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2024-10-31 | ๐ช Linear ๐ก Living ๐ฃ๏ธ
๐ค More thoughts on Linear Processes
๐ก Household Chores
๐ฉ I donโt love doing dishes.
๐ But we have a nice process that makes it easy to do a little at a time.
๐งบ Same with laundry.
๐ค Something about this reminds me of a Kanban planning scheme I designed for work a while back.
๐ฆ Kanban
๐ค Actually, I think these are all examples of Kanban systems.
๐ฆ In Kanban, the flow of work is not necessarily represented by paper cards or digital representations of sticky notes.
๐งบ A basket that moves laundry from the bedroom to the laundry room is a form of Kanban.
โก๏ธ Maybe these are all Linear Processes.
๐ Non-linear processes
๐ค I think I tend to think of home organization as a non-linear process.
๐ Itโs big, complex, and overwhelming.
๐ท To make progress, I may need to hire experts and spend days organizing and engineering systems to maintain organization.
๐ช๏ธ A flurry of intense activity is required in a short period of time.
โ ๏ธ Otherwise we may wind up with half the house inside out and unusable, making things worse.
โ๏ธ System Design
๐ค But maybe it doesnโt have to be that way.
๐ก Maybe we can design an organization process that is nice in the same way that the dishes ๐ฝ๏ธ, laundry ๐งบ, and Kanban planning ๐ฆ are nice.
๐ช A process where incremental progress can happen a little at a time.
๐ค Where a little work yields a little improvement.
๐ This would make the effort a lot less overwhelming.
๐ A lot easier.
โ
Progress could be made.
โก๏ธ Linear Organization
๐ค What would this linear home organization process look like?
๐ญ Iโm imagining a system that looks like combination of Kanban planning ๐ฆ and laundry ๐งบ.
๐ฉโโค๏ธโ๐จ My wife and I can collect ideas on a Kanban board.
โ๏ธ A little at a time, we can expand and define these ideas, adding critical details about goals, outcomes, and the steps necessary to move ideas to reality.
โ
When an idea is well fleshed out and we agree it should be done, we can start working one little step at a time.
โก๏ธ The execution plan should be linear to be well behaved.
โ ๏ธ Each step should leave the house in a state of minimal disruption.
๐ We donโt want a closet organization project paused in a way that prevents us from getting dressed on a daily basis.
๐ค Much Ado about Planning?
๐ง I pause and reflect.
๐คฏ This feels almost revolutionary.
๐คฉ Exciting.
โจ Novel.
๐ฒ Wow.
โก๏ธ A way convert a big, overwhelming, potentially disruptive venture into a series of small, easy, safe steps to achieve a goal.
๐ Designing linear processes!
๐คฏ Wow. So sophisticated. The welding of abstract mathematics to tame menacing real life projects.
โ Or is this just planning?
๐ Write down a goal. ์ชผ Split a big project into little tasks. โ
Complete work a bit at a time.
๐ฎ Peer into the future. ๐ญ Simulate activities. ๐ Look for problems in the simulation. โ๏ธ Write down the steps.
๐ค Do people do this all the time?
๐ง Am I discovering something obvious?
๐คท I canโt tell. ๐ฃ๏ธ Maybe Iโll ask around.
๐ I guess it doesnโt matter much for me.
โ
Whether planning or designing linear processes is obvious to the rest of the world or not, itโs useful to me.
โ๏ธ Blogging
๐ง I think this is also a linear process.
- ๐ก I get an idea
- ๐ฑ I open my phone
- โ๏ธ I write a few words
- ๐ I publish my notes
- ๐ I revisit an idea
- โ๏ธ I revise prior writing
- ๐ข I publish again
๐ I can write and publish a little at a time and my website grows on its own.
๐๏ธ I did a bit of planning when I started this.
โณ And Iโve done bits more over time.
๐งฑ A little more structure here, โ๏ธ a little more writing there.
๐ฑ Continuous, gradual, incremental improvement.
๐ Pretty cool, I think.
๐งช A Test
โณ Letโs see how easily I can find my notes on setting up this blogging system to drop a link.
๐ My blogs posts are currently untitled (minus the date), which makes the Reflections index of limited use.
๐ But I can search for key terms, like โobsidian publishโ and see what comes back.
๐ Boom second of 2 results: 2024-04-21. โ
Easy.
๐ฅณ Thank you, me from 6 months ago! ๐ Look what weโve done! ๐
๐ Okay. Enough for now. ๐ Back to my morning routineโฆ