Letter 30: July 28, 2008
So here we are, letter 30. Who woulda thunk it 29 weeks ago.
Here’s what thirty means to me. Just a few days ago, I had a brilliant marketing idea. It was one which would only work if the entrepreneur happened to have a vague grasp of PHP programming, years of earned credibility in a particular niche and a set of thirty newsletters.
Without all that, the idea was meaningless. And today for the first time in my life I just happen to have exactly that resource set. Thank you.
Writing, like life itself, and unlike cows, is enriched by feeding upon itself. Without laying the foundations (to switch metaphors hurriedly) you not only can’t get to level two – it’s meaningless even to spend time thinking about it.
But let's move on to the core of this email. Here it comes, and if you’re in a hurry, you may skip the first five paragraphs of the letter.
If there’s a theme to these thirty letters, it is that every rule has an exception.
Which would mean that every writing teacher who sells you the One Way is mistaken, or worse.
Here’s a rule that has an exception, one I mentioned here months ago. The principle, by which I stand, is that the immediate almost always drives out the important. The rule is that, if you want to get your writing done, you must find some way of fighting back the almost irresistible urge to do something more urgent and more trivial, like answering email. For that reason, I disagree with David Allen’s suggestion that when you’re prioritizing the in tray, anything that can be disposed of in two minutes should be disposed of.
A friend talks about “feng shui of the brain.” That’s the value of clearing up small things that clutter the mind, so that you can concentrate on the big things. I believe that too. I believe that those little undone jobs lurking at the back of the mind, muttering to each other and trying to guilt-trip you, need to be dealt with. For that reason, I agree with David Allen’s suggestion.
How do I reconcile these? Well, I don’t. Hey, I’m allowed to contradict myself. I am vast (despite an upcoming beach vacation), I contain multitudes.
More seriously, I think they are aspects of the same rule.
When you have writing to do, do it, and delay the other stuff. It can be done at the end of the day, or put off from day to day and week to week.
But when the writing is done and you have some days of recovery time, attend to the feng shui. A clean mind is an efficient workshop. A happy, productive place to let the next work take shape unencumbered.
So something you can try today is feng shui of the brain: when there honestly is time to attend to the minor things, attend to them. This helps in two ways: before you do it, knowing for certain that you will get to it helps you focus; and after you do it, you have that clean mind.
David
David Jung McGarva
+1 (818) 707 1871
Write me: david at todayiwrite dot com
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