Exploring Weaknesses: Lack of Planning
There’s debate whether it’s more effective to build on our strengths or fix our weaknesses. I have my fair share of weaknesses, of course! I wanted to introspect a little and explore a few of my weaknesses. Today: planning.
The symptom
I’m not very good at planning. So I periodically think “man, I should get better at this planning thing!” and over-react by over-planning and over-committing myself.
Getting up at 6.30 in the morning to work on personal projects. Scheduling my whole week in Google calendar to optimize every freaking hour (I’m not kidding, I had a week planned from the wakeup till bedtime).I had appointments to “skype with girlfriend” or “call Mom”. I even had fun stuff planned there, friday evening 7-11pm was “socializing with colleagues”. Ha! I can be such a freak sometimes. When I realize it I often picture a rastafarian guy smoking a joint, listening to reggae music and telling me “just relax, man”.
Just relax man!
So over planning is not the solution. But I still feel my life could do with better planning.
Why it’s important
Some of my unhappiness comes down to a lack of planning. Not planning weekends, not planning fun things to do, not planning travels, and I feel a bit stupid sometimes for not knowing what to do (because I didn’t plan anything) while life goes on. I’ve never been used to plan things and have mostly relied on other people doing the planning for me. Except things are quiet when they don’t. So that’s something I wanted to change. I’m in charge of my own life after all so if I want something, I have to make it happen 
So I’m trying to get better at it. I’m being more proactive looking up for stuff in advance, inviting people to events, and the like.
Planning the professional life
But I could also use some planning for work. Looking up conferences, meetups. Going to social events, meeting my peers. Planning which projects I want to work on, which skills I want to master, which topics I want to study.
There’s still a lot to improve on.
Are you also struggling with lack of planning? Do you want to share how you overcome it, or why you’re completely fed up with yourself because of it?
Hey Tommy,
Nice post. It’s crazy to read that you’re thinking about the same stuff again. I guess building stuff has some patterns?
What have you found works best for planning?
The method I’ve been using for myself that’s worked best has been to answer –
Who, what, where, when, why, how and how much for my project. Seems to be enough to get going.
Still could get better I guess.
Anyway, enjoy reading your stuff so keep posting.
Hey Walt, thanks for your comment. Your question is quite broad but from your own answer I assume you mean how to plan and get started on a project. For me, I experimented with different approaches. Making sure your projects fits in an overall plan (your why) is first on my mind. This has the potential drawback of spending too much time thinking and not enough doing. Could be better too