Draw yourself a picture; Doodle your way to learning.

Rick Cecil and Lisa Haneberg are inspiring me today.

I really need to get better with graphics. For now I just have to copy theirs; that much I can handle. However I’m giving you thumbnails on purpose, for I want you to click into Rick’s and Lisa’s own blogs for the full posts (and full effect).

In his post today, Rick shares with us his learning take-away from Steve Pavlina’s recent series on Self Discipline. He shares some golden nuggets in his “little ecosystem” — I’m going to start using his phrase “energy management” — and he diagramed everything for us.

Self Discipline: Putting first things first

After reading Steve’s great series of posts on building self discipline, I got to thinking more about the Covey+GTD+NEA combinations that I’ve been exploring.

I’ve come to realize the self discipline is the key to being successful in any of these systems—it’s the basis for all of the core life skills. Without it, you don’t stand a chance at being successful. If, as Covey says, we should put first things first, then building self discipline is where we start. Not with personal productivity—though, you might very well use a personal productivity system to help you exercise your self discipline; the initial goal, though, is not to improve your productivity, rather it is to improve your self discipline—productivity gains will be a nice side effect. At least in the beginning.
— Rick Cecil.

Click in and read the rest. If you’ve been in sync with Talking Story this month, you’ll know that I’m also loving Rick’s GTD+Covey+NEA equation. If not, you can catch up with me here and here.

Then I clicked into Management Craft, and found Lisa’s very creative book review:

Two Podcasts and a Book with a Lingering Finish!

We interrupt this broadcast for an entertaining commercial moment.....

As an author, particularly a first time author, I need to put my marketing hat on every day. I decided to take the advice that I often give others and look outside my industry for new ideas.

Which industry tells its products' stories in a compelling manner and in such a way as to create public frenzy and buying binges....... Keep Reading.
—Lisa Haneberg

So well done! Click in and read the rest, for believe me, this is just the teaser! Lisa will inspire you too.

My own stuff is not as slick yet. When it comes to visuals, my diagrams are still of the pencil and paper variety, and I have to learn to turn them into eye candy. But that doesn’t stop me: I still draw them because it helps so much to do so.

I encourage you to go through the process Rick did: doodling and diagramming really works wonders in helping you learn. In my classes I am always encouraging people to mark up my book, for it I can see that it helps them.

Storyboards are fun: in Hawaii, Trin Hunt does wonderful presentations where she teaches everyone to take notes with window-paned sheets and mind-mapping techniques, and she provides you with a rainbow of highlighters and pentel markers as tools. Trin is a very engaging speaker, and her classes are a kick, but they also erupt in breakthrough moments where people have made self-discoveries within their own crude but colorful storyboards.

Pick up a pencil and a coupla highlighters to start, and draw freely as you read something. Diagram it. Doodle it. Storyboard it. Whatever it’s about, you’ll learn it and release some creativity you may not have realized you had.

Just a few more reasons I love our Ho‘ohana Community. Learning from each other rocks. What a great morning I’ve had so far.

Tagging Fun: Diagrams. Doodling. Drawing. Storyboards. Creativity. Learning Styles.

Comments

[Adrian Trenholm]

Aloha to you Rosa.

For more on energy management, try On Form by Jim Loehr and Tony Schwartz. Covers physical, emotional, mental and spiritual dimensions and aims for "Full Engagement."