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Take each item from the capture pile, and ask yourself "is this item actionable?". In GTD, an item is actionable if you need to do something about it.

If the item is actionable

Decide on what action (or actions) are required. Depending on the item this can take some time. Once there's a clear picture on what to do:

• If it will take <= 2 minutes, do it immediately
• If it can be delegated, delegate it to someone and track it on a "waiting" list
• If it will take more than one action to complete, add it to the "projects" list and add the first action to this project
• If it takes a single action, add a single and well-defined item to the "next actions" list and attach an approriate context where the action can be done (e.g. "at store" or "at work")
• Otherwise, defer it:
  • If it HAS to be done on a specific date, put it on the calendar
  • Otherwise put it on a context-appropriate todo list

If the item is NOT actionable

• If it is something to possibly be worked on in the future, add it to the "someday/maybe" list
• If it is reference information, file it
• Otherwise, discard it

Processing an item should take around 30 seconds.

I had so much stuff during my initial processing phase that I decided to do a fast triage to make it a little easier. It's not an approach I recommend, but I didn't want to miss any tasks that due in the next few days.

I ended up with three separate piles:

1. Items I knew were going to be filed. This included things like utility bills, tax forms, insurance documents, receipts older than the current tax year etc
2. Items for current or recent projects went back into the in tray (I know I broke the most important rule)
3. Items that belonged to other projects or didn't really have a set place went to a third pile

Anything that would take under a minute got done during triage. This was mostly small things like "I need to this address in my address book" or "I need to put this receipt in my 2019 my tax folder".

Everything else went straight into the recyle bin.

During normal processing I would not take this approach, but after my initial capture I had over a year's worth of items and it was quite overwhelming. It made sense to batch things up to me, as I'm usually in a creative mood when I'm filing items.

One surprising thing was just how much ended up getting discarded. Around half of the items I processed were either already done, or were things I didn't want any more.

Other things I noticed:

• The two minute rule is a huge help. There were so many things I'd put off that could be done quickly, and getting them all out of the way was a relief.
• It's worth putting time into thoroughly deciding what to do. Sometimes I'll get lazy and add a next action that isn't well-defined. This means I have to spend extra time when going through my actions list because I'm having to process items twice. I always end up procrastinating on tasks that aren't well defined.

I was expecting a huge list of next actions after processing, but ended up with around 50 projects and maybe 200 next items. A good chunk of items also went on my "someday/maybe" list, but I think if I was being realistic I could ditch 50% of them.

1. Run a total of 18 miles

I expected to be a little sort from playing football, but ended up with some heavier injuries that impacted my running.

Important lesson learned - don't play sports for a week or two before race day.

2. Continue bodyweight exercises and track my workouts

I reduced my workout to once a week whilst injured but didn't track anything. To be honest I didn't really know what to track, although that's not a particularly good reason not to do it.

3. Release a playable game

Total failure here.

4. Write every week

I wrote 5 short notes for sodaware.sdf.org, along with a brief post-mortem for Tiny Tactics. A small victory.

1. Run a total of 20 miles

I managed just over 16.5 miles before suffering from some minor knee pain. It wasn't too serious, but I didn't want to chance doing more damage so I took a few days off. The cold weather didn't help either.

Even though I'm calling this a fail, I was pleased with how everything went. My longest run was 3.4 miles (nonstop), which isn't bad considering I could only manage 2 minutes straight in August.

2. Add bodyweight training to my running workouts

I added bodyweight exercises once a week. I didn't track these workouts so I couldn't really measure any improvements. Even the lowest level exercises were quite difficult at first, although things did get easier after a few weeks.

It's definitely something I want to keep doing.

3. Release a prototype of Tiny Tactics

Not even close on this one.

I only worked for around 10 hours over the course of the month. I got a very basic map working along with some gameplay elements (mostly menus), but nothing even remotely playable.

At this point I'm not sure I can turn things around in time to get a demo released. I may end up releasing a tiny game in March just to get something positive done.

4. Write 1,000 words of my book

This one is 50/50. I only wrote around 500 words in February, but I spent some time researching the topic in more depth. I have a pretty good idea of how I want to structure the book and what I want to cover. More importantly, I have a better idea of the stuff I don't want to write about.

5. Finish setting up my GTD system

There's still a small pile of things left to process, but I got a basic system up and running. My inbox was finally emptied after two years, so I can't call this anything but a success.

1. Finish adding items to my "other goals" list

Given how badly February went, I think this list is long enough for now.

2. Release IFTTT version of Garlic Spy

This isn't a project that's particularly important to me, but I wanted to experiment with Ruby on Rails and this seemed like a good start.

I built a few bits and pieces with ActiveJob, set up integration with IFTTT and tidied up the deployment process. There's always more to do, but I'm happy with what I managed to get done.

3. Add new backend to crypto-ticker-mode

I started writing a basic API layer but never got around to finishing or integrating it.

—

That brings February to a 50% success rate. Overall it was a pretty disappointing month. Worse still, it's had a bit of hangover effect into March. Even though I'm a week into the month I haven't really been productive.

1. Run a total of 15 miles

Just made this one.

I play soccer on weekends and picked up a couple of knocks that kept me from running as much as I wanted. The cold weather didn't exactly motivate me either.

2. Decide on my first game for #1GAM

Tiny Tactics will be my first game of 2019.

3. Start planning my ebook

The most neglected of the three, but I made a rough outline of what I want to cover and started collecting material.

1. Finish the hub page

• [X] Add recent runs to the half marathon page
• [X] Add detail to the ebook page
• [ ] Add details to the secondary goals page

Adding recent runs and mileage totals to the half marathon page were my priority here, and I got both of those completed. I also added a word counter and some basic stats to the ebook page.

I would have liked to have spent more time on the secondary goals page, but I did set up a better system for adding and modifying goals on it.

This part was really tough for me. I have a bad habit of keeping notes on my desk and I didn't want to lose them. Even though I knew they would be going into a single place put me off collecting everything for a while.

Seeing the pile grow made things even worse. Each new item made it look like an insurmountable mountain of work that would never be processed.

Here are a few things I collected during this stage:

• Sealed bills that I paid online and never opened
• Letters
• Receipts I saved for when I file taxes
• Greetings cards
• Notebooks
• Paper folders (some empty, some not)
• USB sticks
• Tickets and programs from events
• Notes for whatever I was working on at the time. Some were from projects I finished months ago. Most of what I collected fell into this category, and ranged from full sheets of paper to post-it notes.
• Stuff that could go straight in the trash (empty envelopes, grocery store receipts from 2016 etc.)

I didn't count everything so it's hard to say just how much there was, but it ended up being a pretty large pile. I'd estimate there were over 1,000 individual items (pieces of paper, notecards etc) to process. Some of those items also have multiple items written on them.

That's not even including my email inbox, which currently sits at around 3,000 emails.

Performing a "mind sweep" is also part of the collection phase. The idea is to get your thoughts out of your mind and onto paper so that they can be processed. The GTD website has a list of things to read through to see if they spark any ideas.

Due to the amount of stuff I'd already collected, I decided to perform a mind sweep after the initial processing stage. Sitting down for an hour to think about everything I have to do didn't sound too appealing when there was already a huge stack of things to go through.

With collection done, it's onto step 2: processing!