Suspense Files and Building Habits
Cory Doctorow - renowned author and copyright activist - posted a blog post on Saturday that got me thinking:
Pluralistic: Keeping a suspense file gives you superpowers (26 Oct 2024)
It's a lengthy post but the main course is that of "suspense files":
That's where the other kind of GTD list comes in: the list of things you're waiting for from other people. I used to be assiduous in maintaining this list, but then the pandemic struck and no one was meeting any of their commitments, and I just gave up on it, and never went back…until about a month ago. Returning to these lists (they're sometimes called "suspense files") made me realize how many of the problems – some hugely consequential – in my life could have been avoided if I'd just gone back to this habit earlier. --Cory Doctorow, 26 Oct 2024 (emphasis mine)
He goes on to list some examples and explain how it works - in short, it's things that he's waiting on from other people in a simple text file, and he marks down when he last acted on it. When it's resolved, it gets deleted. Simple.
So that's a neat idea. I don't know if it's something I'd implement as a .txt file, but I might consider it in bullet journal format, somehow. Gmail already does this on its own - sometimes you'll get a nudge in your inbox asking if you want to follow up on something. (It's not always very smart.)
But the thing I took away the most was his bit on spending 5 minutes a day cleaning one space:
A month ago, I added a new daily task: spend five minutes cleaning one space. I did the bar first, and after two weeks, I'd taken down every tchotchke and bottle and polished it, reorganizing the undercounter spaces where things pile up ...
Now I'm working through my office. Ever day, I'm dusting a bookshelf and combing through it for discards to stick in our Little Free Library. Takes less than five minutes most day, and I'll be done in about three weeks, when I'll move on to my closet, then the side of the house, and then back to the bar. A daily short break where I get away from my computer and make my living and working environments nicer is a wonderful habit to cultivate. --Cory Doctorow, 26 Oct 2024
It's a bit of an afterthought not entirely related to the suspense file idea, but it made me realize that his 5-minute trick does actually make things a lot easier. When you try to tackle something all at once it can become impossible to wrap your head around and it's difficult to get started.
I don't think I'll implement a daily 5 minute habit exactly, but I like the idea of spending a few minutes each day to work on one thing that you're trying to get done. In this case, it really does apply to cleaning things around the house though. Working on projects? That's easy. Cleaning the house? Not so much.
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