THE PROACTIME METHOD 7

7. Rise above the daily grind to expand your horizon

Confronted with lots of tasks we risk not seeing the forest for the trees. We may lose our orientation. The goal is not visible anymore. Each tree can also hide a danger. We lack distance to take the right decisions.

It is all about the difference between the reactive and proactive approach. In the reactive mode, events govern our behavior. It can be vital to develop our reactivity, for example when driving a car to avoid an accident. In the proactive mode we pilot our activities on the basis of our goals and projects. We drive according to our goal, to our destination. In the present unstable times we have to be reactive and also proactive, for example in imagining possible evolutions which we may be confronted with in the future.

We gain height when we rise up from concrete to abstract levels, from details to overviews. With GoogleMaps, for example, you can zoom out to see a whole country and then zoom in until you get at the most detailed view of a specific house. We make tasks actionable when we move down to the most concrete level where they become tangible. On the other hand, when we have to manage lots of tasks, we have to rise up in grouping them by projects or even metaprojects. At higher levels we do not need to prioritize each task. We prioritize projects or metaprojects. The question about urgency and importance can be dropped when we proceed by projects. The logic sequence of the project actions determines the priority of each task.

PROACTIME includes other possibilities of grouping activities. Contexts can be assigned to tasks, for example, locations where we shall accomplish them or group of persons implied in these activities. The context tree offers a selective display of your tasks. You can also distinguish tasks by their added value. PROACTIME distinguishes five types on the basis of the hierarchical needs of Abraham Maslow. The definition is done on tab Analyze / Prepare your actions or on the Dashboard, the tab File your actions and in menu PLAN by the help of the context menu. Latter enables you to list only tasks of a specific type.

Last but not least you can distinguish your tasks and project actions by their level of difficulty. It is a useful approach to schedule tasks according to your daily energy levels. You can list them by difficulty on the Dashboard.

As we have seen we make tasks actionable in moving down to the details of concrete reality. We use the microscope. Rising up we take the telescope . Observing the stars, we look back into the past. When planning, we scrutinize the future. We leave the narrowness of the concrete present to adopt new viewpoints and to build the future we are looking for. We get at higher abstract levels.

We manage our use of time in alternating reactivity, the view of concrete reality and anticipation, the proactive view of how we want to create our future. It implies the intellectual flexibility to identify when the reactive mode is appropriate and when we have to privilege the proactive mode.

Menu ACT represents this move from concrete tasks to projects, metaprojects and finally to live goals and projects.

In conclusion, the ability to move up and down abstract levels is a primary skill in managing our use of time. It is also at the core of thinking in general, of decision making, problem solving, negotiating conflicts and motivating people. PROACTIME helps you to develop this skill.