The "to-don't" list

I'm sure there was more I was thinking of when it came to my wife deciding to wake up at 5 AM, which ultimately led to me waking up at 5 AM.  But my brain jumps around like a squirrel on crack, and today I'm just going to follow it.  My brain is on the "to-don't" list.

The "to-don't" list is much like the fabled "to-do" list.  I've come to conclude that the to-don't list is more important than the to-do list.  The to-do list creates a list of things that "need" to be done.  And those are generally well understood.  I should exercise more.  I should keep my check book balanced.  I should study for the next thing I'm going to take on. 

But the "to-don't" list is an unsung hero.  I heard about it in Jim Collins' book Good to Great.  Collins describes it as something more important than a "to-do" list because it is just as important to understand what you shouldn't do as to understand what you should do.  That sentence made absolutely no sense, so I'll explain. 

I have a tendency to have about a thousand ideas running through my head at any different time.  Those involve 3D world creation and architecture, programming, thoughts on robotics, learning Java, learning some version of Microsoft server software, and countless others.  The "to-don't" provides me clarity in what I should and shouldn't be doing.  Even though all those other things are fun little toys to play with, they aren't going to get me where I want to go if I performed them rigorously for the next ten years or so.  In other words, they are nice flights of fancy but they are JUST THAT: flights of fancy. 

Now learning or performing some of what I listed could potentially get me a different job with faster promotion and pay characteristics.  But at the moment, I'm going to give my effort towards my current job.  At the moment, I'm not betting the farm on my current job, but I am planning that to be my advancement. 

Secondly, I took that list of what I wanted to do and developed my "to-don't" list and turned it into a sequential "when" list.  The goal is to never stop learning and improving.  So right now I've got my reading list broken into two parts: practical application and theory. 

The theory portion of learning fits in the category of reading generic business books or IT related books like Time Management forSystem Administrators by Thomas a Limoncelli , the aforementioned Good to Great, or Stephen R. Covey's The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.

My technical list includes a different but just as important variety of books.  Right now, I'm working on Cisco ICND part 1 and 2.  Afterwards, I'm probably going towards Cisco Voice, and then towards the MCTS 70-680 exam for Windows 7, and finally off towards learning Java. 

Let's face it: I work a technical job and technical information is what I need.  Especially when it comes to fixing stuff. 

Anyways, the "to-don't" list has clarified what I need to do to succeed.  In part, it's taking the vagueness and wanderlust out of my random ideas.  What good is random ideas if they don't come to some sort of fruition, anyways?