Despite the fact that I have a well-thought out, time-tested system for productivity, and a wealth of productivity related software and resources at my fingertips all the time, I really fell off the bandwagon this past week. While the main reason can truly be summed in one word (lazyness) there were several distinct areas where I failed to stay disciplined, and boy did my productivity (and thus my stress level) suffer.

• I left tried and true tools. I recently decided to try out some Moleskine Volant Extra Smalls as my capture notebook, and the fact is they’re just too small for me. I can’t really plan anything, take any kind of good notes, or make use of a full two-page spread. Cahiers and the larger Volant notebooks are much better for how I use them. Here’s the real problem, though: Even though I was aware that the Volants weren’t working for me, I kept using them! I hate to waste paper, but this was a mistake. I should have accepted the loss, given the unused Volants to my wife or a friend, and gone back to a tool that I know works for me.

• I fragmented my information repositories. Somewhere along the line I thought it would be cool to have a separate capture notebook for tasks only, and other notebooks for journaling and random ideas. The only one I’ve been carrying around is the task notebook (I leave the others in my man-bag). The result is that I’m jotting down less ideas and I have less access to information I want to have on hand. I gained some portability in the exchange (I use a thinner notebook for tasks only) but I’m really not conviced the trade-off was worth it.

• I stopped reviewing/planning. This is where I got really lazy. I had been taking a specific time at the end of each of days (at 10pm for half an hour) to process tasks from my capture notebook and plan the next day. This really helped to me to hit the ground running in morning and feel less stressed in general. Well, somehow I got out of that habit (it’s really been almost month since I’ve been consistent) and man, did I pay for it…pages of unprocessed capture lists, an overflowing inbox, and stressful planning in the mornings have wreaked havoc on my soul. Okay, that may have been a bit melodramatic, but seriously, I’ve been way more stressed than I need to be, simply because I’ve not been discplined to have a brief process/plan/review time each day!

The recovery plan is simple, thank goodness….I’m just going to do the opposite of all my mistakes . I’ve learned my lesson over the past few weeks, and this last week especially. I’m sticking to tools I know work for me…serious experimentation can wait ’till summer or vacation. I’m going to go buy a decent full sized Moleskine and consolidate my lists and journals, and I have to get back in the habit of regularly processing tasks and planning my day. A key strategy for getting back the swing of things on that front will be scheduling (duh!) my process/review/plan time.

If you feel like you haven’t been disciplined lately either, here are my sugestions:

• Write out the specific areas that you’ve been lacking in. Sounds like it should be obvious, but taking a just minute to put it down on paper will help you to solidfy where you want to improve in your mind and help you focus on the next step.

• Create an action list. For me, it was “buy new notebook” and “schedule planning period.” That’s it. You might be surprised at how small this particular todo list will be.

• Just Do It. This is really hard part. At some point, you have to move beyond simply planning, and into actually being disciplined in order to stick to your system. To help me stay motivated, I plan on setting some goals I know I will only achieve if I stick to my system, like creating an hour or two of extra time this week for leisure reading. I also plan to create reminders in the form of notes or something on my desktop that will help remember that in the end, I will be less stressed if I just take a little time each day to stay on the ball.

Maybe you’ve made some of the same mistakes I have…how did you get back on track? Let us know in the forums.