Productivity and Time Management

Tim Challies begins his book, Do More Better: A Practical Guide to Productivity with a bold claim: “I believe this book can improve your life.” However, after reading the book, which is just 120 pages long including endnotes!, I believe that Challies makes good on his claim. As far as explicitly Christian approaches to personal productivity go, Challies’ Do More Better stands alongside Matt Perman’s What’s Best Next: How the Gospel Transforms the Way You Get Things Done....

Because good writing = good thinking, I believe that everyone could benefit from developing the habit of regular writing. However, because I Am a Ph.D. student about to begin work on his dissertation Edit a blog (Rookie Anglican) Write this personal blog I really need to develop the habit of regular writing. Up until now, I’ve largely relied upon writing in fits and starts, when the Muse descends, as it were....

Getting Things Done (“GTD” for short) is a widely popular personal productivity system invented and popularized by David Allen. However, as Nicole Dieker at Lifehacker pointed out in 2017, “You don’t hear a lot of people talk about the Getting Things Done productivity system anymore.” I think that’s a shame because it’s a very effective system. I first tried Getting Things Done after reading “What’s Best Next” by Matt Perman and then reading “Getting Things Done” by David Allen (in its newly revised 2015 edition) shortly thereafter....

Reading is the closest thing that human beings have to a superpower. We can learn, from other minds, from other times, just by looking at symbols on a screen or a page. But, I mean, come on. Who has enough time to read? I don’t know about you, but I’ve got a stack of books a mile high that I’d like to work my way through. Now, there’s a bunch of good advice out there about finding more time to read (see this post from Farnam Street and this post from The Art of Manliness)....

Personal Productivity in Psalm 127 I love Psalm 127. Not because it makes me feel great, necessarily, but because it hits me like a ton of bricks whenever I read it (like I did last night, during evening prayer). Here’s how the Psalm opens: Unless the Lord builds the house, the builders labor in vain. Unless the Lord watches over the city, the guards stand watch in vain. I don’t know about you, but it’s easy for me to think that my success or lack thereof completely depends on me and the intensity of my efforts....

I want to share with you the following prayer of St. Thomas Aquinas Before Study, based on Oratio S. Thomae Aquinatis ante studium, which Thomas Aquinas would pray before studying, writing, or preaching. We prayed it responsively before class (Patristic and Medieval History and Doctrine) with Dr. Piotr Malysz at Beeson Divinity School, and I’ve since turned back to this prayer often! A Prayer of St. Thomas Aquinas Before Study O God, Creator of all that is, From the treasures of Your wisdom, You have arrayed the universe with marvelous order, And now govern with skill and might....

OK, OK. I get it. Claiming that every Christian should read these 5 books is a bold claim. But, honestly, I think that these reading recommendations stand up to the scrutiny. I’ve been wracking my brain trying to come up with just the top 5 books that a busy Christian should read if she wants to learn the essentials about: Productivity and Time Management Bible Study Theology And, I think I’ve arrived at a pretty good shortlist if I do say so myself....

Do you want to live a more meaningful and purposeful Christian life, but you feel like it’s hard enough just to get everything done on your to-do list each day? I’m right there with you! That’s why I’ve made “Get Your Act Together (Productivity and Time Management)” the first of my Steps to Find Purpose and Meaning in Life. Thankfully, I think I’ve found something that can help. I’d like to introduce you to the “Pareto Principle,” also known as “the 80/20 Rule,” the “law of the vital few,” or the “principle of factor sparsity,” if you want to get all technical about it....

Why write out a list of principles? For one thing, it’s my birthday. And, although I’m only in my twenties, I’m feeling a bit reflective. For another, I’ve just been given a copy of Principles: Life and Work by Ray Dalio (affiliate link). According to Dalio (ix), Principles are fundamental truths that serve as the foundations for behavior that gets you what you want out of life. They can be aplied again and again in similar situations to help you achieve your goals....

Podcasts: An Introduction Although podcasts (think “iPod” + “broadcast”) have been around for over a decade, we’re living in a bit of a golden age – or a least a Rennaissance – of the medium. For the uninitiated, here’s a nice video about what podcasts are: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oerm5Q_9u2A Currently, podcasts are one of my very favorite ways to consume information about a wide variety of topics. Sure, gun to my head, I’ll choose books over podcasts as a way to learn....