Brilliant post. I’ve been using ToDoist, as a GTD tool, since 2018 and it has been a lifesaver. Your technical set up is very similar to mine, although I’m going to adopt your @next tags - brilliant tweak.
The gold of your post is that you’ve expressed why having a system helps prevent work stress and burnout. I am an academic physician and academic and clinical leader so the chaos of demands on my time is insane. ToDoist set up thoughtful and used with systematic discipline (which is not time consuming) has been the mechanism by which I’ve stayed a productive and reliable academic. Anyone reading the blog post - he’s right! Try it!
I've always had a hard time using both a calendar and Todoist. Having my calendar linked on Todoist doesn't have the same satisfaction or sense of achievement as checking a box, but I can't seem to completely transition over to Todoist for recurring tasks/collaborative meetings for three reasons:
1. Todoist doesn't have a very robust recurring task management system (e.g., MWF in a single week), forcing me to create multiple redundant tasks that say effectively the same thing
2. It does not give insight into the duration of an event
3. I end up having to use the calendar anyway to invite participants, effectively doubling the overhead
I wonder if you have dealt with these issues, and, if so, how you've resolved them.
Thanks for the comment. FYI first of all I do not link my calendar to ToDoist. I consider them two separate systems because actionable items that have actual due dates should not (according to GTD practice) go on a next actions list but rather should be put directly on the calendar, which one reviews weekly or daily. In practice there should be little to no overlap between the stuff in ToDoist and stuff on the calendar. (Exception - if you are making time blocks on your calendar to focus on next actions or areas of focus.)
1. In ToDoist you can create recurring MWF tasks that end on a particular date using natural language input, e.g. typing "Do a thing every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday until December 15". The text following the word "thing" will light up to indicate ToDoist knows what you mean. Note, you have to separate the multiple days with commas - leaving the commas out causes only the Friday to recur.
2. This is correct and it's appropriate for GTD methodology which is agnostic with respect to duration. When going through the Clarify process, the question "how long does it take" is only relevant insofar as we are deciding whether it takes two minutes or less, or not. If a task takes longer than 2 minutes, from GTD's standpoint it doesn't matter if it takes an hour or a day, it's just a next action. Unless it isn't -- if you have a task that takes a week to complete, there's a high probability this is a project, not a task, and the correct handling of it would be to add it to the Projects list and then break it down into bite sized actions and then decide on the next action. Note that if you want to include a time duration anyway in ToDoist, you can do that with a label.
3. I don't even collaborate with people in ToDoist so I am of no help on this one, but see my remark above about keeping the calendar and the next actions lists separate.
I started using ToDoIst earlier this month and so far it is REALLY working for me in the sense that things are both captured and organized. It's summer now, so I don't have classes but I do expect it to keep things a little bit clearer. Thank you for the details!
Brilliant post. I’ve been using ToDoist, as a GTD tool, since 2018 and it has been a lifesaver. Your technical set up is very similar to mine, although I’m going to adopt your @next tags - brilliant tweak.
The gold of your post is that you’ve expressed why having a system helps prevent work stress and burnout. I am an academic physician and academic and clinical leader so the chaos of demands on my time is insane. ToDoist set up thoughtful and used with systematic discipline (which is not time consuming) has been the mechanism by which I’ve stayed a productive and reliable academic. Anyone reading the blog post - he’s right! Try it!
Thank you
I've always had a hard time using both a calendar and Todoist. Having my calendar linked on Todoist doesn't have the same satisfaction or sense of achievement as checking a box, but I can't seem to completely transition over to Todoist for recurring tasks/collaborative meetings for three reasons:
1. Todoist doesn't have a very robust recurring task management system (e.g., MWF in a single week), forcing me to create multiple redundant tasks that say effectively the same thing
2. It does not give insight into the duration of an event
3. I end up having to use the calendar anyway to invite participants, effectively doubling the overhead
I wonder if you have dealt with these issues, and, if so, how you've resolved them.
Thanks for the comment. FYI first of all I do not link my calendar to ToDoist. I consider them two separate systems because actionable items that have actual due dates should not (according to GTD practice) go on a next actions list but rather should be put directly on the calendar, which one reviews weekly or daily. In practice there should be little to no overlap between the stuff in ToDoist and stuff on the calendar. (Exception - if you are making time blocks on your calendar to focus on next actions or areas of focus.)
1. In ToDoist you can create recurring MWF tasks that end on a particular date using natural language input, e.g. typing "Do a thing every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday until December 15". The text following the word "thing" will light up to indicate ToDoist knows what you mean. Note, you have to separate the multiple days with commas - leaving the commas out causes only the Friday to recur.
2. This is correct and it's appropriate for GTD methodology which is agnostic with respect to duration. When going through the Clarify process, the question "how long does it take" is only relevant insofar as we are deciding whether it takes two minutes or less, or not. If a task takes longer than 2 minutes, from GTD's standpoint it doesn't matter if it takes an hour or a day, it's just a next action. Unless it isn't -- if you have a task that takes a week to complete, there's a high probability this is a project, not a task, and the correct handling of it would be to add it to the Projects list and then break it down into bite sized actions and then decide on the next action. Note that if you want to include a time duration anyway in ToDoist, you can do that with a label.
3. I don't even collaborate with people in ToDoist so I am of no help on this one, but see my remark above about keeping the calendar and the next actions lists separate.
Good luck!
I started using ToDoIst earlier this month and so far it is REALLY working for me in the sense that things are both captured and organized. It's summer now, so I don't have classes but I do expect it to keep things a little bit clearer. Thank you for the details!
Very cool! Summer is a great time to demo these tools because you can start small and the scale up what's working when the academic year kicks off.