To Do or To Done
Ted Urban's TED Talk on procrastination is a brilliant and hilarious journey into the mind of a long-term procrastinator. The star of the show **spoiler alert** is clearly the Procrastination Monkey, but the line I find myself recalling of the most is "It has always been a dream of mine to have done a TED Talk, in the past.".
While most of us don't aspire to stand on the TED stage, the line is so relatable because we all know the feeling of unhappily measuring the distance between how we feel about tasks or projects not completed and how much better we would feel if they were just done.
For me, it is all of the things. I am such a captive of my to-do lists, that I have a notebook that if opened from one side is work items and if opened from the other is everything not work. And the problem of course is, it is much easier to add items to a list than the time it takes to actually get them all done. So both lists always seem to grow and never ends with the final item, "Now go have a nice day!".
Recently I was thinking about the infinite nature of my to-do lists and thinking that they should more accurately be called "Things I don't particularly want to, but have to-do lists" which of course made me think of the Ted Urban quote about the good part being to "have done a Ted Talk, in the past." since I also wanted to have my to-do list done.
I have previously written about the underestimated power of words and their ability to shape our thoughts and how we perceive the world, so I didn't care for the negative way my proposed list title sounded in my head. So I considered what a positive spin on it might be.
The answer for me has been a new title and a whole new approach to my daily lists. Instead of feeling like a litany of things still to be accomplished when I look at them, my new lists help remind me of the satisfaction of being done.
Rig your life for the results you want!
Conferencing
There is an art to conferencing. Packing plenty of business cards, dressing in layers for cold meeting rooms and muggy hallways, meeting new people and connecting others who need to meet each other.There is also an art to conference photos. Photos that highlight the presentations, speakers and information being delivered is good!Photos that highlight dinners and drinks at the end of a long day of sessions...not so much.
CMLS2015
Words Matter
There are an estimated 6500-7000 languages. Are we changed in how and what we think by which ones we speak and which ones we don't speak?This fascinating 11 min talk by Lera Boroditsky answers that question with examples of stunning contrasts of available words and ideas within different languages that cannot help but shape how their speakers think or even can think.https://youtu.be/VHulvUwgFWo?t=29s
Riding a Dead Horse
An old and well-traveled, but still good poke at how Associations will do anything but the obvious in response to a failing program or service.The wisdom people familiar with horses, passed on from generation to generation, says that when you discover that you are riding a dead horse, the best strategy is to dismount. Modern Associations however offer a whole range of far more advanced strategies such as:1. Buying a stronger whip.2. Changing riders.3. Say things like "But this is how we have always ridden this horse!"4. Appointing a committee to study the horse.5. Visiting other sites to see how others ride dead horses.6. Shorten the track.7. Re-classifying the dead horse as “living, impaired”.8. Hiring outside contractors to ride the dead horse.9. Harnessing several dead horses together to increase the speed and pulling power.10. Attempting to mount multiple dead horses in hopes that one of them will spring to life.11. Providing additional funding and/or training to increase the dead horse’s performance.12. Doing a productivity study to see if lighter riders would improve the dead horse’s performance.13. Declaring that as the dead horse does not have to be fed, it is less costly, carries lower overhead, and therefore contributes substantially more to the bottom line of the organization than do some other horses.14. Re-writing the expected performance requirements for all horses.15. Do a cost analysis to see if contractors can ride the horse cheaper.