一个大学讲师在上课的时候带了一袋沙子、一袋小鹅卵石、几块大石头和一个木桶，问有没有人能把这几种不同形状的东西都装进木桶。一个热心的学生自告奋勇走 上讲台随手抓起沙袋就往木桶里倒，然后把小鹅卵石也放了进去，但是轮到大石头的时候，他发现木桶里的空间已经不够了。讲师遗憾地摇了摇头。他把木桶清空 了，先把那几块大石头放进木桶，再把小鹅卵石放进去，然后倒入沙子。最后他摇了摇木桶，只见这三种不同形状的东西配合得天衣无缝，把木桶挤得满满的。
如果将你的一周比喻成七个大木桶，而你每天需要完成的事情按重要性比喻成大石头，小鹅卵石和沙子。仔细想想，现在的你是先倒入的沙袋呢？还是先放的大石头？
为你的下一周做计划，把大石头放前面
这个同计划每日最重要的事情（MITs）几乎一样，只是这里是计划每一周而非每一天。这里的大石头指的事是每周最重要的任务。那如何为你的下一周做计划？
- 列一张任务清单。在每周开始前（星期天的晚上或者星期一的早晨）写下你想在这一周完成的重要的任务。记住是写重要的任务。
- 保持简单。刚刚开始为下一周做计划时，只需要写4～6个大石头。不要一开始就列出10多个大石头，如果未完成它们，就只会打击你的自信心。以后你就要判断自己每周应该能完成多少重要的事，不要超额。
- 放置大石头。检查你的周程安排（如果你没有，开始一个，或者使用google calender），先把已经有预约的事情列出来，然后把你的大石头放进去。最好把它们放到一个你绝对能有时间去完成的时候，而非最忙碌的时刻，也不要放太少的时间，要让自己有时间去完成。
- 留些空间。每天早晨，检查你的大石头和MITs，不要让自己的日程安排太紧凑。紧凑的日程安排只会让安排的事情混淆，把已经订好的事情往后推迟。
- 尽早完成。如果可以，把大石头放在早晨做，尽量不要放到傍晚或者晚上。因为傍晚和晚上只会让你产生拖延的想法。
- 感到自豪。如果你的大石头都完成了，wow！为自己鼓掌，欢呼～
这些简单的方法为什么会让你的效率翻倍？你要明白效率并不是指完成很多事情，而是指完成最重要、有用的事。如果你到处奔波就是为了完成些小事情，你的确完成了很多事情也很忙碌，但是你到底完成了多少份量的事情？时常的，我们回顾过去的一周，也许没有完成很多事情，但是可以自豪地说已经把重要的事情已经完成了。这样你才会觉得开心对吧。学会放大石头的艺术，你会发现自己变得更有效率的。
If your week is seven buckets, and you go into each bucket without planning ahead, and you fill it up with little pebbles and grains of sand and whatever other debris comes your way … soon there will be no room for the Big Rocks. Your buckets fill up faster than you know it, and once your buckets are full, you’re done. You can’t get bigger buckets.
What you can do is put the Big Rocks in first, and fill in the pebbles and sand around them.
The Big Rocks are the major things you want to get done this week. A report, launching a new website, going to the gym, spending time with your spouse and kids, achieving your dreams. These Big Rocks get pushed back from week to week because we never have time to do them — our days fill up too quickly, and before we know it, weeks have passed and the Big Rocks are still sitting on the side, untouched.
Plan your week ahead of time, placing your Big Rocks first.
This is a similar concept to MITs, except on a weekly scale instead of a daily scale. Big Rocks are your MITs for the week.
Here’s how you do it (with the unavoidable list, of course!):
- Make a list. At the beginning of the week — Sunday evening or Monday morning — write out the Big Rocks that you want to accomplish this week. These should be the important things — if you looked back on the week and said you did them, you would be proud of having done them. Be sure to include not only work stuff, but some of the tasks that will further along your life’s goals and dreams.
- Keep it short. In the beginning, just have 4-6 … you don’t need to try to do 10 or more Big Rocks, especially not at first. Later, you may get better at judging how many Big Rocks you can do in a week, but for now, shoot for about one per day.
- Place the Rocks. Look at your weekly schedule. If you don’t have one, write out the days of the week with one-hour blocks (or print out a schedule from an online calendar). Write out pre-existing appointments. Now take your Big Rocks, and put them in the schedule. Try to put them in a spot where you know you’ll get them done. Not a spot that’s traditionally too busy to concentrate, and not in a little half-hour window between meetings. Give yourself time to do it.
- Leave space for the incoming pebbles. Don’t fill in the rest of the schedule if possible. Every morning, look at your schedule and commit yourself to doing the Big Rock(s) for that day. That’s your MIT for the day. If there are less important MITs, you can put them in the schedule, but don’t put too much. A tight schedule tends to bump into itself, pushing things back when other things inevitably take too long.
- Do it early. If you can, place your Big Rocks first thing in the morning. Don’t schedule them for later in the day if possible, because by that time, a few fires have come up, and the Big Rock will get pushed back as always. Do it first, and then you’ve got the rest of the day for the busy-work.
- Be Proud. When your week’s done, look back on it — if you got any (or all!) of the Big Rocks done, be proud of yourself and happy. It feels good!
How does this simple method make you more productive? Well, productivity isn’t about doing a lot of stuff. It’s about getting the important stuff done. But if you’re running around doing all the little stuff … sure, you did a lot and you were very busy, but how much did you really accomplish? Oftentimes we can look back on our week and say, “I didn’t get a lot done, but I sure was stressed doing it!”
This is a way of getting the important stuff done. Sure, you’ll still have to worry about the little stuff. But at the end of the week, you can look back and say that you’ve been productive. It makes a world of difference.
Note: You probably noticed that this post isn’t really about GTD. But I’ve found that it works incredibly well with GTD, and I’d recommend that you use the two systems together.
Update: As some have pointed out in the comments, this is not an original idea. Steven Covey (in his books 7 Habits of Highly Effective People and First Things First) and others have used this idea for a long time. I should also point out that the idea is not Covey’s originally (although I might have read it from him first) – he relates the Big Rocks story as one that his associate heard at a seminar. I just wanted to share it as something that works for me, and could be used in conjunction with GTD. I hope you’ve found it useful!
关注，时间管理学院！