Michael Townsend Williams
IS A DOER WHO LIKES TO BE.

10 Benefits of GTD (Getting Things Done)

Why is GTD so successful? How does GTD benefit your life?

(This post is written by Francisco Sáez of FacileThings.)

1. Goodbye to stress. This is, with no doubt, the main benefit of GTD. It is not just a method that tells you how to organize your tasks. Its fundamental principles (capture, clarify and review) are intended to help you meet all your professional and personal challenges in a relaxed way. It eliminates the stress and anxiety produced by a poor self organization.

2. Significance. GTD makes you questions about your life constantly. It provides avertical perspective to your daily work that no other method does. This allows you to define what is really important and what is not. The weekly reviews help you check where you are and make the moves that lead you where you really want, that is,achieve your goals.

3. Time. To enjoy your family, your friends, your hobbies… and your work. Want to balance your personal and professional life? GTD does not distinguish between them, and removing this distinction frees you from the anxiety of trying to achieve and maintain that balance.

4. Focus. By capturing everything in a trusted system, your mind is freed up from distractions. The Someday/Maybe list allows you to remove from your mind all the stuff that are superficial or irrelevant right now, but with the comfort of knowing they have been stored in a safe place and can be retrieved at a more convenient time. Focusing on what is important now does not mean you have to forget your dreams.

5. Freedom. GTD does not tell you what to do and when. At every moment you are free to choose among a set of tasks that are better suited to the context in which you are, or you can do nothing. There are no priorities and your intuition is in charge.

6. Better relationships. GTD gives you the tools you need to meet your commitments, both internal and external. You are not going to forget something that someone asked you again, or a wonderful gift for your partner that once you thought of, or something you have promised to do within two months.

7. Organization. An inbox, a calendar with all your commitments, a reference material system perfectly classified and lists of projects and actions up-to-date will enable you to enjoy that good feeling that comes from knowing everything is in place.

8. Creativity. When you release your mind from all those worries generated by poor organization, you can use it to think about other things, create new projects, imagine, invent… You have much more space to be creative.

9. Better management of uncertainty. This is important in these times. New information, challenges and opportunities come to you every day, hence plans and priorities must adapt accordingly. GTD does not put much emphasis on priorities, milestones or deadlines, which allows you to adapt and be ready for new chances.

10. Productivity. It is a consequence of all the above. You learn to know what to do and what not to do.

If you want to find out more about how I work with this approach read here.

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