Afraid to click? How to efficiently process your RSS feeds

I recently came across Tim Ferriss's [1] entry How Scoble Reads 622 RSS Feeds Each Morning, which motivated me to post an "aha" I recently had about processing RSS feeds. (What I took away from the Scoble video was how selective he his in deciding to read a post, how he makes that choice, and that he uses feeds for "relationship work" - networking - so he can be smart when talking with someone. However, I didn't get much on how to handle so many feeds.)

I read about 200 feeds [2] right now, and when I'm feeling overloaded I noticed I avoided keeping up with them. I had an "afraid to click" dynamic because I knew there would be consequences (having to decide the meaning of each post - and there are lots of them) with that click. After some thought, I realized there are only two kinds of posts: Those I want to read, and those I don't (deep, I know). Since all of the feeds I subscribe to are potentially valuable (otherwise I unsubscribe), the work (and it is work) is to go through them as quickly as possible to "harvest" the action involved.

In other words, it's simply the processing and organizing [3] phases of Getting Things Done.

Here's how I do it: I click the feed (or folder, if they're grouped), take the hit (lots will load up), and zip through them one at a time. I've set my reader to show only headlines (best for most feeds except newsletters), so I scan each title and decide mercilessly whether it deserves a deeper look. If so, I use Firefox's middle-click to open in new tab feature [4] to temporarily bookmark it, then move on. Once I've gone through all the new feeds I use keyboard shortcuts to go through each tab to decide "Is it actionable?," closing each tab when I've handled it. With feed reading this usually boils down to:

• Does it still look valuable?
  
• If so, is it short enough to read in two minutes? If yes, read it.
  
• If not, I put it into my to read stream. For blogs, the stream is to buffer up articles-to-read in a text file, print them once a week, and carry them in my Read/Review folder.

Note that this gets me rapidly through lots of posts, essentially moving them from "IN" to my actions list. However, it does require you to have a good "to read" system in place. Otherwise you'll feel compelled to read them all, which takes you from processing and organizing to doing, and that, my friend, will drag you down.

When I finally end up reading the post (either in two minutes or later) I typically have a limited set of resulting actions:

• Try a new behavior/install a new habit (example: keeping a decision log),
  
• Save it for reference [5] - either for me or clients (examples: saying no and FileHamster),
  
• Send it to someone who will hopefully find it valuable (a great little networking gift, along with this one),
  
• Save it as a Someday/Maybe item (I choose to print and file them in a paper folder),
  
• Respond (either via a blog post, an email to the author, or a forum comment), or
  
• Save it as a writing topic (I love stimulating reading that gets me thinking - fun!)
  

Clearly there are others, but the key point is to have an efficient system to turn the reading into action, and to whiz through them. I like my tagged text file (see Pickle jars, text files, and creative idea capture), but use whatever works.

How about you - Have any good tips for handling RSS feeds? I'd love to hear them.


References

• [1] Ferriss has received a ton of recognition for his book The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich (it's in my candidates library - see A reading workflow based on Leveen's "Little Guide"). You might enjoy his blog and site.
  
• [2] My current feed list is here. I use Bloglines for my reading, especially for its killer email-as-feed feature - which gets lists that are email-based out of my inbox. Highly recommended.
  
• [3] You might be interested in How to process stuff - A comparison of TRAF, the "Four Ds", and GTD's workflow diagram.
  
• [4] More great Firefox tips at 15 Coolest Firefox Tricks Ever, including my all-time favorite Reopen the last closed tab with Ctrl+Shift+T.
  
• [5] I had a colleague who tagged these "MUS" - Might be USeful - which I use regularly.
  
• [6] You might enjoy my article Information provenance - the missing link between attention, RSS feeds, and value-based filtering.
  

Why *my* NUTs should not be *your* NUTs!

Repeat after me: I will not brain dump onto others, I will not brain dump onto others, ...

I was talking recently with a friend and mountain bike buddy about the ideas I teach, especially the notion of keeping everything out of your head. He loved it, and really understood the negative impact that NUTs (Nagging Unfinished Tasks) have on us (see Personal productivity, IBMs, and NUTs: Some surprises about the brain). The next time we met he was very animated about this because he realized a) his spouse has these NUTs (most of us do, unless we rigorously practice a method like Getting Things Done), and b) he claimed she tries to get him to take them on for her!

Does this happen with someone in your life? It's essentially delegation, but in an unclear and indirect manner - more like a brain dump onto someone else. And as Roizen and Oz point out in YOU: The Owner's Manual, there's a real cost to not handling these effectively (they say these age you by eight years - excerpts on-line at Google Books).

The question is, how do you deal with someone trying to do this to you? It turns out I had a chance to practice - I ran into my friend's spouse (a very sweet person) when leaving their place for a ride, and she asked me to pass along a message to my spouse. Because I didn't have my capture tool with me (a calculated oversight - see A few thoughts on capture and What's the best tool for ubiquitous capture?), I told her I couldn't take it on. My reason was that I might forget or garble it, and then I'd have two women angry with me (much worse than 12 Angry Men!) Plus, I have enough of my own tasks I have to manage. To myself I thought, I'm not paid to take on stuff like this for others - that's a tough job (see Best practices for GTD and administrative assistants).


Is this bad? Should we take on little things like this for others? And are they little? My advice: Be careful what you take on. In general, saying "no" is important to managing your own stress levels, and it becomes much easier once you've identified every commitment in your life. However, people might see this as being selfish or unhelpful, so treat them with respect and compassion, possibly explaining your reasons. A few resources for saying no:

• The Gentle Art of Saying No
  
• 20 Ways To Say No
  
• Esteem: The Power of Saying, "No"

By the way, would you remind me to...

One way to enjoy the ride - celebrate surprise!

I think that one aspect of living gracefully is to appreciate the steady stream of events (large and small, positive and negative) that make up a lifetime. At the meditation center I attended years ago they taught that the present is all we have - the future hasn't happened yet, and the past is over, so enjoying what's happening now is a key to being happy [1]. This is a variation on the "stop and smell the roses" theme, and it makes sense to me.

Trouble is, when I'm under stress, I find appreciating what's happening in the moment to be hard. For example, as I'm building my consulting practice I experience a mixture of frightening an exhilarating experiences, and many of the former get in the way. It's the old "journey vs. destination" idea - focus too much on the latter, you forget to live fully [2].

So part of my personal process is figuring out ways to (as Patricia Ryan Madson calls it in Improv Wisdom) "enjoy the ride" [3]. Unfortunately, for some of us it's just not straightforward. How do we go about appreciating the moment? It's a huge question, but one thing that helps me is savoring surprise. After all, what good is staring something new if it doesn't result in at least a few surprises?

This hit me on the head Friday when I got an unexpected envelope from a reader in Minnesota, USA. Inside were a handful of the Pentel Forte mechanical pencils I love (he read about them in this post), along with a lovely note thanking me for this blog. Man did that lift my spirits! It also got me thinking about the value of surprise - both receiving and creating it.

Let me finish with a few tips around surprise. I'd also very much like to hear your comments on this, e.g.,

• What tricks do you have for enjoying the ride?
  
• Have you had any recent surprises you've celebrated?

Be open to surprise

To enjoy surprises we have to be aware of them. Otherwise, we won't notice them. I think this is one way that a system like Getting Things Done contributes - getting the daily noise under control lets us tune in better to what we're experiencing. Hmmm. I wonder - How about a course on Surprise Training?

I also think appreciating surprise depends on a second element: interpretation. Like any experience, our perspective determines what it means to us. Naturally some surprises aren't positive, but I've sometimes been able to "spin" an event mentally into a positive thing. Absurdity loves being acknowledged.


Celebrate surprise

I like stopping for a moment to celebrate welcome surprises. It's a chance to slow down and appreciate these important events. I've tried three ways of doing this. First, I have a "surprise wall" where I put notes and cards from readers, and art and messages from my daughter [4]. Second, I highlight surprise emails (see Use Gmail's "star" to highlight your good news). Finally, I sometimes record them using in my journal (I use a "DelightfulSurprise" tag in My Big-Arse Text File - a Poor Man's Wiki+Blog+PIM).


Plant seeds

Fostering surprise is like writing letters - you have to plant seeds to get something to grow. For example, I reached out about six months ago to friends and family to announce my new job direction. As a result, I got two surprise calls last week from two regional colleges looking for faculty productivity consulting. Neat!

Another thing is to look for ways to pleasantly surprise others. My current favorite: When I was consulting last week in Florida, I picked up a bunch of NASA swag - stickers, pens, etc. - which I've been gleefully passing out. The look on someone's face when they get a cool gift is a real heart-warmer.


Other applications of surprise

Creating surprise goes beyond this, though. For example, I work to include surprises in my workshops, including physical ones like door prizes (everyone loves getting a Super Spy Night Pen for bed-side capture) and mental ones (like the idea that multitasking decreases IQ more than smoking pot [5]). (See more great presentation tips from Kathy Sierra's article A few more Presentation How To's.)


Unexpected results of tuning in

Finally, being open to experiences like surprises can add unexpected value and perspective to our lives. In fact, many of my favorite books are stories by someone who got surprised, then followed it up and shared the results. Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking and Freakonomics are two nice examples. I also love the canonical surprise story Twenty-Five Years of Post-it Notes


References

• [1] You might enjoy reading recent books stemming from research on happiness, including Stumbling on Happiness by Daniel Gilbert, Authentic Happiness: Using the New Positive Psychology to Realize Your Potential for Lasting Fulfillment by Martin Seligman, or Happiness: A Guide to Developing Life's Most Important Skill by Matthieu Ricard.
  
• [2] Interestingly, one thing I liked about MissionControl's workshop was their idea of life being an endless sequence of "Nows" (see A GTD-er's perspective on Mission Control's "Productivity and Accomplishment" workshop). They extrapolated this to me we should schedule every action in our work and lives for a specific "Now" - sometime in your calendar. I don't care for this approach, but I know it works well for some people.
  
• [3] See Great time management ideas from the world of improv wisdom and Whose job is it? Mine!
  
• [4] Being around children is a great way to expose yourself to surprise. Kids are great because they don't know when something they do is "bad" - sometimes just a chuckle can change a negative interpretation (dropping something, say) into a funny one.
  
• [5] Widely reported a few years ago, e.g., CNN.com - E-mails 'hurt IQ more than pot' - Apr 22, 2005.
  

The ultimate productivity tip

I've been tagged twice today with the "Ultimate Guide to Productivity" meme; Ian McKenzie (the voice behind Ian’s Messy Desk) and Brett Kelly (host of The Cranking Widgets Blog) came after me. I don't like responding to the "ego" memes (e.g., "five things about myself"), but I'd like to have some fun with this one, in which the Instigator Blog has challenged the initial round of bloggers to "pick your single best productivity tip." My answer:

There is no single best productivity tip

Am I cheating? No.

I've found that everyone needs something different, and - like clichés - a tip that you find less-than-compelling will knock the socks off someone else. For example, I had one client who loved the A-Z filing system. Absolutely the best thing she'd ever heard. The next client? Convinced that the tickler was the thing.

And naturally I'm pleased when a piece (either an organizing tool or a concept, i.e., how to break stuff into actions) helps someone - value is value. But I'm happiest when the entire system clicks for a client. I guess that's the piece that hit me the hardest, and is what separates a buffet approach ("bag of tips/tricks") from a comprehensive and integrated framework.

So maybe the ultimate tip is to figure out what you currently need to make a jump (or leap) in your self management, and adopt it. Then repeat, until you're six feet under. Hey, you might even find a new profession!

Programmers: Get out of your shell and exercise your people muscles - for fun and profit

(Note: I wrote this article for a programming venue a while back, but I didn't end up publishing it. As I've been flat out these last few weeks preparing for summer workshops, I thought I'd share it with you. Regular blogging resumes after I get back from my NASA seminar next week. P.S. I had fun checking out the Constellation Program - what geek can resist new spaceships?)

As programmers, we often have the luxury of focusing on interesting and challenging technical problems, without having to worry too much (depending on your work arrangement) about the external factors that make this kind of sheltered life possible. However, it turns out there are some big pluses to developing our people networking skills and getting out and meeting folks. This is especially true when we move out on our own (or become part of a very small team). These advantages include:

• More business,
  
• Unexpected opportunities,
  
• Great product ideas and directions, and
  
• Improved health and life satisfaction.
  

(There's a longer list here.) Most of these advantages stem from the basic ideas that 1) we humans thrive in a more deeply connected world, and 2) opportunities for new ideas, new projects, and additional work can come from surprising places, once you start putting energy into expanding your network. The down side? You may have to develop some new skills, you have to put in time and energy to meet folks, and you have to stay open to possibly unexpected opportunities (i.e., to be ready to say yes).


So how does one go about growing her network? I began with three books, which jump-started my efforts:

• Love Is the Killer App: How to Win Business and Influence Friends by Tim Sanders,
  
• Never Eat Alone: And Other Secrets to Success, One Relationship at a Time by Keith Ferrazzi and Tahl Raz, and
  
• How to Make People Like You in 90 Seconds or Less by Nicholas Boothman

Why these three? First, Sanders' book is inspirational, and encourages us to freely share our knowledge, our network, and our compassion. This can be hard for us, especially the knowledge bit, because as Susan Jeffers puts it (from Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway):

So much of what we learn in life comes to us with great difficultly. And, for some reason, we have a tendency to want to see others struggle as much as we did. Turn this around and begin giving others as much help as you can possibly give them.

As a programmer, I think of this book as how to look at others as partners in work and life, and how helping them ultimately helps me and my business.


In the second book, Ferrazzi and Raz teach us about the good kind of networking, i.e., the kind involving unselfish giving, not the kind in which I stand at the exhibit hall and pass out 300 business cards. Again, as geeks, this book shows us that networking is very powerful, and demonstrates how to get started.

Finally, Boothman's work gives us some crucial skills on establishing rapport with people in the early seconds of a relationship, which apparently matter quite a bit. It covers mysteries like eye contact, body mirroring, and asking open-ended questions when first meeting someone. As a technical type I found myself thinking "Where the hell was this book when I was in high school!?" Think of it as a social skills user manual.


Great. So given all that, how do we put this into practice? As with anything new, there will be trial and error, and - as with anything social - "error" can feel uncomfortable at first. One strategy I found useful was to start by being conscious of each personal interaction, and looking at these as little opportunities to get to know the other person.

For example, I used to interact with people only when necessary, and only for the minimal time needed to deal with the task at hand. Very much Just the Facts. Say I needed to talk with a user. I'd spent a few seconds in obligatory "How you doing?" mode, then jump right into the fray - "Which version of the JDK are you using?," "Is the server running?," etc. However, I now spend a little time asking about the person either before or after the technical stuff - things like how they like their jobs, where they live, what their passions or issues are, etc. While some folks are all business (can't help that!), most welcome the chance to talk about themselves. And guess what? That connection persists, both in my mind and theirs. (Early on I forgot to do this, so I called the person back, apologized for being so hasty, and asked to hear a bit about her life. She was fine with it.)

The bottom line? Brush up those social muscles, dust off your English (non-programming) language skills, and reboot yourself a bit. You never know what a connection with someone might bring, either to you or (better yet) to them.