Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity
by David Allen
30 popular highlights from this book
Key Insights & Memorable Quotes
Below are the most popular and impactful highlights and quotes from Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity:
“Use your mind to think about things, rather than think of them. You want to be adding value as you think about projects and people, not simply reminding yourself they exist.”
“If you don't pay appropriate attention to what has your attention, it will take more of your attention than it deserves.”
“You don't actually do a project; you can only do action steps related to it. When enough of the right action steps have been taken, some situation will have been created that matches your initial picture of the outcome closely enough that you can call it "done.”
“Your ability to generate power is directly proportional to your ability to relax.”
“Most people feel best about their work the week before their vacation, but it's not because of the vacation itself. What do you do the last week before you leave on a big trip? You clean up, close up, clarify, and renegotiate all your agreements with yourself and others. I just suggest that you do this weekly instead of yearly.”
“You can fool everyone else, but you can't fool your own mind.”
“Everything you’ve told yourself you ought to do, your mind thinks you should do right now. Frankly, as soon add you have two things to do stored in your RAM, you’ve generated personal failure, because you can’t do two things at the same time. This produces an all-pervasive stress factor whose source can’t be pin-pointed.”
“The secret of getting ahead is getting started. The secret of getting started is breaking your complex overwhelming tasks into small, manageable tasks, and then starting on the first one. —Mark Twain”
“Anything that causes you to overreact or underreact can control you, and often does.”
“It does not take much strength to do things, but it requires a great deal of strength to decide what to do. —Elbert Hubbard”
“Pick battles big enough to matter, small enough to win. —Jonathan Kozol”
“Think like a man of action, act like a man of thought. —Henri Bergson”
“The world can only be grasped by action, not by contemplation. The hand is more important than the eye. . . . The hand is the cutting edge of the mind. —J. Bronowski”
“You’ve got to think about the big things while you’re doing small things, so that all the small things go in the right direction. —Alvin Toffler”
“There is no reason to ever have the same thought twice, unless you like having that thought. I”
“You must use your mind to get things off your mind.”
“I am rather like a mosquito in a nudist camp; I know what I want to do, but I don’t know where to begin.”
“Suffice it to say that something automatic and extraordinary happens in your mind when you create and focus on a clear picture of what you want.”
“Every now and then go away and have a little relaxation. To remain constantly at work will diminish your judgment. Go some distance away, because work will be in perspective and a lack of harmony is more readily seen. —Leonardo da Vinci”
“Things rarely get stuck because of lack of time. They get stuck because the doing of them has not been defined.”
“The beginning is half of every action.”
“You are the captain of your own ship; the more you act from that perspective, the better things will go for you.”
“Simple, clear purpose and principles give rise to complex and intelligent behavior. Complex rules and regulations give rise to simple and stupid behavior. —Dee Hock”
“At at any point in time, knowing what has to get done, and when, creates a terrain for maneuvering.”
“Getting things done requires two basic components: defining (1) what “done” means (outcome) and (2) what “doing” looks like (action).”
“There are no interruptions, really—there are simply mismanaged occurrences.”
“Reacting is automatic, but thinking is not.”
“Interestingly, one of the biggest problems with most people’s personal management systems is that they blend a few actionable things with a large amount of data and material that has value but no action attached.”
“The big problem is that your mind keepsreminding you of things when you can't doanything about them. It has no sense of past or future. That means that as soon as you tell yourself that you need to do something, and store it in your RAM, there's a part of you that thinks you should be doing that something all the time.”
“The cognitive scientists have now proven the reality of “decision fatigue”—that every decision you make, little or big, diminishes a limited amount of your brain power.”
