Cause to Pause

If you have been experimenting with MS Office 2010, one of the features you have probably noticed is the ability to “share” a document or PPTX presentation via SkyDrive. Makes it handy if you are starting a doc at work and are going to finish it at home, etc. Also, if you save it to a public folder on your Skydrive, you can pass out access to that folder and others can collaborate accordingly.
Unfortunately, this handy little feature is not available in OneNote yet. That will be great for managing projects. Especially if you happen to work on a given project across multiple machines – desktop at work, laptop at home or on the road, etc.
Too bad it won’t be available until the full release later this year…..
Unless, it seems, you are running Windows 7 and have your OneNote notebooks indexed to Live Mesh. Then, you can email a link that looks like this:
https://somedigits.docs.live.net/9dafunkykeycode/Documents/Study/
Anyone with the proper Windows Live credentials (ie: you at work) can open the link and the notebook is added alongside the others. All changes will be synched immediately as a default, however you can also change that.
Another potential solution is to map a drive letter to your SkyDrive (I use www.Gladinet.com) and change the Notebook location to that drive. If you map a drive letter on the new machine to that same SkyDrive, you should be able to open it there. I have not tried this yet though.

All in all, I am finding OneNote to be a handy tool for projects as well as study – and I don’t miss not being able to access it from my phone – there is too much going on with that thing as it is.

POST EDIT: After two days, OneNote began crashing w/3 seconds of opening. System Restore did not correct. Uninstalled Gladinet. System operating normally.
If you use OneNote, I would stay away from Gladinet for drive mapping of either SkyDrive or Google Docs. 

Tags: multi-tasking, productivity

I have been extremely blessed the last few weeks to have had a very small part in a very large project. My part wasn’t all that important or difficult, but it gave me the opportunity to push myself and be part of a team. One I would not otherwise get to be so involved with.
Here’s what I learned:

• While I like to be in bed by 10:00-10:30 (because I get up at 5:00), if sufficiently stimulated, I can still crank way into the night.
• Cranking way into the night has its liabilities now that I am older.
• Compensating for said liabilities means changing screen resolution.
• Caffeine is not the best stimulant, enjoying what you are doing is.

There are a lot of other bullet points I could make, but it really all boils down to finding something you like to do and hammer it. Apart from your regular job. Sure, many of us are fortunate to actually like what we do all day. Some are even manic enough to pop out of bed like a toaster pastry saying “Whoo Boy, I GET to go to work today!”. That doesn’t count. What I am talking about is outside of work. Because by pushing yourself in a productive way outside of work, makes some of those difficult tasks at work seem much more manageable.
Hobbies don’t cut it. Because at the end of the day, a hobby is something you do for yourself. Which means it probably doesn’t matter or bring value to anyone else.
I think maybe this is why Jesus was so big on service. Because not only is it taking care of the needs of others, it is hitting a part of your soul that really needs tending.

So, find something you like to do, that you really enjoy, that has you operating in that “sweet spot”, to where time becomes completely irrelevant. Something that brings lasting value to others, and run with it for all it is worth. Even if it is only for a little while. You just might learn something about yourself.

WordPress Tags: productivity,team

I’m not making light of a tragic situation, but in case you are not aware, C.S. Lewis lived his life a confirmed bachelor. That was until he met his wife Joy late in life. 
Shortly after they were married she was succumbed to cancer and passed away. So great was Lewis’ sorrow that he could not express it. His only respite was to keep a notepad on a table. Everytime a thought entered his head he would jot it down. And then move on. This chronology became the book “A Grief Observed.” The progression of emotions is real and plainly evident. It is impossible to read this book without emotionally walking the path with the author.
Were he alive today, Lewis might have tweeted those short thoughts. Those observations of grief.

Twitter can be inane- “Went to the bathroom. Out of toilet paper again.”
Twitter can be an incredible time sink- “I need to know what each of the 237 people I am following are doing. Every three minutes.”
But, if you consider your audience, and take stock in your life-at this moment right now- you might find something that is of value to others.

Lewis put his grief out there, but he was willing to do that only because he lived it and it was real.
Live life. REALLY live life…only then will you have something to tweet about.

Tags: productivity