Articles by Jean Moroney
Here is a guide to the many articles on this site.
Book Recommendations: I write book recommendations for books I am willing to give a 5-star recommendation. That means I found the book, not only true and clear, but so original and valuable that I expect to refer to it and re-read it. I always try to name what I found so valuable about the book in my recommendation. Some of my most often cited book recommendations are:
- David Allen, Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity
- David Burns, When Panic Attacks
- Dennis Greenberger & Christine Padesky, Mind Over Mood
- Darrell Huff: How to Lie With Statistics
- Alan Lakein, How to Get Control of Your Time and Your Life
- James Prochaska, John Norcross & Carlos Diclemente, Changing for Good
A list of all of my book and product recommendations on the site is here.
Thinking Tools: In order to manage your time, you need to be able to solve problems, make decisions, and plan work quickly. Or, to be more exact, you need to be able to do these thinking tasks in an appropriately short amount of time. “Appropriate” depends on the importance of the task. There are some problems or decisions that matter so much, that you keep coming back to them over a long period of time. But that should not be the norm. To solve problems faster, make better decisions, and plan work using less than 5% of the available time, you can benefit from using thinking tools that help you concentrate, activate relevant knowledge, and get to a result quickly. I have developed many thinking tools over the years, which I teach in my classes. Some short writeups are available on the blog, such as:
- Speed Up by Slowing Down
- Wishing for Motivation
- Setting Standing Orders
- Jump-Start Your Thinking
- Mental Cleanup Time **
- Getting Started Using a Bit of Pretend
- How a Decision Log Can Help You Move from Scattered to Streamlined
- Coping with Interruptions
A list of short writeups on Thinking Tools, open to the public, is here. Writeups for all the thinking tools I teach are available to Thinking Lab members in the Thinking Lab Library.
Focusing on Values: A theme that has evolved from my work over the last twenty years is the need to focus on values in every situation. This means that instead of testing everything by whether you feel good, checking off concrete “to do’s,” or just doing things because you “should” or someone expects you to, you figure out what really matters. By values, I mean what matters to you, at root, for your life. A few articles on this topic:
Understanding Emotions: Emotions can motivate work, leading to high productivity, or not. If you want to be able to manage your own motivation, you need to understand your emotions. Emotions are signals that there is a threat or an opportunity. Interpreting that signal, and validating it, are skills to develop. A few articles on this topic are:
- Don’t Let Pressure Sabotage Your Thinking
- The Work of Worry
- Burnout
- Introspect So You Can Take Action
- Three Observations About Accepting Facts
- Empathy Bath
Other articles on this topic are here. Plus, much more instruction is available in the Thinking Lab.
Acting on Priorities: There is no advice on productivity that isn’t advice about how to get into action. Though my area of specialization is the mental side of productivity, it’s all for nought if you don’t act on your decisions, take the steps to solve the problem, and make progress toward that goal. Here are some articles on this topic:
- Aiding Willpower
- Getting Started Using a Bit of Pretend
- Unclear on Your Priorities? Do a Thought Experiment
- How Latent Knowledge Can Help You Choose Priorities
- How Triage Can Help You Prioritize Under Pressure
- How a Decision Log Can Help You Move from Scattered to Streamlined
- Find Yourself Digressing? Take a Quick Timeout
- How Thinking Sooner Can Help You Follow Through on Good Intentions Later
- Becoming More Productive by Testing the Rule of Six
- Taking Words Seriously Can Help You Get Things Done
And the rest of the articles:
Other categories of articles include: Communications Skills, Course Correction, Creativity, Decision Making, Following Through, Goal Setting, Habits, and New Year’s.
Read my most recent articles on the Blog. Or search the entire site, including the Thinking Lab pages, using the Search bar at the top right side of the page.