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i've written a bunch of stuff about my idea about 'project management' here and there, long-stewing on an essay about it, so once again i'ma try and blurt it out in a thread for starters, I define a project as... https://t.co/PVXJkysrD2
i love this definition so much bc it makes so many things simpler & clearer. when you get good at doing projects, you get good at collaborating. and collaboration is a useful skill in any direction. it's humanizing if we can do it, dehumanizing if we cant https://t.co/nDbVmrX8Kw
ok so lets say you're sold, projects are about collaboration, it's worth learning how to collaborate better. where do you start? buncha different possible answers to this question. you could start small. or you could start compelling. this itself can be a micro-project...
you could list out a bunch of things that you're interested in doing, or feel compelled or obligated to do. i recommend doing this in writing, whether in a notes app or on paper, so that you can look at it, and pay attention to how you feel about it
if you don't have a lot of experience getting things done, there's a chance your list will include vague things like "learn guitar", or "get fit". these are good starts, but they are poorly defined projects. how do you define success? how do you determine progress? vague = no-go
this is where we get to "do 100 things". it's one of the simplest templates you can pick up re: projects. do 100 pushups, however long it takes, across however many sets over however many days. keep track of it (write it down), and see how it feels https://t.co/HH3J9LKQt8
you might try starting a do100thing project here and there and find that you ran out of interest, motivation, energy, etc maybe 7 or 15 things in. this is absolutely fine and normal. if it were easy to do100things you'd already have done it. embrace your failure and investigate
why did you stop? did you lose interest? in which case, cool! strike that project off from your list. do you wanna do something else? cool! do that instead, you can always pick this project up again next time if you like. but what if it's neither? cool, a more complex puzzle!
in my experience with my own projects, talking with a couple of hundred people about theirs, my investigation and reading, my broad sense is that usually people drop off a thing because they weren't in the flow zone. they either pushed themselves too hard too fast, or not enough https://t.co/RFFSbhUzzg
so the critical thing about keeping a project running turns out to be managing your own psychology! you wanna be having fun, you wanna be feeling like you're learning and growing, becoming more dynamic, more powerful, expanding your range of expression https://t.co/PGGQhI3pwa
let's start over from a different angle. one of my fav ways of thinking abt collaboration is as a "conversation". a back and forth, one bit of "speech" after another. here's a thread about Good Reply Game, re: being a desirable conversation partner: https://t.co/9Fzs72g8el
There is an art to replying and commenting, and probably like 60-70% of people I’ve seen on the internet fail at it. The important thing is not to speak your mind, but to “support” the OP. You can support them by disagreeing well & you can “mis-support” them by agreeing stupidly
now see this gif again, and see it as a physical manifestation of good reply game. observe how each person has to be attentive, and reposition themselves slightly to receive the pass well, & be attentive to the next person who is receiving *their* pass https://t.co/nDbVmrX8Kw
now think of all of these guys as temporally different versions of yourself. 2pm you, 3pm you, 4pm you. or january you, february you, maruary you. or 2020 you, 2021 you, 2022 you. how well are you passing "the ball", whatever that means, from one self to the next? https://t.co/RMejXUGU8A
if you aren't good at this stuff yet, you're going to drop the ball a bunch. that's ok! the thing is to see that ball-passing is a skill, it's learnable, you can get better at it. you can modify your environment. you can ask for help. you can do smaller passes. use 'better balls' https://t.co/5QLDYukjA3
