People who have a high level of perspective but a low level of control fall into the quadrant of the Crazy Maker: They have too many ideas in proportion to the amount they can get done, they take on too many commitments, and they make everyone around them nuts with random and uncontrolled directives. Their systems and behaviors are not functioning to capture and contain all of their creative output.
In its extreme form, this is the totally self-distracted state, with an inability to hold a focus for any appropriate length of time — the condition that is commonly referred to (rightly or wrongly) as attention deficit. In its milder form it is expressed as overcommitment: Your psychic bank account is overdrawn, and you have made more agreements with yourself and others than you have the ability to keep. This can range from promising too much to too many people to simply allowing yourself to collect far more to read on your coffee table (and all over your house) than you could ever possibly finish.
I refer to this as the “bright bauble” syndrome, and it’s one I myself fall into rather easily. I am prone to getting distracted by and attracted to the most glittering and glamorous thing in front of me, especially if it’s “warm and fresh” — whether doughnuts, e-mails, or ideas. I can resist anything but temptation, and all that’s required for something to qualify as a temptation is for it to show up in my visual or conscious field. I need and use GTD myself because I often have to have blinders, just like a horse, to stay on course.
On the Positive Side
Of course you can never really stop visioning because it’s natural to constantly imagine outcomes and goals. As soon as you decide to leave a room, you have made a commitment that is unfulfilled, which creates a cognitive dissonance that generates the juice necessary to get up and moving. Being attracted to something that you want to experience or accomplish is core to expressing and expanding yourself, whether it’s a matter of putting on a hat or creating a conference.
Many executives I have coached fall into this quadrant. They are successful because their visioning capacities give them the ability to create and lead into new territories and because they are sharp enough to cooperate with people and establish structures that make up for their lack of order.
There are also times when, in order to stay on course for yourself, you will simply need to unhook from organization and execution and get a little crazy. Sometimes it’s important to stretch into new places and spaces that will bring some valuable disturbance into, if not totally blow up, your comfortable, well-worn patterns.
Adapted from “Making It All Work” by David Allen, by arrangement with Viking, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
