Setting a goal of ‘two hour blocks’ may seem easy, but if yesterday said anything, I’m pretty sure it’s quite difficult.  Instead of simplifying my day into chunks, it created frustration in trying to remember what I had spent time doing, what I was doing and what I was going to do.  In light of this, I went for a little help from Joe’s Goals.

Each night, I plan to put a check next to each goal if it were completed that day.  This means, 1 check for 2 hours of writing for this blog, 1 check for 2 hours of marketing, et cetra.

This would be helpful in any situation where an attempt towards de-multitasking takes place.  Joe’s goals, in a sense, emulates a reward system on GTD crack.  The system shows your total checks for the day, total checks for a goal overall, and even your longest chain. <~ This last part speaks to me the most.  Creating an unbroken chain of worthy habits (or denying chains of vices) creates a sense of accomplishment.

Keeping it Simple

When first creating my goals, I had a tendency to write in everything I could want, two hours for this, two hours for that, working out, anything.  This created a problem very quickly.  My days were being boiled down to ten two hour blocks.  No, I’m not into polyphasic sleep - nor could I ever do that many tasks each day, every day.  Then came a realization:  Joe’s Goals allows for multiple checks for each goal!  This combined with simply cutting the goals down to the three most important, I came up with a system of ‘work’, ‘personal development’, and ‘pr0n’.

For the uninitiated…

Work refers to this website as well as my day job.  Personal development covers working out, healthy habits, and the like.  While pr0n (l33t for porn) doesn’t refer to pornography by any means.  It simply denotes spending time doing anything I really want to do outside of the other two sections.  i.e. filmmaking.  Until filmmaking becomes my career, it fits in this category.

Final Note: Ben’s Goals

Looking back to when I first ever learned of Joe’s Goals, I found this article on Lifehacker.  From there, I learned of this site. How cool! I suggest checking it out if you want to make extended personal development goals. I’m also adopting his strategy and copying his goals with minor differences, so I’ll be starting the next thirteen weeks with temperence.

Adding Joe’s Goals to my bags!

Aww, work ethic.  I’ve found myself many times lost in a daze of wiki-madness.  I’ve sat down to work only to find heavily wonderful distractions.  I’ve lost sleep from fascinating YouTubery.  This needs to stop, but how?  How about cutting the multi-tasking?  I propose a plan I first heard from this gentleman…

Setup work time to include solid two hour blocks or more, two hours of a single task.

This sounds easy enough, just turn off instant messenger, put on classical music and go.  Or so it may seem.  For someone as sporatic as myself, a more drastic measure has to be put in place. For this I employ the ability to have multiple accounts on this computer.  I created seperate accounts for play, writing, and blog management.  With this in place, each space has its own set of tools.

Play!!

The play workspace includes every piece of software on this mac (yes I use a mac…).  From Celtx, to Twhirl.  From Avid to  After Effects.  Everything sits on my dock waiting to be played with.

Writing

This space includes only the software I need to write: Blogwriting software, Firefox, iTunes and Skitch.

Blog Management

Everything you’d think would go into managing a blog: Dreamweaver, CSSEdit, Firefox, iTunes, and an Office Suite.

SO those workspaces combined with two hour blocks… lets have it a go!