Creating a Better Life

5 Easy Ways to Capture Your Ideas

If you’re anything like me, you’re having million dollar ideas all the time. The problem is that when you get home to work on them, all that you can remember is that Heroes isn’t on because of the writer’s strike, or that you have to get the bills paid before they shut off the cable (which really wouldn’t matter… I mean, there is a writer’s strike going on.)

Most personal productivity systems and experts suggest that you use something other than your own brain to record your ideas. With two of my favorites, GTD and Simpleology, it’s absolutely essential that you do so. GTD talks about using “trusted systems” - use anything that you know will be there later, and be easily accessible, so that your brain can forget about it. Simpleology has a “Dream Catcher” built into it’s online software, and suggests that you use it to prevent “Runaway Brainware.”

I actually remember learning about this for the first time way back when I was still in grammar school. I was going to be a famous novelist back then (there weren’t blogs yet), and was a big fan of Roald Dahl. He’s most famous for being the author of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I remember reading a book of his short stories and essays, and one of them was about the process of writing. (I wish I could remember the name of the book or the essay itself…)

It was from this essay that I first learned about the importance of capturing ideas. In one of the examples that he gave, he was driving when an idea came to him. He pulled over to the side of the road to write it down, but couldn’t find a pen… so he made a note in the dirt on the bumper of his car! Now that’s dedication!

Hopefully the following methods are a little easier:

1. Notebook

Low-tech solutions can often be best. No worries about crashes, accidental erasures, or battery life. And it’s also cost friendly - nearly anyone can afford to pick up a pocket sized notebook. The biggest problem that I personally have with this one is finding a pen or pencil when I need one. I swear to god, I don’t care if I am a man, one of these days I’m going to start carrying a purse!

2. Cell Phone with a Notes or To Do List Function

Most modern cell phones have these. This one solves the problem of having to find a pen, and you are probably less likely to misplace or forget it. The problem is that it can often be difficult to enter notes into one unless you’ve got a text friendly keypad.

3. Voice Recorder

These are great for when you’re driving and can’t use your hands to write or type. Some cell phones have a record function built in, but you can also pick up stand-alone versions at most of the big retail stores.

4. PC Software

If you live in a small apartment (like I do), and have your computer on all of the time (like I do), it can be easy to just jump over to the PC and type something into a notebook application. My two favorites for this are both from Google - the scratch pad gadget for Google Desktop, or the Google Notebook browser add-on. I’ve actally begun using Google Notebook quite extensively… with it’s ability to use multiple notebooks, sections, and tagging, it’s usually pretty easy to find what I’ve filed there.

5. Post-Its

These were the inspiration for this article.

Last night, I was at the computer and one of those million dollar ideas (OK, maybe this was only a thousand dollar one) popped into my head. Being the good collector I am, I fired up Google Notebook to record it…

… and the screen froze. Nothing moving. I’d aked my baby to do one too many things.

It was a godsend that I had a stack of Post-Its in front of me. So I wrote down the initial idea, and then thought, “Hey, wouldn’t it be helpful if I shared some of my ideas on capturing ideas?”

So out comes another little yellow sheet of paper, and a day later, this very article is born.

(By the way… I’ve written about my love of Post-its before…)

So those are my 5 favorites… which of these do you use? Have I missed any that you like to use?

—

Discuss this post at Personal Development Partners

The Worst Kept Secret of Success

One of worst kept secrets of success is the power of focus.

We live in a society that loves to distract us. You no longer have to wait for a commercial to find out what’s on next on the television - an announcement of the next big show will pop up on the bottom of the screen, complete with animation to be sure that you’ve noticed it. Where I live, it can sometimes be a struggle just to get into the grocery store without someone wanting to talk to you about impeaching one of our political leaders or lending a hand to people who are down and out. With cell phones, PDA’s, instant messaging, and all of the other tools of communication that we’ve come up with, people can interrupt you on a whim.

If you want to be successful, you’ll need to learn to stay focused. It isn’t really very difficult, but you may need to make some changes to your thinking and behavior in order to achieve it. Here are some suggestions:

Learn to Accept Distractions

Not accept as in allow them all in - accept as in “it is what it is.” People are going to distract you, and it just becomes even more of a distraction when it gets under your skin. When you allow your own emotions to become more of a distraction than the 30 second cell phone call, your productivity can take a real hit. When something does show up while you are focused on something else, make the decision immediately to defer it until later or to completely forget about it.

Turn Off Your Phone, Email, and Instant Messaging

Simply because someone wants to communicate with you, you are under no obligation to reciprocate. I’m not talking about complete isolation here, but when you are working on a project that demands your attention, the last thing you need are ringing phones and flashing windows on your computer distracting you. Voicemail works just fine for many communications, and your email isn’t going anywhere (no matter how much you want it to!). Just be sure that you take the time to stay on top of these things, or the tug of “What’s in there now?” can become a distraction in and of itself.

Stop Multitasking

If you consider the millions of pieces of information that are flowing into our minds every day, and the fact that our conscious minds are only able to focus on one thing at a time, it’s pretty amazing that we are able to focus on anything at all.

Our conscious minds can only focus on one thing at a time. It may seem like some people can do multiple tasks at once, but what they are really doing is one of two things - they are either “fast-switching” between tasks, which gives the appearance doing more than one thing at a time, or they are using the power of habit with one of the tasks, and therefore not consciously focusing on it at all.

If you think about a computer, it can sometimes seems like your PC can do multiple things at once (playing an MP3, displaying a Word document, receiving an email)… but unless it has more than one processing chip (the computer’s brain), it really isn’t - it’s just switching back and forth between doing one thing at a time rapidly.

It’s the same with us. Our conscious minds can only do one thing at a time, and every time you try to focus on more than that one thing, you lose a little bit of your power of focus. Decide what you want to be focused upon, and do only that.

Use Specific Times for Planning and Reflection

One of the things that has helped me immensely when my own brain gets “scattered and splattered” is pausing for a moment and saying to myself “Where am I Now? What am I working on Now?” Many times, my brain has veered off into the realm of the past (regret about what happened yesterday), or the future (worry about what might happen tomorrow.) Those two little bugaboos can kill your today. There’s productive reflection and goal setting, and then there’s regret and worry. Make your reflection and planning distinct activities, and you’ll know that when they pop up in the middle of preparing that report for work, you can remind yourself that now is not the time.

Live in Day Tight Compartments

This one comes from a couple of different sources, and is related to the previous suggestion. One of the first things people recovering from addictions are taught is the benefit of living “One Day At A Time.” The “Living in Day Tight Compartments” wording comes from “How to Stop Worrying and Start Living” by Dale Carnegie.

While the ideal is to live Right Now, as human beings the current Right Now is flowing into the next Right Now, and the next Right Now, and the next Right Now. The Now is not something you can hold on to. When you decide to live in day tight compartments, it goes a long way toward eliminating much of those distractions that can pop up in your own head that were mentioned earlier.

Keep a List

Do your best to always have an easy way of recording your thoughts as they pop into your head. When I’m working at the computer, my personal favorite is Google Desktop’s Scratch Pad Gadget, while away from it a small notebook and a pen and paper do a great job. While you are doing what you are doing Now, and things pop into your head, jot them down. This has the benefit of telling your brain “I’ve got it, you don’t have to worry about this right now.” Then, get back to what you are working on.

Practice Focusing

One of the biggest benefits I’ve experienced since I started meditating is an increased ability to focus. Fifteen minutes of meditation seems to add two hours to my day, which isn’t a bad return on investment. Those extra hours come from the increase in focus that meditation gives me. Learning to watch your own breath, and the practice of gently bringing your mind back to that breath when it wanders, does wonders for your ability to concentrate the rest of the day.

What do you do that helps you to focus? I’d love to hear your own suggestions. Be sure to leave them in the comments section so that all of us can benefit.

Click Here to Leave a Comment

Tony Robbins on TED

Sometimes I come up with some real gems when I go through my draft posts. I was originally pointed to this by Tony Teegarden’s Empowerment4Life blog, way back in November of 2006:

Direct Link to Video

It’s still all about the power of decision.

Here Are Some Real “Secrets”

Aaron Potts has done an excellent wrap up of the results he got from his “Simply Successful Secrets” project: Simply Successful Secrets Roundup

We’re done. We don’t need to explore personal development anymore. It would take more than 10 lifetimes to actually master everything on this list. Then again, blogging/writing ended up at #9 on the list, so I guess we better keep going.

I was especially struck by #1 - Exercise/Eating Healthy Foods. Not because I don’t think that it’s important, but because I personally have never placed that much of an emphasis on it. As a matter of fact, just yesterday someone at work asked me if I follow a special diet… “McDonalds, Coffee, and Cigarettes” was my answer. Maybe I should be working on that?

Here’s a list of all of the other blogs that participated:

Chris Garrett on New Media
Breathing Prosperity
Live the Power
Shards of Consciousness
Make the Most of U
Achieve-IT!
K-L Masina
Evolving Times
Sania Wyatt
Be the Change - Tread the Path
ITtoolbox
The Fast Lane
Vcuisine
Life Optimizer
The Wrong Advices
Thoughts & Philosophies
Bryan Baker
The Reasoner
Casual Keystrokes
SmartWealthyRich.com
Alex Shalman
MomGadget
Smug Puppies
Behind the Glasses
Writing Thoughts
Pink Apple Connections
The Tall Poppy
The Inspired Market-Her's Blog
Quasi Fictional
Pamil Visions
I'm Forty What??!!
Words of a Broken Mirror
Grow Your Writing Business
Conceive, Believe, Achieve
North Star Mental Fitness
Women Walking in Wisdom's Footsteps
Raymond L. Burton
I Captured a Blog
LeoChiang.com
Shama Hyder
DebraMoorehead.com
The Power of Trinity
Creating Abundant Lifestyles
Bionic Ear Blog
Home Biz Notes
Kavit Haria
ClickNewz
Adversity University
Creation Thoughts
Content Done Better
Keeping the Secret
The Silence is Golden
Rachel Creative
Blown World
BrianKim.net
Beyond Horizon Coaching
The Urban Monk
Change Therapy
Life Beside the Edge
A Creativist Journal
Andy Wibbels
Made to be Great
Tennessee Text Wrestling
Sylvia's Insight
Writer in the Making
ZenChill.com
Now
Christy's Coffee Break
Optimist Lab
Druid Journal
Internet Marketing Sweetie
JaneChin.com
Business Advice Daily
Breeze Debris
Success from the Nest
Finish Strong!
Build a Better Blog
FreeLanceMom.com
Online Fandom
SpinMe.com
The Goat's Lunch Pail
Juggling Cats
Story Geek
Second Life Education Research
Rule of 5
Life Wealth
SelfHelpSpot.com
Desmond's Personal Development Site
Blogpreneur
CalvinWoon.com
Strive Success
Momentum Coaching
Money, Meaning, and Beyond
Marketing Qi
Sky Windows
Jeri's Organizing & Decluttering News
Kathy Calculates
Roni's Weight Watchen Page(s)
The Ted Rap
Just Another Weigh
Life is Good…Even When It's Not!
Ed Tech Journeys
Ezine Marketing Center
PatriciaLin.com
FreshBlogger
Dr. B's Blog
The Official Weblog of Henry Jenkins
eJabs
Dangerously Irrelevant
Mr. Fire
The Sovereign Journey
Adventures of a Suburban WAHM
A Teacher's Life
Around the Corner v2
Do I Dare Disturb the Universe?
Enhance Life
In Another Place
Life is not a Race to be First Finished
Evenstar Houses of Healing
The Maverick Marketer
Pay O'Bryan
eSoup
Kathy Schrock's Kaffeeklatsch
Affordable Internet Marketing
Pour Out
Verve Coaching
The Figurehead
All About Music Blog
Pet Peeving
World Copywriting Blog
FunDiva.com
JustCommunicate
MarketingMoment.com
Out of the Blog, Into the Light
Writing White Papers
Joe Dale - Integrating ICT
The BizTechie Chronicles
E-Commerce Confidential
Create Reality
Do What!?
BurningBush
The Destination is Success…
5 Star Affiliate Programs
Law of Attraction Blog
Living Out Loud
BusinessBlogAngel.com
Coaching Wizardry
The Daily Positive
Judith Morgan
Think Positive Blog
The Growing Edge
Energies of Creation
Ramblings from a Glass Half Full

Thanks to all of you for helping me to see where I’m on track, and what I can work on.

And a huge thanks to Aaron for taking what could have been simple link bait and turning it into a useful resource for all of us!

Using a Daily Checklist

I’m still trying to hit that sweet spot of taking the actions necessary in order to reach the goals I have, while cleaning up the wreckage of my past, while doing the things I need to do to maintain stability in my daily life.

A tool I’ve been using is a simple daily checklist of those actions that I need to take each day.

I’m still working on hitting all of the targets on it on a daily basis, but it’s a great tool for when I’m in those moments when I’m not sure what the next action should be, or I catch myself wasting time surfing the net or mindlessly watching TV. If there’s a spot without an X in it for that day, it’s time to get moving.

This is also a great way to review my progress, and see where my focus needs to go. For instance, just looking at this version tells me that:

1. I forgot to eat breakfast this morning!
2. I need to focus on reviewing my days when they are over.
3. I’ve been consistent on my Science of Getting Rich for Practical Geniuses and Simpleology exercises
4. Up until yesterday, I was probably a little on the stinky side

Gotta go get something to eat!

[update: This post was included in the May 6th edition of the Personal Development Carnival, hosted at Live The Power. Thanks, Karen!]