Unwritten Agreements With Yourself Wear Down Self-Esteem
Getting every would, could, and should onto paper can ease the pressure, since getting it out of your head is what matters.
The Tim Ferriss Show · #885: How to Simplify Your Life — Tips from Oliver Burkeman, Chip Conley, Elizabeth Gilbert, and MoreProductivity coach David Allen says the 3 a.m. worry about cat food happens because the list lives only in your head.
He describes those items as agreements you have not kept with yourself. Breaking one, Allen says, makes your self-esteem plummet.
The tracker in your head, Allen explains, "has no sense of past or future." That blind spot makes a background part of your mind nudge you to handle the errand and the big hire around the clock.
Allen says your mind acts as if you should handle everything nonstop, because it can focus on only a single task at once.
His fix starts before any prioritizing. Get a physical in-tray, take a stack of printer paper, and write down everything that has your attention, one item per sheet, then toss each sheet in the tray.
For the experienced managers and executives he coaches, just naming it all takes one to six hours. Naming the agreements lets you see what you are not doing.
You do not have to finish a task to keep faith with yourself. You only have to move it out of your mind onto paper and then decide what the agreement really is.
There are only three ways to avoid breaking it: do not make it, keep it by doing it, or renegotiate it to later. Allen adds, "you can only feel good about what you're not doing when you know what you're not doing."
Questions people ask
What counts as an agreement with myself?
Anything you have told yourself you would, could, should, need to, or ought to do. That includes errands, big hires, broken gadgets, and vague ambitions like needing a new life or planning a vacation.
How do I renegotiate an agreement with myself?
Change the terms consciously. Move it to a later date, shrink the scope, or put it on a someday list. Once the new term is written down, not doing it now is keeping the agreement, not breaking it.
What do I do after everything is in the tray?
Review what you collected and decide what each item means and what, if anything, you will do about it. Trash what is not really an agreement, file reference material, and put real next actions and dates where you will see them.