by David Parker
How to Rewrite a Task
If a task that you’ve written seems too complicated to act upon, don’t fret or bemoan it, just put a light wavy line through it and then re-write the same task by reconsidering what else might first be necessary in order to act upon it. Ask yourself what you need to do prior to what you had previously written down as your first step, and then write that new instruction underneath the line that you drew the wavy line over. Then, look over the new instruction and see if that motivates you to take action. Remember that The J.O.T. Method™ is not only based upon taking action on just one task, it also involves dealing with the smallest possible work unit that you can find in your task.
If, by chance, the new instruction you’ve given yourself still doesn’t work for you, then put a light squiggly line through that new one as well, and give yourself permission to re-write it once again. In fact, it may take several attempts at first just to find the smallest-sized task you’re comfortable with; that’s fine, just remember that once you complete your task, be sure to draw a light line through the task. In addition, remember that it’s important to begin building up a reserve of inner strength. One good way of doing that is by training yourself to stick with your more difficult tasks as you encounter them. Part of a habitual procrastinator’s persona is to change direction immediately after he’s faced adversity. If this happens to you, do your best to fight off this feeling, and continue to stay on track with the task that you’ve chosen to complete.
Let’s pick up where our friend Barry, from Chapter Ten, left off. When we left him, Barry had just completed two tasks in the order in which he gave them to himself. After first writing down the day and date on his J.O.T. list, Barry then gave himself a simple first task: putting a DVD away in its proper place. Following The J.O.T. Method™, Barry immediately took action by finding the DVD, and putting it back on the shelf where it belonged. To complete the task, he then drew a light line through the task in his J.O.T. list. Barry then gave himself a second task, to look over a coupon that had come with a bill, before discarding it. Here’s how Barry’s J.O.T. list looked at the end of Chapter Ten:
Now, Barry decides to pursue his third task with the aid of The J.O.T. Method™. He looks around his home and sees that his sink contains an assortment of dishes, cups, and utensils, so he returns to his notebook and writes in it, “Wash whatever is in the kitchen sink.” Afterwards, his J.O.T. list looks like this:
Suddenly and quite unexpectedly, Barry doesn’t immediately take action upon his third task. Instead, he begins wondering if he’s missing anything on television. And, unlike how he acted with his first two tasks, Barry now finds himself feeling paralyzed with anxiety, dread, and uncertainty concerning the task that he’s just given himself. Even worse, Barry not only feels like the habitual procrastinator that, up until a short time ago, he always was; he worries he may have lost the magic he fleetingly possessed. What happened to Barry, and why did The J.O.T. Method™ fail to work for him?
Barry wasn’t aware that the instruction that he had given himself actually contained two flaws. Here’s how these flaws clashed with The J.O.T. Method™:
1. The instruction that Barry had given himself wasn’t as simple as he thought it was.
2. While Barry thought that the instruction was clear and precise, it wasn’t; it was actually vague.
First, although the task that Barry had given himself seemed as simple in his mind as it did on paper, insofar as reality was concerned, washing whatever was in the kitchen sink was always a task of last resort for Barry. In fact, Barry regretted writing it the moment he put down his pen. So, although he had written down what had seemed to him at the time to be a simple task, it was only after he’d written it that he realized that the task was actually a bit deceiving. However, what Barry hadn’t realized was, that unlike his first two tasks, this was the first time he had written down a task that he didn’t actually want to deal with. Barry only realized this when his situation had changed from paper (his J.O.T. list) to practice (dealing with the actual task).
Secondly, while the instruction seemed clear and precise, its wording: “Wash whatever is in the kitchen sink,” was actually vague, which caused Barry to back away from the task. Even though the message might have seemed quite clear when he wrote it, Barry needed better instructions than, “Wash whatever is in the kitchen sink” and Barry was the only person who could give himself the kind of instructions that he needed.
Back in the early days of computers, there was a saying among computer programmers: “Garbage In, Garbage Out.” Meaning, that if you give a computer poor instructions, don’t be surprised when it fails to execute the task you’ve given it. The same is true with habitual procrastinators. So, even though Barry’s instruction, “Wash whatever is in the kitchen sink” seemed clear to him when he wrote it, once he put his pen down and stared back at it, it seemed to be far less a valid instruction, and much more like a vague want. While Barry still wanted the result, he felt unsure of how to go about it, and as a result, he froze; meanwhile, his mind searched for a distraction with which to fill the empty and unsettling time.
In order to understand what’s holding Barry back, let’s go back for a moment to the section titled “Bear In Mind” in Chapter Ten. The first line of this section’s two-row table states: “When writing your task, use clear and simple language, because this is one situation where less is more.”
The remedy that Barry needs to accept is that the instruction he provided himself with was unintentionally faulty, and that he now needs to rewrite it in a more specific, yet less complicated form. So, even though the instruction, “Wash whatever is in the kitchen sink” appeared at first glance to be clear, Barry’s lack of physical action on that task told a different story.
What Barry needs to do is to draw a light wavy line through the instruction that gave him trouble. This makes his J.O.T. list look like this:
Staying with his task and not fleeing from it, Barry spent a few moments rethinking his faulty instruction. After a short while, he broke his task down further and came up with something that seemed a bit more reasonable to him: “Wash the cups in the kitchen sink.” Barry then wrote his new instruction on the line directly underneath the task he overwrote with the wavy line. Barry’s J.O.T. list now looks like this:
Having given himself a more reasonable task, Barry immediately follows through with action by washing the cups in his kitchen sink. With his new task now completed, he then draws a light straight line through the task, making his J.O.T. list look like this:
Afterwards, Barry uses The J.O.T. Method™ to guide him as he continues working on his original task of washing whatever is in the kitchen sink. As a result of that work, Barry’s J.O.T. list grew longer, until it came to look like this:
As you can see, Barry needed to break his overall task down into smaller parts, and once he found the smallest unit of work, he stayed with his task until its completion. Barry now feels reconnected with The J.O.T. Method™, and his notebook proudly displays his achievements for this day. Barry can continue using his notebook the next day as well, which will provide him with an added incentive—he’ll see his productivity from the day before while working on whatever tasks he chooses to do on Sunday.
Do More While Writing Less
After you’ve used The J.O.T. Method™ a few times and gotten comfortable with it, you’ll soon find that you don’t need to spend as much time thinking out your tasks as you did in the beginning. This is because you’ll instinctively begin searching for the smallest unit of work so you can write it down, get it done, and draw a line through it on your J.O.T. list. In fact, you may find that the last part of the process, drawing a line through each completed task, to be mildly addictive, spurring you on to get even more accomplished.
One surefire way to speed up your productivity is to incorporate a few simple abbreviations into the process of using The J.O.T. Method™. Here are a few abbreviated entries that will soon appear in Barry’
s J.O.T. list:
Abbreviation What It Expresses How They Appeared in Barry’s J.O.T. List
“C/B” I need to call back _________. C/B Fred Smith
“G/T” Go through _________. G/T old magazine
“L/M” I left a message on Janet Sawyer’s voicemail. Call Janet Sawyer – L/M
“L/U” Look up or get information on _________. L/U budget hotels located in San Diego
“P/A” Put the _________ away so that it’s not cluttering up the kitchen table. P/A George’s business card
“T/O” Throw out the bag of old newspapers. T/O bag of old newspapers
Let’s now add those examples to Barry’s J.O.T. list as his entries for Sunday, and see how it looks:
You probably noticed that the first and last entries in Barry’s J.O.T. list did not have a line drawn through them. You may also be wondering why Barry’s violated the third rule of working with The J.O.T. Method™ which stated: “After the task has been completed, lightly draw a straight line through the task, making sure that the task underneath the line can still be read.
Although one of the basic rules of The J.O.T. Method™ is not moving beyond a task unless it has been accomplished, there will be occasions when although you’ve tried your very best, circumstances just won’t be in your favor and you will not be able to complete the task at the time you’ve chosen. That’s just how life goes sometimes. However, it’s good to know that by already having a task written down in your J.O.T. list, this makes it much easier to come back to. In addition, when a task doesn’t have a line struck through it, that task clearly stands out from the pack.
What can Barry now make of his J.O.T. list? Well, he’s had a couple of productive days and it looks like he’s gotten back on track: not too shabby for a habitual procrastinator like Barry, huh? Barry knows that he still needs to call back Fred Smith, even though he already tried to do so. How do we know that he already tried to call Fred? Because, according to the rules of The J.O.T. Method™, after writing down a task we then take immediate action upon that task, with no diversions of any kind. If we accept The J.O.T. Method™ as a tool that will work for us, and if we decide to use it as it was intended, then we need to do just that: use it as it’s meant to be used.
When Barry rang Fred, he didn’t get voicemail; he got a busy signal instead. That’s why Barry still needs to call Fred; however, just because Fred was unreachable, that doesn’t mean Barry should stop everything and keep redialing Fred exclusively. Now that the incomplete telephone call had already been written down on his J.O.T. list, Barry was free to choose his next task, so he went through an old magazine that he just wanted to skim through. Then he called his friend Janet Sawyer, but he only got her voicemail, so he left her a message. Barry then went on the Internet and looked up budget hotels in San Diego for his upcoming vacation, and after that, he found the business card of his friend George, and put it away in a good place he’d remember so it wouldn’t continue gathering dust on his coffee table. Needless to say, Barry doesn’t draw a line before completion of what seems like an easy task, nor does he wait until he has a bunch of tasks completed to draw lines through them. Instead, as each of these tasks is completed, he draws a light line through the corresponding item on his J.O.T. list.
A Place for Everything, and Everything In Its Place
The quote, “A place for everything, and everything in its place” has been attributed to everyone from Isabella Mary Beeton to Benjamin Franklin. Being a very old quote and perhaps sounding like something that your grandmother might have told you, it’s easy to dismiss something that, for we procrastinators, is actually quite good advice.
In order to get the most out of The J.O.T. Method™, it’s best not to keep reinventing the wheel when it comes to certain tasks that we tend to repeatedly deal with, such as the organizing of little things. Let’s say that like many other procrastinators, you’ve become accustomed to allowing certain areas of your home to become unofficial gathering places for things of one sort or another. This can include anything from your collection of antique cufflinks, to your income tax statements for the last fifteen years.
I’ve noticed that habitual procrastinators on the whole tend to be a bit less organized than non-procrastinators. One reason for this can be found in yet another old saying: “Out of sight, is out of mind.” To most people this means: “If you do not see something for a period of time, you may stop thinking about it.” However, to procrastinators it can have an entirely different meaning, that of: “If I can’t see it, I might not be able to find it when I need it!” This is especially apt when it comes to bills, the checkbook, receipts, and items that relate to taxes and/or bookkeeping. It’s for this reason that it’s important to have a dedicated place set aside for the things we want to hold on to; such as in this case—business cards, and a good starting point might be to place that card in the corner of a desk drawer. That way, he can keep all the business cards that he already has, as well as those he brings home in the future, together in one place.
Barry now completes the last task on his J.O.T. list by removing the bag of old newspapers that he keeps under his kitchen sink, which is probably as good a place for storing them as anywhere in his home, and takes it out to his recycling bin. However, what if Barry were still unable to connect with Fred Smith? What should Barry write in his J.O.T. list to make sense of it all?
What Do You Do If You Have Uncompleted Tasks on Your J.O.T. List?
Once you get the knack of using The J.O.T. Method™, you’ll soon discover that many of the tasks that you would have considered un-“do”-able in the past, are now, more or less, routine. Soon, you begin developing confidence in your abilities, and the little tasks that once immobilized you now seem a lot less threatening. You might even begin to think nothing of filling your notebook with lots and lots of them. In other words, the more that you do, the more capable you become.
If you could perfect the use of The J.O.T. Method™, then you would only write one task at a time, “do” that one task, and then draw a line through that task. However, we can’t get everything done in a day, as much as we wish we could. This was the case with the telephone call that Barry tried to make to Fred Smith. What Barry now needs is a logical way to transfer his undone tasks from the end of his current day to the next day. He needs his transfer method to be clear and simple in format so that his J.O.T. list readily conveys his task’s new status, indicating that it is undone from the day before.
In order to properly transfer his task of contacting Fred Smith by telephone from his Sunday J.O.T. list, Barry places this task in brackets, making it appear as “[C/B Fred Smith]”. Barry then copies this unaccomplished task from Sunday, as his first task for Monday. Here’s what Barry’s J.O.T. list looked like on Monday:
Barry then tried to contact Fred Smith by telephone, but still could not reach him, so while Barry waited for Fred to return home, he filled in the time by finding a few small tasks to take care of. This made Barry’s J.O.T. list appear like this:
As it turned out, Barry finally reached Fred on Monday, after Barry had thrown out his third old newspaper that evening. And as you can see in the next and last diagram concerning what you should do when you have uncompleted tasks on your J.O.T. list, Barry drew a line through both his first entry for Monday, as well as his last entry for that day:
So, if you run across a situation where you weren’t able to accomplish a task that you wrote down, it doesn’t mean that you’re a failure or that The J.O.T. Method™ has failed you. Simply bracket the original item—and then copy it to the following day’s entry on your J.O.T. list. Then, the next day, you’ll already have a simple task to accomplish, which will add a bit of extra meaning to your day.
In addition, we’ve all encountered the problem of saying to ourselves that tomorrow we need to take care of a particular task, but then when tomorrow arrives, for one reason or another, that task slips our minds. However, The J.O.T. Method™ provides us with an additional
side benefit: we can begin writing our next day’s tasks today. Plus, if today we write down a task that’s meant for tomorrow, it’s helpful just to have tomorrow’s task lightly drummed into our conscious minds while working on today’s tasks; especially if that task is something important, like keeping an appointment.
Getting Even More Out Of The J.O.T. Method™
Always keep in mind that your J.O.T. list will provide you with reassurance that the work that you’ve been doing counts. After all, if you’ve taken the time and trouble to write a task down, and then came back to it on paper to put a completion line through it after its accomplishment, it must be valuable!
Here’s a cavalcade of reasons why The J.O.T. Method™ will continue helping you:
The J.O.T. Method™ helps slow down your thinking so you can decide what you want to do, and then do it. This makes you feel more in control of your life.
You now know that your tasks don’t need to overwhelm you, because you can provide yourself with step-by-step instructions.
Handling your tasks one-by-one in order calms you, by lowering your level of anxiety concerning the rest of your tasks because you now have the ability to concentrate on dealing with just one task at a time.
When you are almost constantly doing small things, there’s almost no time to be depressed.