I spoke on a episode 118 of the Mac Power Users about a habit app I’ve been using but then forgot to include the link in the show notes. It is this one, Good Habits.

Good Habits is just the right mix of practical and fiddle for my taste. I’ve got a nice list of habits I’m working on in there and I find it very satisfying keeping my momentum going as I open it at the end of the day and check off things. Several of my daily tasks from OmniFocus have transitioned over. These include things like flossing teeth, checking banking site, logging food, and doing something (anything) on a MacSparky Field Guide. These never felt like tasks so much as habits and I’m glad to have them out of my OmniFocus database.

Anyway, the app is free and if you are looking for a way to give yourself a little geek-motivation, I recommend it.

There is a lot to like about the Omni Group’s OmniFocus Mail Sync service. I’ve written about it before and it is amazing. Forward an email to a certain email address and a task built around that email just shows up in your inbox Omni-Synced OmniFocus database.

It gets even more interesting when you start automating email. You could, for instance, set up an Apple Mail rule that automatically forwards an email from your cable company to the the Sync Service and files the original email in your archive.

Think about that for just a moment. An email arrives, a task is created, the email gets filed. Your total involvement: zero.

You could also use something like IFTTT to do the same thing. The IFTTT hooks in Gmail give you enough control to pull it off. Create a rule that examines incoming Gmail for a particular recipient (like your cable company). Next, have Gmail forward the email to your magic Omni Sync address.

Unfortunately, this only works with Gmail. IFTTT’s IMAP email account support doesn’t give you enough control.

There are several local and web-based mail services that can forward an email for you. For instance, if you are working for “the man”, you could set up the auto-forward in Outlook. Use a little creativity, this should work for everyone.

TextDrop is a Markdown friendly web based text editor that looks at everything in your storage. It is fast, easy, and magical. MacDrifter did a thourough job of writing up the latest update. I’ve only been a paid subscriber for a few weeks but I’m already hooked. If you want an easy way to access your text from any computer, this is worth it. If you spend any time sitting at a “work PC”, this is an absolute no-brainer.

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I’m in the curent edition of Read & Trust magazine, this time talking about craftsmanship and my father.

Below is a reprint of an essay on productivity I wrote for the the Read & Trust magazine last October.

Productivity is a loaded word

Superficially, productivity implies some super-human skill to keep busy where other mortals can not. It is the polar opposite of the dilly-dally. I can’t go to the park today. I need to be productive. I want to be more productive. Don’t you? If not, what’s wrong with you?

For the longest time, I thought productivity was something I could conquer. I sure tried to conquer it. I put my head down and ran straight at it full tilt. I repeatedly bashed my skull into it for years. I can look at so much folly in my life arising from this private war with that slippery productivity.

When I should have focussed on why I’d lost interest in engineering, instead I obsessed over learning to use an engineering calculator. As a young lawyer, I spent days generating forms that I’d never use. My life is a long series of fool’s errands all in the name of productivity. Productivity gave me a perfect out when I didn’t want to pay attention to the direction my ship was heading.

I never grew out of this personality flaw. I’m still likely to stick unfortunate body parts into the productivity bear trap. Maybe it is the latest app or technique or book that everybody swears is the answer to finally getting my shit together. They are all so tempting to me. I don’t think I’ll ever entirely get over it. I’m like a reformed alcoholic trying to walk my way down Bourbon Street without falling off the wagon.

What I have obtained, however, is a degree of wisdom. I accept that productivity crap is my own personal kryptonite. I consider myself enlightened in this way.

Having made every mistake, I can testify that for a lot of people, productivity is what people talk about when they are unknowingly running in circles. For a lot of us, it has become what we do when we are having trouble making tough decisions.

Knowledge is power. Now that I’ve accepted this personal foible, I pay attention. If I’m suddenly much more concerned about sorting and organizing projects than doing them, red flags go up. I’ve got to examine things closely. Usually there is a reason. Maybe the project itself isn’t something I want to do any more. Maybe the project no longer makes sense. Or maybe it is just really fracking hard and I’m putting it off by finding some way to be more productive.

If you bang your head into this enough times, eventually it sinks in. Productivity is not something to conquer. Indeed, like some mystic religion (or my sister’s cat), the way to get productive is not through pursuit but instead focussing elsewhere.

It was only when I started really thinking about my life that I got productive. As I started choosing my battles and focussing on my own lovely windmills, I really started getting things done. No collection of productivity hacks and software is going to make a difference when you’re heading full speed at that iceberg. Instead put down the fiddly stuff and and pull hard to starboard.

Then, when you are indeed pointing the right direction, do you become productive. At that point, you can even return to your fiddly tools (with moderation) and they can make a difference.

Like I said, productivity is a loaded word.

“‘Consistency’ has become a synonym for consistent mediocrity of ‘powerpoints’: the slides covered with text and bullet points.”

At some point we all need to stand up and just start refusing to submit “Powerpoints” to conference materials. Like Aleh, my slide deck is completely unintelligible without me there talking.

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Andy Ihnatko turned me on to this years ago. Every New Years Day, every font in ComiCraft’s inventory is marked down to cost a penny per year (this year $20.13). Every year I plunk down my twenty bucks for another and now I’ve got a really nice collection of interesting fonts. This year, Lunar.

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