Warning: I’m about to talk about David Allen again.
This is because I listened to him get interviewed by Tim Ferriss yesterday, and found myself freshly illuminated by the man’s wisdom.
One bit especially, which came fairly early in the episode:
The part of your brain that keeps track of to-do’s doesn’t have a sense of time, which is why you’ll wake up in the middle of the night with the mental reminder that you need to buy milk.
This is the whole reason we’ve got to get stuff out of our heads. Get the checklists and to-do’s out of your poor brain and into a system that you can trust. Otherwise, you’ll just feel anxious all the time about all the things that you can’t possibly do RIGHT NOW. Meanwhile, whatever it is you’re supposed to be doing at the moment will get less of your attention and energy.