Top 15 David Allen Quotes

Your mind is for having ideas, not holding them.

If you don't pay appropriate attention to what has your attention, it will take more of your attention than it deserves.

You can do anything, but not everything.

"You don't actually do a project; you can only do action steps related to it. When enough of the right action steps have been taken, some situation will have been created that matches your initial picture of the outcome closely enough that you can call it "done.

Your ability to generate power is directly proportional to your ability to relax.

Much of the stress that people feel doesn't come from having too much to do. It comes from not finishing what they've started.

Most people feel best about their work the week before their vacation, but it's not because of the vacation itself. What do you do the last week before you leave on a big trip? You clean up, close up, clarify, and renegotiate all your agreements with yourself and others. I just suggest that you do this weekly instead of yearly.

You can fool everyone else, but you can't fool your own mind.

Everything you’ve told yourself you ought to do, your mind thinks you should do right now. Frankly, as soon add you have two things to do stored in your RAM, you’ve generated personal failure, because you can’t do two things at the same time. This produces an all-pervasive stress factor whose source can’t be pin-pointed.

Use your mind to think about things, rather than think of them. You want to be adding value as you think about projects and people, not simply reminding yourself they exist.

When we truly need to do is often what we most feel like avoiding.

The secret of getting ahead is getting started. The secret of getting started is breaking your complex overwhelming tasks into small, manageable tasks, and then starting on the first one. — Mark Twain

Anything that causes you to overreact or underreact can control you, and often does.

It does not take much strength to do things, but it requires a great deal of strength to decide what to do. — Elbert Hubbard

Pick battles big enough to matter, small enough to win. — Jonathan Kozol