Making It All Work Quotes

“It is a tricky business to know when you should set goals and objectives in order to achieve a focus, and when you would be better off dealing with the acceptance and management of your current reality so you can later step into new directions and responsibilities with greater stability and clarity. Only you will know the answer to that, and only in the moment.”
― David Allen, Making It All Work: Winning at the Game of Work and Business of Life

“It’s the nature of human experience, which is always in some form of motion, to veer off course—sometimes in major, but consistently in minor, ways.”
― David Allen, Making It All Work: Winning at the Game of Work and the Business of Life

“There is no freedom without discipline, no vision without a form, no structure without a function.”
― David Allen, Making It All Work: Winning at the Game of Work and the Business of Life

“Making It All Work is about the work you have to do to know the work you have to do when the work you have to do doesn’t tell you the work you have to do.”
― David Allen, Making It All Work: Winning at the Game of Work and the Business of Life

“More often than not, it seems that people are having thoughts, though not really thinking about what they’re thinking about—at least not in an effective way that resolves, advances, or manages the content.”
― David Allen, Making It All Work: Winning At The Game Of Work And The Business Of Life

“Nothing is perfect, final, or fixed in this material world. As soon as we are tempted to believe it is, we’ve probably set ourselves up for disappointment. What we’re truly striving for is the permanence that we can count on, amid all the change and flux. And the most permanent, secure, and stable thing we can possess is a foolproof way to deal with impermanence, insecurity, and surprise. A real connection with some greater awareness of the wellspring of our being and our universe will always provide the ultimate relief and resolution. But, as an Arab proverb so appropriately counsels: Trust in Allah, and tie your camel.”
― David Allen, Making It All Work: Winning At The Game Of Work And The Business Of Life

“The game of work and the business of life are really the same thing, when it comes down to the principles and behaviors and techniques that eliminate distraction and foster beneficial focus.”
― David Allen, Making It All Work: Winning At The Game Of Work And The Business Of Life

“The trick is to ensure not so much that what you are doing is, for you, the right thing, all the time (how, ultimately, could you know that for sure?) but that you are firmly in the driver’s seat with a functioning process for discovering and engaging with your best choice.”
― David Allen, Making It All Work: Winning At The Game Of Work And The Business Of Life

“Much of what sophisticates loftily refer to as the “complexity” of the real world is in fact the inconsistency in their own minds. —Thomas Sowell”
― David Allen, Making It All Work: Winning at the Game of Work and the Business of Life

“you can decide what, specifically, something means to you and what you intend to do about it, if anything; if you can use a placeholder as a reminder of what you need to attend to;”
― David Allen, Making It All Work: Winning at the Game of Work and the Business of Life

“The key here is maintaining the capability to unhook from and/or change the form or structure that’s guiding you, as soon as it has served its purpose. Knowing when to refocus from another viewpoint, and when to sacrifice a system that has begun to constrain expansion and expression, is a sign of mastership.”
― David Allen, Making It All Work: Winning at the Game of Work and the Business of Life

“The art of progress is to preserve order amid change and to preserve change amid order. —Alfred North Whitehead”
― David Allen, Making It All Work: Winning at the Game of Work and the Business of Life

“Defining “thinking” in its broadest sense to include any kind of focus and imagery held in the mind, in addition to the cognitive process of logic and rational judgment, means that your feelings will typically be more driven by the thoughts you hold than the other way around.”
― David Allen, Making It All Work: Winning At The Game Of Work And The Business Of Life

“why has almost everyone done the calendar thing, but almost no one has moved everything else in their life into a similar zone, by capturing it all and creating the habit of assessing it all appropriately? Three reasons: First, the data that is entered onto a calendar has already been thought through and determined; it’s been translated down to the physical action level. You agreed to call Jim at noon on Monday: there is no more thinking required about what the appropriate action is, or where and when you’re going to do it. Second, you know where those kinds of actions need to be parked (calendar), and it’s a familiar and available tool. And third, if you lose track of calendar actions and commitments, you will encounter obvious and rapid negative feedback from people you consider important.”
― David Allen, Making It All Work: Winning At The Game Of Work And The Business Of Life

“why has almost everyone done the calendar thing, but almost no one has moved everything else in their life into a similar zone, by capturing it all and creating the habit of assessing it all appropriately? Three reasons: First, the data that is entered onto a calendar has already been thought through and determined; it’s been translated down to the physical action level. You agreed to call Jim at noon on Monday: there is no more thinking required about what the appropriate action is, or where and when you’re going to do it. Second, you know where those kinds of actions need to be parked (calendar), and it’s a familiar and available tool.”
― David Allen, Making It All Work: Winning At The Game Of Work And The Business Of Life

“Since the publication of my first two books, Getting Things Done and Ready for Anything, I’ve had the opportunity to engage”
― David Allen, Making It All Work: Winning At The Game Of Work And The Business Of Life