During the hell of working 100-120 hours per week for much of last year, I must confess that my system of keeping myself organised and on top of things fell into an abyss, along with many other important things in my life! And I’ve found it difficult to pull it back out again.
So in recent days I’ve been reading through Getting Things Done all over again to remind me how it’s all supposed to work and that it does in fact work – it’s the only system I’ve ever attempted to use to manage my time and committments that actually does the job.
It’s also been very useful to remind myself that I have slipped into committing many GTD cardinal sins, such as keeping lists of things I need to attend to in my head, or of writing them out and then never looking at them again – and even of hiding piles of ’stuff’ in drawers, based on the rather flawed premise that if I can’t see it, it therefore does not exist.
Once I got my head around all of that once more, I set to work on collecting everything into lists and piles and have now gone through every single item and processed it. This shot of my in tray(s) as of a few weeks ago in comparison to one taken this evening will give you some idea of the difference to my state of mind:
It’s not that I’ve done everything, it’s just that I’ve organised what needs to be done in a way that means I won’t need to keep fretting about all the things I haven’t done or might have forgotten or might forget if I don’t keep reminding myself over and over numerous times a day. And it also means I can put my finger on exactly what I need to complete things whenever I decide to do them. Yay me!
The centrepiece of my new organisation is a very nifty piece of software I’ve discovered called Journler. It has many, many possible uses, but after lots of thought I have come up with a way to make it do exactly what I want in terms of organising myself.
So far it works a treat! And it’s going to be far more efficient than the old little application I have been using to date, which was one reason I let things slip into a hole. If you’re a Mac user I very highly recommend you get a copy and have a good play with it. If you’re not … well, it sucks to be you, huh? ;P
So far Journler has 131 entries in it in terms of next actions … and that’s after I knocked quite a few on the head this afternoon. And it’s not including the large number I still need to move across from my old software (in fact, that in itself is one of my next actions!). So, yes, there’s still too much to do. But at least I’m in control of it – and we jewellery makers do like to be in control!
PS. Hi steppy!!!
Today I’ve made a good start on a few new pieces for my 
So my very first task for 2007 was to entirely dismantle the room and start again. And I am pleased to report that I have pretty much finished, after many days of very hard work and after spending a rather vast sum of money at Ikea! 
Behind the still to be properly hung curtain is some metal shelving containing relatively big pieces jewellery equipment, materials and more – with lots of chemicals in the boxes at the top. The table in the foreground will be where I keep my pickle for cleaning metal – saving me from running back and forth between rooms with very hot or wet pieces of metal! I will also use it for polishing. In the background are my new bookshelves, all neatly arranged as of today.
One thing I realised I desperately needed in the last few months was simply a place to pack parcels which would also be the place where my packing materials are kept. And finally here it is! 
