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A continuous cycle of progress requires moving from research to practice in a short amount of time, repeatedly.

But splitting important work into chunks of time is difficult because it seems unproductive. Switching gears feel like a waste of time, and people don't like to stop the type of work they’re doing because they'd prefer to move faster, not slow down or halt their current activity.

However, developing an ongoing cycle that's driven by the feedback of previous tasks is a powerful model to use to make knowledge work efficient. Creative work requires immersion into many different types of work. Moving from one form of immersion to another is a matter of time management, not task management.

This is why a task management system is never sufficient.

“A writer’s flywheel is a short and continuous knowledge cycle.” Me, 😬

Learning to switch from research to note-taking to practicing does not decrease productivity rather it increases productivity. By splitting the work into manageable chunks you will get a slice of work done multiple times per day, which is more efficient than a big-bang approach of batching each task in isolation.

Action: Instead of managing the different phases of work in terms of tasks to be done, manage the time you're allowed to complete them.

Short cycles pay off manyfold. It pays off because you become more relaxed about the overall project, you know where you'll be able to pick work up where you left off, and will be content that you achieved something substantial every day.

Writing Knowledge Cycle:

1. Research - search for new material by scanning and selecting what's useful.

2. Read - consume and capture what's relevant for your project.

3. Take notes - transfer short-term knowledge into long-term notes.

4. Compose - integrate the knowledge into a new section or add notes to the outline of an existing draft.
   

Draft early and draft often.

Until next time,

Josh Duffney

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Favorite-thing-of-the-week 🥰: [https://github.com/kepano/obsidian-minimal]
Source: Use a Short Knowledge Cycle to Keep Your Cool