Attention Data Hounds: What Personal Data Are You Tracking?

I'm working on a roadmap for the Personal Informatics movement (you'll find a quick summary of the emerging field below), which I'll post later this week. In the meantime, as readers of my site (i.e. people who actively improve themselves, either via productivity or more generally) I'm sure many of you are already tracking data about yourselves. I would love to know about what personal data you have coming in, and how you use it. (Well, not too personal ;-) The topic is all categories about the human condition, such as health (diet, sleep, mood, medicine), relationships (friends, family, dating), work (I shared a bunch of productivity ones in Micro-Experiments), finances, parenting, and so on.

So please share: What are you tracking? Why? Did you have any insights about yourself? What kinds of changes did you experience? How sure are you that what you did caused the changes? Would you recommend what you tried?

In my case, a few that I've tried include time tracking (Daily Planning and Time Blocking), diet (using a version of The Hacker's Diet), mood, and mental interruptions (during the day I ticked off every time I was drawn off-task).

Happy tracking!

An Incomplete Summary of Personal Informatics

I'll give this a whirlwind treatment, though the topic deserves a better description. Disclaimer: I'm biased. I see tremendous potential here for self-improvement (especially via small steps - it's why I wrote You Did WHAT? 99 Playful Experiments To Live Healthier And Happier), and for leveraging social media to help each other. There are gaps and missed opportunities (next post), but I think this is big.

Briefly, the personal data movement involves recording quantitative information about ourselves with the rough goal being: data collection -> personal insights -> individual behavior change -> collective societal improvements. This is happening now due to an intersection of new tools, mobile technology, and ubiquitous connectivity. Of course people have been tracking things about themselves for ages (as long as there's been writing, I suspect), with a more modern example being Benjamin Franklin's tracking of his virtues during his week.

Surprisingly there's no Wikipedia article for it (though there is one for Omphaloskepsis), so the best starting point is two articles, The New Examined Life and Know Thyself: Tracking Every Facet of Life, from Sleep to Mood to Pain.

For tools and sites, there are too many to mention. I know of two general ones for tracking and visualizing personal data (Mycrocosm and Daytum), one blog (The Quantified Self - know any others?), and a ton of sites that support specific (I'll call them "vertical") areas of life. Following are a few:

• MyMonthlyCycles (menstrual cycles)
  
• Trixie Tracker (infant feeding schedules)
  
• Bedpost (sex)
  
• CureTogether (medical conditions)
  
• Tweetwhatyoueat (diet)
  
• Academic Ladder (scholarly writing)
  
• Nike + iPod (running)
  
• Happy Factor (happiness)
  
• Joe's Goals, stickK (habits & goals)
  
• Mood Tracker (mood)
  

Question: How would you define this?

Did, Doing, To Do: Why your Past, Present, and Future Selves Need to Chat

Who is going to control your destiny, the "past you" or the "present you?" [1]

Recently I've been drawn to the notion of how our actions are informed by our past, and how they impact our future. I've particularly found it helpful to think of myself as three people: my Past Self, Present Self, and Future Self. I haven't found a solid reference for this from psychology (I'm sure it's out there [2]), but I want to share my thinking, and to get your impressions.

The perspective I'm trying for is that of asking how well we treat them. What if someone could hear your conversations? Would they think you're a saint? A genius? A jerk? Let me give it a shot.

Talking to your Past Self

I can think of three reasons to visit the past: Nostalgia, self-esteem, and insight.

If a thought from the past gives you pleasure, then naturally spend some time with it. Well-made memories are a treasure. But limit yourself; the past is over. Treat those memories as something you take off the shelf, savor, then put back with respect. Warning sign: "That was the highlight of my life."

To treat your past self well, honor her. She did hard work to get you here, after all. Celebrate how courageous you were, how much you experimented and tried. No one else could have done it.

That said, I believe the highest use of the past is to learn, that is, to chew up experiences that turn your present self into an improved future one (more loving, smarter, or kinder, say). Productive use of the past is via debriefs (pointers in Personal Lessons Learned In 2008) and analyzing and capturing lessons learned. Hard-earned experience without capture and reflection is waste.

A special challenge I face in my relationship with the past is around doubt. Second-guessing your Past Self with questions like "Why did I do that?" or "Did I do the right thing?" is toxic and unproductive. It's disrespectful. To combat this, renew trust that you made the best choice given current information. Blaming our past selves for not knowing what we know now - for not knowing the future, in other words - is absurd. A constructive way to handle these thoughts is to detach a bit from that person. He tried something (hear hear!) and got some information. It's your job to integrate that. Be grateful.

Talking to your Present Self

Clearly most mental effort should be in the present. Do you agree? It stands to reason - this moment is your only decision point [3], your only chance to affect the future. This is when you put your lessons learned into play through enlightened choice. You know that list of tasks your Past Self created? Work them. You see that blocked out project time on your calendar? Use it.

Watch your task appetite, though. You want it all (that's human nature), and you can only do one thing at a time (that's human circuitry), but take care how much you defer to your future self - it's easy to overload that person coming up.

This is also your sole chance to celebrate your accomplishments. Zipping right past them without giving a little cheer is a lost opportunity for happiness. Come on - you rocked! Warning sign: A culture that asks "What's next? Let's keep moving, people!" without pausing. "The best is yet to come" might tell you something too.

Reflection takes place here. This is when you connect where you planned to be, what your current goals are, and what new actions will take you there.

Finally, watch your self-talk. This is probably the most common self-help concept on the planet, but I honestly haven't found a book or idea that's been helpful. A popular one is Shad Helmstetter's What to Say When you Talk To Yourself. Any suggestions?

Talking to your Future Self

A final crucial activity is how you prepare your Future Self. What kind of gifts can you give? I admit it - I love this category. I'm an information collector and prospector. I capture all but the tiniest tidbit that might be valuable. News stories, interesting phrases, cool job descriptions, and especially blog ideas, product ideas, and new ways to help clients. Yum!

For productivity, pay attention to planning (see Simple Project Planning For Individuals: A Round-up). Look ahead in your calendar to see what you might need for all the projects coming his way, and pave the way. Do this by working back from due dates and working out hours needed to accomplish each one on time. Consider blocking out time for specific ones, as I described in Testing The Classics: A Time Management Experiment: Time Blocking. He will thank you, trust me.

Books deserve a special mention. They're an investment and a resource for when the time comes for needing that knowledge. I know that I can't know it all (anti-knowledge is a strength), and these books represent an act of faith that my future self will need them some day. It's a kind of preparation for the unknown, I suppose. Much more in On Keeping An Umberto Eco-like Anti-Library, especially in the incredibly insightful comments.

A practical note: Preparations can save yourself a ton of work. For example, my internet connection went out at home. It was frustrating, especially due to poor timing. After the standard stages - denial, anger, etc., I consulted my notes from the last time it happened [4], and fixed it in 5 minutes! Hooray past self!

To enable these conversations, keep a log of what you did, decisions made (see A Key To Continuous Learning: Keep A Decision Log), and your thinking at the time. This journal is what you'll mine for insights.

Wrap-up

What do you think? What are your tricks and methods for working with yourselves? I'm curious!

References

• [1] From Seize the Day!: How to Best Use What Can't Be Replaced - Time by Michael F. Woolery.
  
• [2] Do you have a good reference for this perspective? The best ones I could find weren't great hits. They are: The One Self and the Many Selves, Exploring Perspectives on the Past, Present and Future, Handbook of Imagination and Mental Simulation, and Possible Selves (the latter two Google Book previews). Perhaps most interesting (if tangential) is Genograms: "Seeing the family in its historical perspective involves linking past, present, and future and noting the family's flexibility in adapting to changes." Check out Genograms: Assessment and Intervention. Page 65, Genogram 3.2 shows Bill Clinton's Family. What engineer wouldn't love such a diagram?
  
• [3] The Mission Control people call this a "Series of Nows" - see A GTD-er's Perspective On Mission Control's "Productivity And Accomplishment" Workshop.
  
• [4] Don't have a good note-taking flow or filing chops? Give me a call!
  

The Beginner's Mind Operationalized: Cut-Throat!

(In a big departure this week I'm going to risk sharing an experience I had a few months ago. I was playing "cut-throat" racquetball [1] for the first time with two friends, and had a Think, Try, Learn breakthrough. I humbly submit my unedited journal entry from this experience. Have you had any similar experiences? Share! -- matt)

A HUGE, formative experience today seeing the methods in action playing the three-man version of racquetball called "cut throat". I had the absolutely best time of my life. I was able to enter the experience with an experimental attitude: "This is an experiment! I'm new to it, I don't know what the game is, how it's played, or any strategy. I am happily ignorant."

We started with my two partners who are experienced with the game explaining the rules and game play. It took me a little while to understand, but my attitude was to not get too wrapped up in remembering everything at the outset. I trusted that I'd learn as we went along. This was major shift in attitude for me. Previously I would have been pretty uptight about not knowing the rules, but this was much lighter.

Then we started to play, and I was very successful in observing myself with affection as I learned the game. I savored my little successes, such as returning a tough shot or succeeding in the (counter-intuitive) technique of hitting the ball off the *back* glass all the way to the front. It was a blast! At one point I had some concern that I was being *too* playful with it and not being serious enough for my partners, but they were patient and understanding, which I was grateful for. Later they told me they enjoyed sharing my delight during the games.

Compare this to how this would have been for me in the past. First, I would have had an expectation of performance, which would have set me up for judging the endeavor's success based on a completely inappropriate measure. I was a beginner, after all. I would have been happy only with successes that I wasn't able to achieve except by luck! Most of the game would have been a series of frustrations.

Additionally, I would have been fixated on winning. Again, this measure is but one of many I could have chosen - perhaps the worst one if my goal was to enjoy the process, rather than counting points. Again, the judgment is disconnected - is *channeled* - into something highly positive: reveling it what *is*. Instead, I was able to appreciate my performance based on my improvement DURING THE GAME. My learning was that fast, that intense. Yes, my partners ended up with far more points than me, but I still had a fantastic time. And hey, I got some points myself, and made them earn theirs a few times.

Regarding my partners, my view would probably have been *oppositional*. They would have been obstacles to my success, based on my measurement of it. Instead, I looked at them as guides. They gave a little helpful advice, complimented me on good plays, and got to enjoy their relatively high level of skill and performance. My perspective enabled my sincerely appreciating their ability to play the game so well. This is far more positive than feeling envy or jealousy.

I respected my own bit of courage in trying something new. When we think of children trying new things - my daughter trying basketball - we sometimes take it for granted. After all, they're *always* trying something new. But it's easy to be tough on ourselves as adults in the same situation. Partly this is due to our having mastered so much, we're not comfortable being beginners. But why?... This is more "Let's see what I can do!" than "How good am I?"

Overall this is the beginner's mind operationalized - a mindset and methods to switch into this mode for something new, and it was amazing. This is very different from hearing the ideas - "beginner's mind", "mindful", "present", etc. Here I was experiencing it with child-like joy, and all because I treated it like an experiment. Maybe one way to put it is that I structured my thinking to avoid the >>constraints of expectation<<. I was able to relish my being brand new to it - something that can only happen once for each endeavor. it's like your first kiss; you want to be fully in it because it'll never be as fresh

References

• [1] See Wikipedia's Racquetball article and Cutthroat Racquetball at Racquetball for Beginners.

IdeaLab: Risky performance, kill your Netflix, and don't be so certain

These last few weeks have been nutty as I implement my workship plans (see Testing The Classics: A Time Management Experiment: Time Blocking), so I'm going to cheat and share some quick bits I've been collecting on Twitter. Comments?

• Should every performance be an experiment? It depends. If you are beta-testing new ideas, then yes, experimentation is important. It's also risky. However, for mature performances, less experimentation makes sense. But with minimal experimentation comes complacency.
  
• Want more time, more money, & less stress? Cancel Netflix. Why less stress? Mostly it's the burden of "I've bought it I have to use it." (Question: What's the economic term for this?) I also found myself frequently searching for instant selections that looked appealing. I ended up lowering my standards a lot to match what I found.
  
• Time management tips from 2nd grade girls softball: a) 2x2: Swings hard vs. Connects. Depends on success rate. Either wasteful or amazing. b) Waits until last minute then swings fast: No planning, pure reaction. OK if intentional and tactical. Terrible if strategic and avoidable.
  
• Twitter navel-gazing: More than anything else, Twitter's value is as an excuse to make conversations.
  
• Good Enough is hard to swallow. Good Enough is medicine for perfectionism. It's a reverse application of Parkinson's law. But man it's tough to let go of wanting it just right.
  
• Uncertainty is a function of experience.
  
• The unknowns always happen at the end of projects, not at the start. To protect against this, constantly test, and keep your iterations tight. (Credit to my TTL collaborator Liza.)
  
• Honest but bad: Actual response from submitting a request to a city library: "Our response may be fairly rapid or it may take us many weeks or months to respond." While they're trying to help, this isn't specific enough to matter. Basically it means "Don't depend on anything from us," i.e., they might be a black hole. I'll phone them instead.
  
• Divergent and convergent phases have their own energy. Continuing the diverge/converge cycles idea, divergence courts discovery, while convergence witnesses birth. Where are you in your projects now?
  
• Every warning sign has an interesting story. Don't feed the animals. Bridges freeze before roads. Patient loading and unloading zone.
  
• Before jumping into a response, ask yourself, "How big a deal do I want to make of this?" Some things simply aren't worth it.
  
• Did you work two days straight on one project? Why was that necessary?
  
• Amount of time I spend in my outliner: 45%? In browser: 45%? You?
  
• How do you know what you did actually WORKED? Or didn't. Did you measure it?
  
• Certainty is dangerous. (Ask Robert Burton). However, does faith = certainty?
  
• The more audacious your goal, the more painful the process. You buy it?
  
• Resist the urge to start over completely from scratch (2nd system syndrome). Most often it's better to evolve current version. Agree?
  
• A reader asks if it's possible to eliminate keeping a master projects list. Well, yes, but it's essentially cheating: Keep a single actions list, but group them under projects (or "None"). This is merging the two, but it's a list trick - you're still maintaining two levels. (See Extreme GTD: How low can you go).
  
• Don't be discouraged if you wind up at the same place again. You are not the same person as before; you know something new.
  
• Relationships are projects. Not all, though.
  
• Relationships are experiments. ""
  

Testing the classics: A Time Management Experiment: Time Blocking

Nothing beats project anxiety like a plan. -- me :-)

You know me - I love experimenting on myself almost as much as on you. Or my clients. Kidding aside, I've studied many, many techniques to manage ourselves as we work, and a classic on is time blocking, AKA time mapping (see [1] for more). It's a simple idea: Schedule regular chunks of time with yourself for important tasks. The experiment I've tried for the last few weeks is applying it to three largish projects coming up (higher education workshops) with a relatively short timeline (less than a month). The advantage is it forced me to make steady progress on projects to prevent last minute scrambling, stress, and failure. The result: Worked great!

Following are the details, along with a few rules and caveats when time blocking. 

(Updated 2009-06-08 to remove confusing project plan image.)

Planning and estimating

My first step was to get my head around all the work I'd committed to. The three workshop projects ranged in complexity from updating an existing full-day one, through adapting one for a shorter program, to creating a brand-new 90 minute one from scratch. I applied the planning ideas I'm developing (see Simple Project Planning For Individuals: A Round-up) and came up with the number of hours needed per project: 8, 12, and 18 hours, respectively. I tried to be conservative in my estimates, but ultimately only time would tell (uncertainty is a function of experience).

I then calculated the number of days available for each project from the day I started: 15, 24, and 19 workdays, respectively. Thus, to stay sane and on-target I needed to spend the following time every day for the next four weeks: 1/2 hour/day, 1/2 hour/day, and 1 hour/day. In other words, because of my (happily) agreeing to take on the jobs, I'd committed to working on these three projects 2 hours EVERY DAY. That was a shock.

Implementing

The next step was to simply create repeating entries in my calendar for the three blocks. Here's a screenshot from iCal for a typical week. (Note: Not all client work is shown in this view.) What you should focus on is the orange chunks.

You'll notice a couple of things. First, while they were all initially scheduled for the same time each day (in the morning - my prime time), you see that they've been moved. This was the first thing I learned - my life is unpredictable and varying enough that planned times don't always meet reality. So I adapted by negotiating with myself and pushing them down. I'm sure you see the possible problem: Pushing them completely off the bottom, i.e., not getting some done. I found I was consistently able to honor my commitment to myself (a zero tolerance rule), but this meant working late some nights - part of the deal of being a self-employed parent.

One novel thing I did that was helpful was using each block as a project accountability record. I did this by simply editing each appointment after finishing it by adding a short description of what I got done. This kept me honest. This little record-keeping didn't replace my full project plan. Like all my projects, that was captured and tracked in each project's outline.

Finally, if when I was deep in the flow I extended the time beyond what I'd allotted. The rule, though, was no borrowing from the others! This information was useful in after-action project analyses, esp. in answering, "How did estimated and actual compare?"

Wrap-up, Questions, and Challenge

Though I've tried smaller versions of this, overall the experiment validated this approach, and I'll continue recommending it to clients.

I'm curious: Have you (or do you) used this for yourself? For what projects does it work best? What have you learned that you'd like to share?

If you haven't yet tried time blocking, I'd like to challenge you to give it a spin on your next new project. Call or email me if you'd like help. I'd love to hear how it goes. Cheers!

References

• [1] See Time Design ("consistently setting aside time for high priority activities") or Julie Morgenstern ("allotting specific spaces in your schedule for tending to the various core activities of your life").