unavoidable.

~~~
codazoda
I typically work best in the morning. I have my most productive hour the first
hour I work. If I'm able to get flow on my project then it will carry me a
couple hours into the day. Once I'm pulled out of my flow or I tire, I find it
hard to get back in. This is the time I'd like to spend having conversations
and/or meetings, with other people helping to spur my imagination.

I can't always control my schedule to this degree, because I work for others,
but it's ideal for me.

I suppose it works this way for "morning people".

~~~
devdad
I only book external meetings Wednesdays and during lunch. If next Wednesday
is full, the meeting goes on to lunch date or the week after. We're a small
shop and all of our employees have to do this (noone is only sales, everyone
is part of our code base). Works great for us.

Internal meetings are kept short. 30 minutes each morning, 30 minutes after
lunch.

~~~
matwood
I do something similar and try to get all meetings on the same day(s). Of
course this doesn't always work given others schedules, but does help because
most of the time nothing is so critical it can't wait a few days to be
discussed.

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blinry
If you understand German, you might enjoy Volker Strübing's song on this
topic:
[https://youtu.be/T4DWCJfkyzk?t=333](https://youtu.be/T4DWCJfkyzk?t=333)

~~~
sbruchmann
Which is inspired by Marc-Uwe Kling and the kangaroo respectively.

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thinbeige
The title and idea are great, the post itself not so. However, one part of my
'not to-do list' ist my /etc/hosts file. All the worst time wasters go there
and redirect to 0.0.0.0.

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epalmer
When we are approaching new somewhat abstract project idea we do a IS and IS
NOT exercise and get the sponsor to sign off on the lists. This has been
helpful in the last 15 years of my career.

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muzani
I can see how this can go wrong.

* Don't look at porn for more than 30 minutes today.

* Don't eat any chocolate or other unhealthy food.

* Don't work on that side project.

~~~
BoiledCabbage
I don't follow - how is this "wrong"? If those are things you want to
eliminate, why not eliminate them.

~~~
muzani
Because having a list of things reminding you what you should not do will
often trigger the impulse to do it. I knew a friend who had such a list, she
would immediately do everything on the list then vow not to do it again
tomorrow. At some point, it became a habit to do those things on 'break' days.

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pizza
"the power of rules"

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subway
I wish I could read this on android. It just redirects to a single ad.

~~~
crispinb
Android is entirely useless without Adguard (or equivalent)

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y4mi
how is that an android problem?

the internet is borderline unusable without proper adblocking. Its the same on
all platforms.

~~~
crispinb
Sure. This just happened to be a comment about android.

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xiaoyadinner
This is just a waste of time. First, you must have common sense before you put
your pants on in the morning.

