Introduction: The Getting Things Done (GTD) Program

The Getting Things Done (GTD) program is designed to increase your productivity and effectiveness—not so you can squeeze even more into your already busy life, but so that you can do things with less time, energy, and effort. When you feel in control of your life and your to-do list, you can be present in each moment without the nagging feeling that there’s something else you should be doing. When your mind is clear, you can focus and use your creative energy for the task at hand, and in your free moments, you can fully enjoy life without feeling guilty that you’re not doing something “productive.”

The GTD program is meant to be a lifelong practice, and you’ll continually graduate to more advanced levels of application. As you start to cement the strategies as habits, you’ll reach new levels of mastery to enhance your life and productivity in new ways: Once staying on top of your emails is second nature, use your skills (and newfound free time and energy) to take on a new hobby or strengthen your important relationships.

In the meantime, don’t wait until you finish the book to start using the strategies—put them into practice as you go. Practicing the skills will give you a richer understanding and help you dive deeper into the program.

Many readers regularly re-read this book and come away with something new each time. The program requires more habit changes than most people can fully implement all at once, so readers tend to absorb pieces at a time; after the first time through, start practicing the basics, and the next time you’ll better understand the strategies for refining those basic skills. Each time you read the book, you gain a new level of understanding and practice.

Revised Edition Of The Book: New World, Same Program

This book has been revised and updated from its original 2001 edition. The principles and general strategies remain the same, but the world is a different place than it was at the turn of the century, so the author has made the following adjustments and additions:

• He incorporates the rise of digital technology and the ubiquity of apps designed to help you organize and schedule your life. The digital world compounds the problem of being overloaded with tasks and information while also offering more tools to deal with it. The author doesn’t list any specific apps or software, but he builds more flexibility into his advice about organizing with paper and digital tools.
• He addresses a broader audience of people seeking help organizing their lives. The original version was geared more toward executives and professionals. The revised version acknowledges that everyone is overloaded with tasks and information—in large part because we’re living simultaneously in the real and digital worlds—and needs help gaining control of life’s many demands.
• He takes a gentler approach to instructing readers on how to implement the program. Some readers of the original version felt that the GTD program was too overwhelming to take on; while the author doesn’t remove anything from the program, he emphasizes the fact that implementing it will be a long-term process, and that any pieces of the program you can put into practice will be helpful.
• He adds cognitive research that affirms the validity of the GTD approach. Much of this evidence didn’t exist when the original was published, but studies have since proven his claims.