Heroic Interview: Getting Things Done with David Allen

You're listening to Getting Things Done, an Optimal Living interview with David Allen and Brian Johnson. Hi, this is Brian. Welcome back to the optimal living 101 series. Today I'm thrilled to be chatting with David Allen, author of Getting Things Done and one of the world's leading thinkers on effective time and self management. David's one of my favorite teachers and my team and I have gotten so much out of his work. If you haven't checked him out yet, head on over to davidco.com or gettingthingsdone.com and dive in. Absolutely amazing stuff that has truly transformed my life. So, David, thank you so much for taking the time to chat.

Hey, thrilled to be here with you, Brian. Thanks.

Well, I'd love to jump straight in. And the title of your best selling book is Getting Things Done. You know, kind of the essence of your brand. What are the biggest challenges that you see that people face in getting things done?

Most people's addiction to stress is what keeps them from actually implementing this. I've never had anybody in, you know, the 10 years it's been out, you know, probably 2 million copies out there around the world, nobody said anything in there is wrong in terms of the principles of the technique. Most everybody goes, they really, I know they work. I just don't do it. Oh, gosh. So trying to scratch my head and uncover the barrier to entry for people about this, and I really realize that it took me 30 years to kind of build the habitual process of getting used to actually having nothing on my mind except whatever I want on my mind. And that's just a very unusual place for people to be. And most people are just, when I say addicted, it's the old comfort zone. Things like anything you get used to, it actually feels strange and uncomfortable and awkward to get out of that, even if it's good for you. So having nothing on your mind, you know, while you've got all the things that you're accountable for and all the plates you've started spinning in the air, you know, sitting there with your karma and your Dharma, you know, running all around you and being able to stay clear about that. You know, I figured out the algorithm about how to do that, but, you know, I think most people just don't either don't believe they could get there or. Or it's so unusual for them. You've really got to spend a lot of time building that new standard, raising the bar for yourself internally.

That's fantastic. And the subtitle to Getting Things Done is the Art of Stress Free. Productivity. So this idea that we're addicted to stress and you talk about the fact that we want to be maximally efficient and relaxed, how do we do that and why is that so important?

Well, ask any 4 minute miler how important relaxation is to be able to break the four minute mark. We say, oh, excuse me, that is, you know, 80% of what you do is stretch and relax so that some part of you can respond appropriately and optimally. So relaxation doesn't mean lethargic or unconscious. You know, it just means, hey, it basically this means you're appropriately engaged with whatever you're on. So you're on. You could be relaxed running a 4 minute mile or staring at your navel and walking around the rose garden. Either one. Relaxation is a nice place to be because it tends to be what most people do. And by the way, I have to back up a little bit, Brian, because stress free is actually kind of a lie. If you didn't have any stress or challenges, you wouldn't grow or express or expand yourself, which is, I think, what we're on the planet to do. So it's not about having no stress, it's about having no negative stress. You know, stress says, hey, I want to be out of the room and I'm not out of the room. That automatically creates a kind of a stress or kind of a distance for which you get up and get engaged. And that's what gets you out of the room. So you have to. Actually we're in a constant process relaxing ourselves from tensions we set up for ourselves. As soon as you set a goal, as soon as you say, I want to go somewhere that you're not yet, you create the kind of tension that then pulls the rubber band, you know, out there toward it. The problem is that people say, I want to be out of the room. Oh, but damn, no, I want to sit here and read the book. I can't do both the same time. Now you're, now you're in spin. Now you're in negative stress because the energy is not, it's just been, all it's doing is creating a negative spiral for you psychologically and even physiologically.

Yeah.

As opposed to, you know, part of, you know, the energy you use to positively engage. Yeah. If that makes sense. That's really, that's really the master key about, about that. So how do I get appropriately engaged?

Well, let's go there. So obviously we're not going to be able to unpack the whole system in this quick chat, but what are some of the.

Oh, yes, we can.

Let's do it in 20 seconds. Let's do it.

Yeah. Any potentially meaningful thing in your psyche needs to be offloaded out of the psyche, put in front of you objectively, so that you can then sooner than later decide what exactly that means to you, what outcomes and action steps you're committed to take relative to that meeting. You then need to park the results of that in appropriate categories so that somebody who doesn't have to keep rethinking what are all the things you're committed to, and you need to step back and regularly review and reflect on all of that in engagement at all the multiple levels of horizons you have it to keep all that stuff clear and clean and then trust your intuitive judgments about what you do and as importantly, what you're not doing. That's it.

Well, we're done.

That's it.

That was easy.

Really? That took 67.6 years to get to, but what the heck.

That is fantastic. Well, what's plays with some of the big ideas that make up that 20, 30 second overview? One of the big things that I just in your work is this idea of mind like water. Can you tell us about that?

Sure. Well, it's a martial arts concept that as water responds to whatever it's engaging with out there, it engages with it appropriately. It doesn't over or under react. You throw in a pebble, it does pebbleness. You throw in a boulder, it does boulderness. It doesn't sit there pissed off that the big boulder just disturbed its tongue. It's just dealing with whatever is in a very neutral, dispassionate way and appropriately so, so that it's ready for whatever the next input is. So the analogy or the metaphor there obviously is about having your head so that you're not over or underreacting to things, so that you're clear with engaging with whether something coming to you either from an internal drive or an external input, so that you don't take one meeting into the next, you don't take home to work or work to home. You're just fully available to be wherever you are with all of your optimal resources at hand.

Yep. And then we're going to talk more about details in terms of the system and some of the other big ideas that I've gotten a lot out of. But I'm just curious as I reflect on this, how much you know in terms of your attention, training beyond the systems that you've created for yourself and you've shared with now millions of people, do you have an attention training practice in terms of meditation. Other practices that you've cultivated over the last X decades that have helped in this regard?

Yeah, sure. Well, I've done, you know, conscious spiritual work since the last 40, 45 years. So part of that happens to be a spiritual kind of an exercise. It's not meditation in the sense of trying to clear your mind. You can't do that. You can leave your mind, but your mind is always going to be running. The universe is always on, as is your mind. So what you need to do is to train it so that it's not a distraction and it doesn't hold your attention because if you ever changed your mind, then you'll see is who did that? So it's the who did that? That's really been of interest to me. Who is this really in here? And what is this game really all about? So my spiritual practices are more about being able to quiet the sort of more mundane operational horizons just so that you can listen to the more subtle ones. Because the universe is always on. Which part of the universe do you want to listen to? And it's hard to hear that flute way over there if you got a big truck driving front of you. So, you know, learning how to be able to let go at whatever level you tend to be wrapped around. I mean, if you can't let go of something, emotionally and mentally, welcome to karma. That is what it is. It's like, I don't know why I keep doing something, doing this and I can't let it go now. At some point you get sick and tired of being sick and tired and somebody drops off. But you can also train yourself to be much more ready for that and also to learn how to listen.

Yep.

So, you know, I'm still a beginner in the universe, but that's, you know, at least that's, that's been my, my practice. You know, I am an ordained minister in the movement of spiritual inner awareness. I've worked with, you know, my spiritual coach, John Rogers since 1971. You know, the guy who's just kind of been out ahead of me in terms of that path and that track. So, you know, but there are certainly lots of people. I learn from everybody. You know, anybody who's, who's tapped into that something could have got somewhere for me.

Yeah, well, what's beautiful about your work is to really bring the spiritual, to allow that to come out from having a well disciplined mind with the mundane and even the little things. Just the idea of capturing everything. When my wife and I Started integrating this into our lives from the most simple grocery item, you know, just to be able to open up my omnifocus, which I absolutely love, applying many of these principles and just capture the. I need the grind to salt from Whole Foods next time we're there. What that does to free up my mind on the mundane is profound.

Yeah. I wrote an essay, it's in my second book, I believe, ready for anything, called the Magic of the Mundane. And there really is something about godliness is right next to ordinariness. And how many years does it take for people to kind of give up all their romantic lead, the next exodus to Venus kind of visions and all that spiritual stuff. And you don't have to go any further than exactly where you are and exactly with what you're doing. So being able to manage and maintain this level with integrity and elegance, you know, there's nothing perfect here. This is more about, you know, just having appropriate direction and excellence in terms of what you do. This is the big classroom here.

Yep.

But to be able to engage with that appropriately, you know, really just seems like part of the whole ball of wax.

Yeah.

I think when you catch this, you realize that there's as much integrity in managing your own agreement with yourself about salt at Whole Foods as there is called find God, truth in the universe. And in a way, once you kind of tap into a certain level, it's all the same thing.

It's amazing how we can get caught up in just the high transcendent spiritual in Ms. That when the reality is just growing from the ground up and allowing that the magic in the mundane as you described, unbelievably beautiful and powerful and yet simple. Can you tell us about standards and how important it is to notice and to ideally raise our standards?

Well, we all have standards about everything. In other words, whatever it is that you allow and whatever it is that's going on, you've allowed because you have standards, if you will. So, you know, I think that's where what becomes critical is you just need to look around and say, look, is my life in balance? Is it appropriate? Are all the moving parts sort of in appropriate relationship with each other? And then, you know, then it's all about, well, you know, what. What standards might need or want to change relative to where you're going. So, you know, you may have a standard. I have a standard by zeroing out my in basket every so often, you know, because if I don't, you know, if it starts to clog up and then I've Got that clog. And then I can't appropriately deal with new inputs and it stifles my creativity and my spontaneity. So, you know, we all have standards like how often do you need to take a shower before you feel scuzzy, you know, or how often do you brush your teeth? So those are all standards we set for ourselves. What's the, what's the comfort level that I'm used to about that? I think what's important to notice is, look, am I allowing myself behaviors and experiences that are not moving me toward where I want to go or that undermine or subvert some of the more important things to me? And that's where you just need to start to pay attention to those. Then it's just about habit change.

Yup. And two of the more mundane but magical areas of my life that you've encouraged me to kind of optimize and raise my standards. On the two minute rule in the inbox to zero rule, can you talk about why just that two minute rule? I think you call that magic as well. Can you tell us why that's so powerful?

I don't know. Just is. Well, I know over a lot of years I've watched people go, oh my God, the two minute rule, that's just, it's like it gives me an extra six months to my life and it's so powerful. First of all, it's so easy to implement. I mean, once you figure out something that only takes two minutes to do, it take you longer to stack a track and look at it again. If you're ever going to do it at all. So go ahead and do it right. Then you wind up, you know, it's kind of like becoming like Teflon. But the real power of that is it's training people to actually make decisions and make executive decisions right on the front end as opposed to, you know, piling stuff up into stacks and that, that change where you start to get in the driver's seat about, wait a minute, something just landed in my universe that I've allowed. What exactly does it mean to me? So the two minute rule is just a fast way to start to train people to put their hand on the helm and start to direct themselves. These are the inputs that they've allowed implicitly to come into their life.

Yeah, that's awesome. It's interesting because tying it to the inbox to zero rule, I noticed when I implemented that we as a team in our business, we have a tiny team of five people, but we all went through your got the book and did your. I think it's a 10 CD live lecture on CD. And we all went through that and would reflect on it for a number of weeks and then implemented a number of these different practices. And one of them was the inbox to zero. And our target is can we get our inbox to zero email inbox once every 24 hours. And I noticed in conversations with my team how fascinating it was that that email or two that wound up in your inbox at the end of the day that you've been kind of avoiding. It was really just a decision. It was uncomfortable, maybe communication you needed to make or decision you had to make. And it just, it all comes down to that decision making ultimately, huh?

Sure it does, but it gets kind of subtle because it's actually okay to decide, not to decide as long as some part of you is okay with that. The problem is when somebody says, oh damn, I should have.

Yep.

Instead of, I need to cook on that for a while. Let me put it in my cook pile. Believe it or not, you could create yourself an email folder or, and, or a physical box. Here's all the crap I just don't feel like dealing with. And you, as long as you moved all that in, there you go. You walk free. Because, you know, being organized simply says, look, I'm now, I am now properly engaged with this stuff. I do not want to deal with that. Yeah, you know, it's. You're the one who creates the karma with yourself based upon what you, what you've told yourself it really means to you. And so, you know, a lot of people think I'm the organization guy. It's like, nah, not really. I mean, organized just means that, you know, where something is matches what it means to me. I'm just, I'm only organized because I'm so lazy. I don't like to have to rethink what something means or be, you know, or use my head to remind me about anything. So that's just lazy. So. And that's just a pure efficiency factor. And look, if life is more important to you than the material world, then you want to get through the material world with as absolutely little effort as possible. And if you really love the material world, then you want to play in the material world with as much efficiency and effectiveness as you like to. Sort of. It's curious to me why efficiency gets such a bad rap.

Yeah. And just to create that energy, the upward looping when we actually make decisions, and even the decision consciously to not make a decision. And the Energy that allows us to feel and to experience has just personally been extraordinary for me and appreciate you making it so clear for me and our team. So thank you on that front.

Sure. You're welcome. Here's a big secret, Brian, about getting things done is not about getting things done. You know, because you think of all the things you and I are not doing right now, talking to each other. Now, that's either bad or good news, right? Either good news that, hey, talking to Brian right now is exactly what I need to do. And I am now appropriately engaged with my universe because I know every single thing I'm not doing. And that's fine. This is the most important thing I need to be doing. Or I could be sitting here going, oh, God, I got all that other stuff to do. I want to get off the phone. It's like, you know, you look at the behavior. It's just one thing. I can only do one thing. So half empty or half full. So the trick is, how do I get appropriately engaged with all of that? But that's impossible to do. From my experience, if you haven't gone through the processes of the getting things done process, capture, clarify, organize, review, and engage. Because if you're here to get things done, then there's a part of you that must be appropriately engaged with getting things done in order to have nothing in your mind and in order to really be at peace.

Yeah, amazing. And then walking through kind of some of the other aspects of the system that have been so beneficial for me. Outcome and having a clear sense of the outcome we want to achieve. And I want to tie that into how you describe action management versus time management. But can we start, can we go to outcome thinking and why that's so important?

Well, yeah, actually, we're all outcome thinking all the time. It's just, you know, you walk into a meeting, oh, another damn meeting. Well, that was an outcome thinking. It just may not be the most effective one. You just have a picture of this being crap. So somebody just, oh, you want crap? Watch this. And that's exactly what you'll notice when you walk, walk in the room. Because that's how your brain works. So you're constantly affirming, you're constantly talking to yourself. You're constantly imaging yourself. Somebody estimated 50,000 a day. So you can't stop that as long as you're conscious. So you're always thinking about outcomes. So the real, you know, what we really are getting at here is making sure that you're focused, that you've got the image that is going to be most effective for you. When you walk into the meeting, say, exactly why would we call this meeting and what exactly are we trying to accomplish? What would wild success for us be by what time in here? Because until you actually have that data point clear, you don't know how to frame the conversation or how to be appropriately engaged with that time and that context. So getting clear about what are we trying to do, it's really kind of the zeros and ones of getting things done. What does done mean? And then what does doing look like and where does it happen? That's why outcome and action really become the ultimate sort of baked down truths about how do I get control of, you know, my living room, this meeting, my life, my career, my company, whatever it is. It really comes down to, hey, where are you going? And well, what do you need? How do you allocate your resources to make that happen? So it's nothing but good business. There's nothing but good life, one on one. It's just, you know, that's, that's actually how you get out the doors. You see yourself out the door, then you decide to engage your physical and take an action toward it.

Yeah.

So in a way, it's just, I just made explicit what sort of commonly, implicitly, what implicit common sense really is all about. But boy, people could certainly use a lot more focus on it. How many emails are written without somebody thinking about what am I trying to accomplish with this email? How many meetings are set up and conversations are had with people not getting really clear? Excuse me, why are we doing this? What's the purpose? What are we trying to do? So just building that in is just a great lexicon for any kind of an organization or family to build into its vocabulary. It'll help streamline the intersections of time.

And does that just go back to the addiction to stress and the addition to reactivity that Stephen Covey would talk about? Just, you know, rule number one, right? Be proactive. Is it just that we're moving so quickly that we don't even take the time?

Sure. It's really back to our point of how do you organize your energy so it is most effective to you, but in fact it's back to standards. How much are you willing to tolerate? But I'm still working on stuff today. Gee, how much lack of exercise can I tolerate before I feel uncomfortable about my energy level? How much of a lack of new creative thinking am I willing to tolerate before some part of me gets a little anxious? Come on, David, you should have Added more value to that thing. That could have been a lot cooler in terms of that next seminar, that next speech you're going to get. So come on. My work's cut out for me. So it's not like I don't think it's an all or nothing. I think it's just a matter of degree where and what kind of outcomes are going to serve you the best and sort of refocus yourself and move yourself in that direction.

Yes. Awesome. I appreciate your playfulness and your humility about it, too, because I know that in my work, a lot of people look around at people like you and other individuals who they admire and think you've kind of got it all figured out. And there's somehow we arrive at some static. We're exonerated from any further work in this object area.

All those of us who've ever figured anything out is just figure out what it is that we do that screws up our life regularly. We're just talking to ourselves. Yeah. So don't let anybody kid you.

Well, I think that's a huge distinction, though. I mean, it's one of the things that, you know, I come back to a lot of my work is just Abraham Maslow's wisdom that there are no perfect human beings and we're not going to be the first one. So I think even just giving people the permission to continue to learn and to fall down and to approach life with that growth mindset, I think is extraordinary. So, again, I appreciate you modeling that, making that clear, because I think that's one of the reasons. One of the other things we're addicted to, perhaps, is this idea that I'm either perfect at it. I'm either going to be able to do this GTD system or whatever else I'm committed to or interested in perfectly, or it's not worth doing.

And I think that's a great game of the ego. The ego says, gee, I should be perfect, and oh, damn, I'm not. But because I should be, I'm potentially a perfect person. So now I'll beat myself. Because that's what perfect people do when they're imperfect, they beat themselves up. Such a way to pretend that you actually are perfect. It's a strange paradoxical thing that the human psyche does to itself that way.

And how would you describe the exit to that? What? Mindset shift? Would you relax? Relax?

Well, the first law of spirit is acceptance. Anything you try to push back on or resist, that's true. You just screwed yourself from actually being able to be Open for spiritual energy and awareness and intelligence. So acceptance is the first law. What's true, what is. And so being willing to stare at yourself, you know, and look hard. I mean, it takes a lot. It's a lot of courage to take a look at all the weaknesses and foibles and all those other kind of things. So, you know, we just try to keep. It's funny, you know, it even cards back to why people are addicted to things in their head instead of writing everything down is to addicted. It gives people a false sense of control. If I let it out of my head, it's like, I can't. I feel so out of control anyway. Oh, my God, I can't even let it out of my head because then I'll really be out of control. Strange paradox. Trying to keep it in your head is what's making you feel out of control. So there, you know, even if there's another version of the magic of the mundane, even at the most mundane level, it's all let go, let it go, let go, and let God. That's the, the primary admonition we want to try to run my day by is keeping on. And if that quasi religious or spiritual thing, if you're allergic to that, call it your inner wisdom or your intuition, which is really a key to executive, to leadership success. And executive success is your willingness to listen to your inner wisdom before it's all perfect and you haven't CYA'd by trying to get everybody to sign off on what you're doing. And the willingness to take, you know, make courageous decisions like that based upon some sort of inner knowing, but, you know, trying to hang on and not listen, you know, I got to protect. I have to protect. I have to protect. Oh, my God. And I understand it, believe me, I'm in it too. But it's. It's strange how that works. It seems to be part of the lessons we're here to learn that, you know, it doesn't happen. Obviously, I don't know. The stuff I teach is oftentimes counterintuitive to people. It seems unnecessary, it seems uncomfortable, and it seems like, gee, way too much work to keep everything out of your head, decide outcomes and actions, organize it all, step back and review it regularly. That seems like more work than people actually want to do. So this thing doesn't seem to happen. It seems like we have these challenges that the psyche presents to us and all of which teach us who we really are in there.

Yeah. Then let go, let God and have.

A trusted system right yeah, well, you know, that isn't. You know what? Trust on Allah and tie your camel. You know, I would love to not have to worry about anything. You just show up at the phone and God gives me your phone number. That'd be sad. But until he does, I happen to have it right here. But I'm still open. Hey, I'm willing. That'd be fine.

Well, I think that in your point too, that if you want to hear the flute playing kind of in the background, and you've got a truck driving by you, two inches away from your face, you're going to have a hard time tuning into that flute. So just this idea of going back to the mundane, going back to the mundane, capturing and organizing and just really getting clear on what the next action steps are and taking them consistently allows us, paradoxically, that investment of effort allows us to connect that most divine within us. Yeah, it's a beautiful thing. And again, I'm inspired by your connection between the spiritual and the mundane. And then I think that I'm seeing such a core part of your practice is laughing. I mean, just how much the free spirit that you bring even to this conversation is inspiring to me.

God, you gotta have fun. I mean, it's, you know, it's. Yeah, well, you know, laughter is one of the things that a sure sign is spirit present. If there's a real authentic sense of humor. We know that in relationships, humor is the ultimate romance. Everything else has a half life.

Good stuff. Well, I'd love to chat about. Let's talk about fears for a moment. So fears. We'd love to hear how you have and deal with any fear that you have. Kind of exercise that. That courage muscle. I'll just pause there and I'll move on in a moment. But fear, one of the big things we talk about in Optim 101 and developing courage. What are your thoughts on it?

Sure. Hey, come on, look, you're either in love or fear. You're either an expansion or contraction. There's really no middle ground. So fear is just an indicator. I think that to me that I'm trying to hang on to something, that there's a lack of trust in the universe. I think caution and clarity is a very fine thing. Otherwise we have all been run over by some bus a long time ago. I think a distinction between am I contracting by this or is this creating and allowing expansion? So I think there's the critical criterion in there to make that distinction between am I holding back? Because is the holding back about anything? Is this Intuitive wisdom that says the timing's not right or am I afraid of something? Very subtle stuff. You have to really be very aware of where all those voices are coming from. So again, that's why spiritual exercises and the ability to be able to tap back into your higher self and perhaps the spirit inside of you that really knows. And that still small voice we all have, so learning to listen to that, I think is where is the big key. So fear is just. If I find myself in that modality, it's just a great wake up call. Hey, David, let go, relax, sit down, go inside, find out, explore this, see what it is. And sometimes it's just, I need to just start moving on this and seeing whether I start to feel more in contraction or more expansion as I move in and through this. So tricky stuff.

I think it comes back to the, you know, one of the core tenants you mentioned of acceptance and kind of embracing reality and being honest and being willing to look at what's really going on here. Is it caution or is it I just, you know, not willing to step outside my comfort zone right now?

Sure. And you have to be careful. You know, Jesus at some point was tempted by the devil in terms of how, whatever the biblical interpretation that was, but it was like, hey, go ahead and jump off because you're all powerful anyway. And that may not be smart. So tapping your intuitive wisdom about what to do versus I'm shut down or I'm voiding something because I'm afraid of something I might lose. Sometimes it's not that simple a distinction, but a very subtle and sublime one if you start to pay attention to those levels.

Love it. What would you describe as some of your fundamentals independent of this stuff that we've talked about today? Although anything you want to share related to kind of the getting things done methodology. But generally speaking, in your life, what things do you do that really help you stay plugged in so that you can live with this enthusiasm and playfulness and creative spirit?

Well, you know, I think the creative spirit is it. If I go too long without letting go and sort of going inside and finding out the deeper and more subtle worlds that I'm really engaged in. If I go too long without that and I get too wrapped up in the material physical world, well, you can get wrapped around that axle really tight and suddenly all the juice tends to. Well, not suddenly, actually. That's the problem. Very slowly. Let the frog, you know, that gets boiled alive if you boil the water too slow. So I have learned, you know, my biggest lesson Starting to pay attention to. Look, is my juice drying up? Because I'm getting too involved in the physical world. And so, you know, just a wake up call. Ding. You know, come on, David, relax, go back. Because you know, the funny thing is when you go inside, tap your intuitive knowing and tap the spirit inside, it produces this inspiring kind of energy that then makes you want to go into the world and go create and produce. And now I'm going to paint or painting, and now I'm going to write music and now I'm going to create a whole new thing and I'm not going to write a book. And then you go out there and get wrapped around that world and then if you don't stay connected to the source of what created that energy to begin with, then it can dry up very subtly. So learning to pay attention to that and make sure that I've got the appropriate rhythm, it doesn't take very long. 30 seconds. What does it take? Take a breath, relax, let go, Check in internally. And easier said than done.

Do you have any practices, any specific practices that you can mention or you feel inspired to share related to kind of when that juice is drying up, what you do to connect the source?

Just stop, sit down, go inside, close my eyes, focus on your breathing. I have some very simple mantras that I work with that are. They just sort of line up my thinking and my focus and my internal focus. Never hurts to sit down and use your creative imagination to imagine, you know, all kinds of cool, neat things, you know, and allow yourself to sort of move more into a positive energy state. All those techniques, there are probably 6 million techniques that have been out there that everybody, everybody and his brother who's ever been down this path probably has found a bunch of them.

Yep. Those mantras private or there's something you share?

There's one that's public. Some are private, but the Hu, the Hu chant is one I learned many, many years ago, which apparently the old Sanskrit word for God. And it seems to have a universal energy to it. So either hu or just the hu itself is a great frequency. I found that more useful and deeper than the home.

Beautiful. Wonderful. Well, thanks for sharing that. And you mentioned exercise. Exercise is one of your core fundamentals.

Oh, I'd love to think it was. It's one of those things. Okay, well, you know, time to go get off my butt and go put on my running clothes and go for a jog, a bike ride or lift a weight or two or, you know, do a few push ups or whatever. So you Know, I go through cycles of it, but that's one of the balance things. How much do I need? How long can I let it go, get involved in other stuff, pay attention to it.

That's great. Love it. And then just to kind of wrap up today, what would you say to someone who's interested in optimizing their lives, whatever they are on the spectrum? What would your number one tip be?

Well, it seems to be my concept du jour today is relax and let go. I guess the master key that's ties to a lot of the operational work that I do is pay attention to what has your attention, because what has your attention, there's a message there. The reason things have your attention is because there's something about that that has not yet been clarified, decided, or organized or structured appropriately. In other words, it's not on clues to be. So you don't have to go very far to see where to start to apply to getting things done method. It's just to say, wait a minute, what's on my mind right now? It's interesting that there's an inverse relationship between on your mind and getting done. The more stuff is actually bugging you now it's on your mind. If I'm doing creative developmental thinking or just appreciating or enjoying it or grazing, but just by looking around and appreciating stuff I'm thinking about, you know, that's great, but that's usually what's on people's mind are things that are concerning them, bothering them, you know, frustrating them, worrying and whatever. And that's where, that's. That's where your work is right there. Okay. Start to pay attention to what that is. Let go. And if you wanted to get that off your mind, you know, I just discovered the algorithms about how do you do that? You know, your spiritual work or your inner work, you can leave your mind, meaning I can let go of that level, but you're still going to have that static and that distraction there potentially when you come back to it. So I like to say, you know, like to keep it all as clear and clean as possible so that I just minimize the distractions in my life. But the way you do that is you start to pay attention to what has your attention. Because if you don't give appropriate attention to what has your attention, it'll start to take more of your attention than it deserves. Then you'll be out of balance.

Yep. Pay attention to what has your attention. Wonderful. Well, again, for those of you who haven't experienced David's work yet. Go to davidcoe.com, getting thanks. Totally transformed my life. Cannot recommend it strongly enough. David, thank you so much for who you are and the work you've done and taking the time today to share.

Brian My pleasure. Thank you very much.

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