So I was talking to Sarah last week about my current blog funk. And I gotta say — I felt like throwing in the towel…
I think I was hitting burn-out. Very little inspiration and time to commit to it lately. As if supplying the content weren’t enough of a task, the engineer in me wants to rip out the Frankenstein guts of the blog and rebuild it. It’s too busy, too clunky, too buggy, not all that pretty, outdated. It could be so much better, so much more efficient. And then there are so many old posts that don’t seem relevant anymore. Some of them I’m downright embarrassed about. I felt like hitting the delete button on more than a few. Been there, done that, delete.
I’ve been reading lately about this cultish craze called GTD (Getting Things Done), a three-year old phenomenon which I apparently missed altogether the first time around. It was first a sort of self-help book. Then it gained a following. Here’s a summary from the one-stop-shop personal productivity site 43Folders:
Stuff is bouncing around in our heads and causing untold stress and anxiety. Evaluation meetings, bar mitzvahs, empty rolls of toilet paper, broken lawn mowers, college applications, your big gut, tooth decay, dirty underwear and imminent jury duty all compete for prime attention in our poor, addled brains. Stuff has no “home” and, consequently, no place to go, so it just keeps rattling around… We’re too neurotic to stop thinking about it, and we certainly don’t have time to actually do everything in one day.
Boy that’s me lately! My mind so full of stuff to do (most of which I pile onto myself). So many details to sort out first, where to start? So I’m going to give this GTD stuff a try and apply it to my blog, to my personal todo list. I’ll keep you posted.
So for now, I’m giving the blog a stay of execution. But expect some changes soon. Some minor cosmetics, some major overhaul.
I’ve been following the PCTN craze for most of my life. ProCrasTiNate. 😉
Looking forward to seeing the changes. It can definitely be hard to be inspired and blogging can truly be alot of work, and none of us need more of that, but I’m glad you are sticking with it. Getting Things Done sounds really interesting.
Sounds like a plan.. 🙂
I can sure relate to that quote. That’s me all the way. I am trying hard to organize my life in hope that my thoughts will follow suit! Having more space in our new home has really helped me a lot. Plus, I’ve tried things like getting a thingy to hang my keys around my neck when I go places. I don’t even have to think about where my keys are! It’s function over fashion these days. It’s official, I’ve become one of those moms! GTD sounds interesting.
Have fun with your changes. I look forward to seeing them.
Rob, check out the GTD version of TiddlyWiki I’ve got it on my machine at work, although I confess it was mostly to rip apart the Javascript and see how it works. I’ve never seen so much JS and CSS in one file before! I like saying the word “TiddlyWiki” 😛
I am slightly turned off by the rampant commercialization of the GTD “movement”. I guess that’s the curse of becoming popular. At some point, you get so big that you appear disingenuous and, thus, untrustworthy.
I’m a huge GTD fan.
I have been using some of 37signals products to help me get junk out of my head. I use backpackit.com for personal and random work-related items (like “log time tomorrow”) and then I use basecamphq.com extensively for projects at work. Getting things that need to be done out of your brain is like taking a vacation!
Other than that…. maybe try some tweaks like I did on my blog. I now post ahead for the week with photos. If I feel like filling inbetween, then I do. I am more interested in it now because I’m showing off photos and getting comments (you don’t seem to have a problem with that).
I haven’t even been reading blogs lately, let alone posting on mine…..oh well!Good luck, Rob! Go Fight Win!