• “the big” imac to deal with video. (28″ with a dual monitor setup, loads of space).
• a mac mini standup desk (and 30″ monitor) to deal with customer contact.
• a white macbook for “writing.”

This was 3 workstations for just me. I wasn’t making a ton of money.  I was a poseur, hopped up on lists, GTD and other kludges that simply aren’t generally good ideas.  I wanted to be this serial entrepreneur.  All I was doing was spinning my wheels, reinventing my productivity systems time and time again.  I had it all: google notebook, evernote, Jott.

I had my own office, a place with my company name on the door that cost $1,000 a month or more, walking distance from my place.

All these tools. None of them necessary.

Fact is there was nothing that I did that needed to be “managed.”  I would have been infinitely more productive had I just gone to where I was drawn.  I kept thinking that this next tech gadget would be the one that recreated me. That saved me.  That changed things. That made me thin, happy, and rich.

Thing is, I was human sprawl. I was going wider without attacking real problems. I spent hours on productivity overhead, and before I could start to work, I had this convoluted system to manage.

Now, I’m making more money than I have in my life, I have a more stable business, and I’m happier.

My whole business fits in a small bag, on a 13″ macbook air.  I have an iPad for pitching. I have a PO Box for getting my mail.  I use things like Tout  and Batchbook. I could probably get  by without them just fine. I work from the back bedroom of my house, and the odd coffeeshop.  I do more real work than I did when I had these endless GTD lists.

I had a productivity apparatus that had become a one person bureaucracy where I barely had permission to get anything done ever.

There’s a lot of waste and failure points when you have a system with a ton of tools, and one that requires a ton of gear changes.

Now, it’s time to look at reducing my footprint in other areas:

• What I wear
• What I own
• How I eat.

Related posts:

1. Friction A little friction here and there ads up. If you...
2. Perfect Day What is your perfect day? Have you given this much...
3. Zen To Done: A Simple Getting Things Done (GTD) System That SO Lives Up To The Hype Technorati Tags: GTD,ZTD,GenuineChris I’ve been struggling with GTD for a...

Then January hits and they do 0-1 deals, and the deeals that they do are carryover from December–fallout.

Then Feburary hits and they start to panic.

Well, I’m not in that boat–i’m not a full time practitioner anymore, I still am in the RE cycle.  And i still need business both now and in January.   So, I decided to do something fun:

I’m counting December 1, 2008 as my ‘fiscal year.’  I want to start a month early, while I’m focused and motivated so I hit my goals….starting this month, not wanting to dig a hole is a kludge to make sure I get what I want to get done, done.  I created something in Google Docs to hold myself publicly accountable.  Since I switched from being a Realtor->mortgage broker->freelancer…I needed to do this to make sure I do what I say I’m doing.

I made this scorecard to make sure that I stay on task & on target:

I’ve got 21 planned work days so that generates the calculations that are going to show what pace I’m going to be on/etc.  The workouts that I do will either be ahead or behind because I do one at a time, and that’s OK.   The rest of it tracks me.

It has some oddball goals: to lose 4.5#/week through the holidays is to be fun, and much easier this year…but the way it usually works is that suddenly I find myself 3# lighter, after staying the same weight for 2-3  days.  Anyway, that’s produced the idea that I’ll be losing 63# in December based on the fact that I weighed in on a ‘high’ weight day.  it’ll normalize when time passes and I don’t have extra days.  Still, kind of fun.

In 2009–which starts tomorrow–I’m going to have a good year.  My primary goal is to get myself to 160#.   That’s not going to be easy by any means, but it will certainly happen–of this I have no doubt.  The next goals are to finish the rewrite of Subprime, to get F–therapy up and out, and to have a practice that rakes in $225-250k in consulting fees.  All while continuing to enhance my character and work out my relationship with the Nazerene.  I’ll codify a little bit better tomorrow, at some point.

Right now, I’m overdue on about 400 deadlines cause I was fighting a war maiahost.com  (great company for 1-5 blogs, needs help for more than that).  So extricating 25++ blogs I manage for people to my new host is a PITA.  I can thank Laura for that stuff.

Anyway, as is always the case, more to come.

Related posts:

1. Goals…Update So right now, the revenue part of the Chris Johnson...
2. Five Figure Months…Joe’s Goals and Google Docs So the sidebar “transparency” project is nearly done. I’m glad....
3. May 2009 Goals: Some BHAGs There is really light at the end of the tunnel...