The Journey Within

It has been more than 4 months since I’ve last heard about Getting Things Done (GTD), a book that has changed the way I plan and organise my life. There’s some influence in how I should go about using the knowledge I have collected so far. There’s even some hint of the book in an article about tai ji! I just want to note down my progress so far in the GTD adventure.

It took some effort to get into the GTD mind set. One of them, is to decide the exact next action of the “stuff” in my head. It’s quite a discipline to decide on the next action everytime some “stuff” pops up in my head. It’s easy for something we’re used to, like going out for dinner in a restaurant. This activity actually involves lots of next action. First, decide what to eat, then decide where to eat, then check if it’s open today, then check if the restaurant can accommodate our group of 4, then decide how to get there, then call a cab etc.

For something like “I want to exercise more regularly”, is not that obvious. “I want to exercise more regularly” is not actually an action. You just know you have to do something about it, but not sure what that something is. So this “thing” stays in your brain unconsciously. Everytime you feel like it (which could be weeks, or months later!), you’ll pick up your jogging shoes, just to find that the sole is gone. You’ll have to look for a replacement, but not sure where to look. You’ll then ask the regular jogger among your friends where you can get a good pair of shoes that’s within your budget. Then you’ll have to set a time to make a trip to that shop. And all these have not even addressed the original question of exercising “more regularly”. You’ve only addressed the “exercising” part!

Once I got used to nailing down what’s the next action is, I will feel uneasy if there’s no next action for something. Somehow knowing the next action makes me feel more in control, and more relaxed, even if I’m not taking that next action.

Right now, time sensitive actions are sometimes outside my control. However, a peculiar side effect of knowing exactly what needs to be done has actually resolved the time sensitivity of most things. Efficiency has increased, rendering a lot of things, less time sensitive.

Of course, if you really want to argue, there aren’t actually lots of things that are truely time sensitive. Most of the things that has to be done, doesn’t really “have” to be done that day. It can always wait, or choose not to do it at all. The more important things in life are normally those that are non-time-sensitive. So instead of getting things done, are we getting the “right” things done?

The GTD journey continues, and hopefully, it’ll eventually resemble GTRTD – Getting the Right Things Done.

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Space, the final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship enterprise. To explore strange new worlds. To seek out new life form and new civilisation. To boldly go where no man has gone before…

Ok. Star Trek was part of my daily TV diet during my university days. And because of that, I scored fairly high on some nerd test online. Although I now will also have to bring in another one under-rated film, Contact. It explores the relationship of human beings when faced with alien technology. The one line I remember from the film is:

(in the context of whether there are aliens out there)… If it is just us, seems like an awful waste of space…

We see space everywhere. From the “thing” between stars and galaxies, to the space between you and your fellow commuter on the train. No matter how little space we feel we have, the lift can always seem to fill “one more person”, until the “overweight” alarm sounds.

I have used the word “space” in its broadest sense, representing all spatial relationships. A recent martial art movie, Fearless, highlighted an interesting message about plants.

Plants are living things. They need space to grow. Without sufficient space, they can’t grow properly.

Maybe that’s why there is so much space. The water bottle needs space to store water. The house has living space. Art is made up of spaces so that the subject is instantly recognisable. Without space, there can be no physical matter.

I think this applies to time as well. We need to allow some space in our time, not to fill up all the space time has to offer. The space is there to make the time spent actually “doing” things more meaningful. And to take cue from the universe, we have to provide some “space out” time. So, for all the action junkies out there, or even if you feel guilty spending “space out” time, just remember, you are just learning from the universe. Great excuse to day dream isn’t it?

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The figure 8 training method is to draw a figure 8 on a horizontal plane while you’re in a horse stance, using your body as the pencil, and the butt as the pencil tip (or more precisely, the bottom of the vertical axis running through your body as the pencil tip). Please let me know if you have a good picture to illustrate this. My drawing skills are somewhat limited bordering on non-existent!

Anyway, my previous encounter with this training method was just to draw this figure 8, to train the legs and to train turning the body. Recently, I was asked to revisit this method again, but this time the kua should not protrude. This criteria was not previously included. By including this criteria alone, the intensity of the training is so great that I can’t last more than 1 minute of it!

The protrusion of the kua was something recent to me. It is whenever the kua is not relaxed that there will be some protrusion, i.e. some tension at the kua. To resolve this, my current teacher suggests (among other things!) to try out this figure 8 training method.

If you have tried this before, or even if you haven’t, please let me know if you are having similar experience. Just be careful about the knees, as the training may seem like drawing circles with the knees.

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