Muscle for Life with Mike Matthews - Book Club: My Top 5 Takeaways from Getting Things Done by David Allen

Episode Date: August 18, 2017

If you’d like to know how to get more done every day with less worry, confusion, and stress, then you need to read this book. Unlike other productivity books that focus mostly on changing specific behaviors, adopting certain attitudes, or cultivating various habits, Getting Things Done is all about getting organized. Ironically, I think the book itself was rather poorly organized (and too dry and long-winded), but it’s worth the slog. Its premise is simple: the more organized your mind, work, and life is, the easier it’ll be for you to do the things that you need to do to get the results that you want. It doesn’t just talk about these things, either — it provides you with a system that you can immediately implement to see how the principles work for you. Want to be notified when my latest book recommendations go live? Hop on my email list and you’ll get each new installment delivered directly to your inbox. Click here: www.muscleforlife.com/signup/

Hey, this is Mike from Muscle for Life and I'm often asked about books. People ask me for book recommendations on various topics. They ask me what book I am currently reading and what books I have recently read and what my favorite books are and so forth. And as an avid reader, I am currently reading and what books I have recently read and what my favorite books are and so forth. And as an avid reader, I am always happy to oblige and get some book recommendations in return as well. I also just like to encourage people to read as much as possible because I think that knowledge benefits you much like compound interest benefits your bank account in that the more you learn, the more you know, and the more you learn, the more you know, and the more you know, the more you can do,

and the more you can do, the more opportunities you have to succeed. And on the flip side, I also believe that there is little hope for people who aren't perpetual learners. I know that might sound a little bit pessimistic or cynical to you, but let's face it, life is overwhelmingly complex and chaotic.

And if we look around, we can find plenty of evidence that it simply suffocates and devours the lazy and ignorant. So if you are a bookworm and you're on the lookout for good reads, or if you'd like to just get into the habit of reading more, then this book club is for you. The idea is very simple. Every week, I'm going to share a book that I've particularly liked, and I'm going to tell you why I liked it and give you several of my key takeaways from it. I'm also going to keep these episodes short and sweet so you can quickly decide whether or not a book is likely to be up your alley or not. All right, so let's get to this week's book, which is Getting Things Done by David Allen.

So if you would like to know how to get more done every day with less worry, confusion, and stress, then you should read this book. I've read quite a few books on productivity and have quite a bit of work experience. And unlike many of those books, one of the things I like about Getting Things Done is it's not so much about changing behaviors, attitudes, or habits. Instead, it's really just about getting organized. And it's kind of ironic because I think the book itself was actually rather poorly organized, and it's far too dry and long-winded, which is pretty standard for these types of books, but it is worth the slog. The premise of the book is simple.

The more organized your mind, work, and life is, the easier it's going to be for you to do all the things that you need to do to get the results that you really want. This book doesn't just talk about these things either. It provides you with a simple system that you can immediately implement and see how the principles work for you. The goal of this system, which is just generally referred to as GTD, is to help you turn anything that has your attention, so concerns, worries, problems, issues, tensions, etc., into achievable outcomes to be executed with concrete next actions. That's the core of the system. And it's hugely popular because it is

simple and practical. It works. It doesn't require more than a handful of lists and folders, which you can keep online or offline. I prefer online. And a calendar, again, which I prefer online. And this system I've found pays emotional dividends very quickly. Within your first week of using GTD, even if you only implement bits and pieces of it, which is really what I've done. I don't do everything he says in the book, but I do work with the nucleus. You're going to find that it pays emotional dividends quickly. You're going to notice more mental energy. You're going to notice more mental clarity. You're going to notice less friction and stress, which ultimately isn't going to just increase

your productivity, but also your overall enjoyment for your work and your life. Hey, quickly, before we carry on, if you are liking my podcast, would you please help spread the word about it? Because no amount of marketing or advertising gimmicks can match the power of word of mouth. So if you are enjoying this episode and you think of someone else who might enjoy it as well, please do tell them about it. It really helps me. And if you are going to post about it on social media, definitely tag me so I can say thank you. You can find me on Instagram at Muscle for LifeFitness, Twitter at MuscleForLife, and Facebook at MuscleForLifeFitness. So that's my short and sweet pitch for the book. Let's now go over my

five key takeaways. So here's the first one. There's always more to do than you can do, and you can only do one thing at a time. The key is to feel as good about what you are not doing as about what you are doing at that moment. And my note here is one of the biggest secrets to high productivity is simply doing what you're doing when you're doing it. This is why multitasking sucks. We know that empirically, scientifically, it sucks. It just makes you less effective and makes you more stressed out. And this is also why the inability to fully concentrate on one task for long periods of time makes it more or less impossible to produce a lot of high quality work. Number two, I suggest that you use your mind to think about things rather than think of them. You want to be adding value as you think about projects,

not creating stress by simply reminding yourself that they exist and that you need to do something about them. So my note here is you might be surprised at just how much energy and attention that you waste every day on maintaining a mental laundry list of to-dos and don't forgets. And remember, that's energy and attention that could be used creatively and productively instead. All right, number three, your work is to discover your work and then with all of your heart to give yourself to it. And that's from Buddha. And my note here is as someone who loved Robert Greene's Mastery, a book that I highly recommend that you read and probably will end up being featured on one of these podcast episodes, as well as Mihaly, I don't know how to pronounce his last name, Mihaly, M-I-H-A-L-Y.

And the book is called Flow, which is another book that really resonated with me. As I like those books a lot, this quote stuck in my mind. All right, moving on to number four, doing a straightforward clear cut task that has a beginning and an end balances out the complexity without end that often vexes the rest of my life. Sacred simplicity. And that isn't David, actually. That was a quote in the book. I didn't note down who said it, but it was in my takeaways. So here we are. And my note on that is I've always found that work can be both a refuge from and antidote to the chaoses and complexities of life. No matter what is giving me trouble in my life, staying productive has always helped me better deal with it. And the fifth and final

takeaway is you often need to make it up in your mind before you can make it happen in your life. Many of us hold ourselves back from imagining a desired outcome unless someone can show us how to get there. And unfortunately, that is backward in terms of how our minds work to generate and recognize solutions and methods. And my note here is while research shows that positive visualization may or may not

actually help you accomplish your goals, there's no question that clearly and completely outlining and envisioning your desired results before taking any sort of action or even figuring out what action to take is highly beneficial. All right, party people, that is it for this week's book club. I will see you in the next episode. All right, well, that's it for this week's book review. I told you I'd keep it short and sweet. I hope you found it helpful. And if you did and you don't mind doing me a favor, could you please drop a quick review of the podcast on iTunes or wherever you're listening from? Because it really helps boost visibility, which ultimately helps more and more people find their way to the show and check it out. And of course, if you want to be notified when the next episode goes live, then simply subscribe to the podcast and you won't miss out on any of the new stuff. And lastly, if you didn't like something about this episode or just about the podcast on the whole, then

definitely shoot me an email at mikeatmostofallife.com and share your thoughts on how I could make things better. I read all the emails myself and I'm always looking for constructive feedback. So thanks again for listening to the episode and I hope to hear from you soon. this book has sold over 200,000 copies in the last several years and helped thousands and thousands of men and women get the bodies they really want eating the types of food that they really love, which is why it has over 700 reviews on Amazon with a four and a half star average. So if you want to know how to build your best body ever without having to follow a boring, bland, quote unquote, body building diet. And if you want 125 of my personal favorite recipes for building muscle, losing fat and getting healthy, then you want to pick up the shredded chef today, which you can find on all major online retailers like audible. Yes, there are

audio book cookbooks. It is a thing. Uh. Amazon, iTunes, Kobo, and Google Play.