Information Overload | Info Grooming

Reconnect with Nature to Beat Information Overload

One of the best ways to beat information overload is to take time to reconnect with nature. I spent the morning at my computer paying bills, updating a membership database, and writing a newsletter, but I took time this afternoon to enjoy the cold but sunny day. I like gardening, so I did cleaned up the yard and cleared weeds out of my vegetable garden. Signs of spring were everywhere—worms writhing in the soil, birds singing, and crocuses and snowdrops blooming. It was good exercise and a relaxing break after an intense week.

What’s your favorite way to reconnect with nature?

Celebrate Time Management Month

Did you know February is Time Management Month? To mark the occasion, I’ve teamed up with other organization and time management experts to create a fabulous giveaway.

Just visit http://www.TimeManagementGiveaway.com to get your free tools on managing your time more effectively. You’ll discover resources on

Organizing your small business and office
How to save time and trouble for you and your business
Online time management strategies
Business systems and structures
Productivity tips
Using ready-to-go articles in your newsletter
Social media made simple
Office makeovers
How to get more done in less time
How to beat information overload (That’s my e-course Beat Information Overload the 5F Way, which has been newly revised for this giveaway.)
And more!

Everything is free. There’s nothing to buy. This isn’t a teaser offer where you only get to see what’s listed and then have to buy something in order to get the goods. But the giveaway event is only scheduled to run through Feb. 28, 2011.

Time is the one thing you can’t make more of. But you can probably make better use of the time you have. Use a few minutes now to check out http://www.TimeManagementGiveaway.com and pick up some great new ideas. Then let me know which giveaways helped you the most!

Task Management and Priority Setting by Using Questions

When managing day-to-day tasks, it can be difficult to keep the big picture in mind. It’s tempting and natural to choose between tasks based on their urgency or on how easy they are to do. Yet keeping the big picture in mind is critical in setting priorities and making progress toward your vision and goals.

I’ve recently tried asking myself the following questions when choosing what to do, and I’ve found them helpful in setting priorities and keeping up my motivation:

Does this task, activity, or project align with my vision and goals?
What one thing can I do today to advance this project or goal?
Am I acting like the person I want to be?

With a few variations, these questions can also help you beat information overload. Every day, we face a flood of information through personal interactions, social networks such as Twitter and Facebook, blogs, e-mail, video, television, radio, and print. Filtering out unimportant information and focusing on the most important information is key to beating information overload. When you’re feeling overwhelmed with information, try these variations on the questions above:

Is this information necessary to work toward my vision or goals?
What one piece of information do I need to advance this project or goal?
Will this information help me become the person I want to be?

What questions have you found useful in managing your tasks and/or information? Please share them in a comment.

Beat Information Overload by Leveraging Your Learning Style

People can learn in a variety of ways, but most of us have a preferred learning style. Learning new information is easier when you use your preferred style.

There are multiple ways to categorize learning styles, but one of the most commonly used is Neil Fleming’s VARK model:

Visual
Aural (auditory)
Read/Write
Kinesthetic

Visual learners learn well by seeing pictures and diagrams, watching videos, etc. If you’re a visual learner, try drawing pictures, flowcharts, or mind maps. Use multiple colors to highlight or underline important concepts. Practice recalling information by visualizing what your notes look like.

Auditory learners prefer to take in information by listening. If you’re an auditory learner, try downloading recorded lectures and teleseminars so that you can listen to them repeatedly. Read handouts and notes to yourself, or talk through them with another person. You can record significant points from your notes and listen to them later for review. Text-to-speech software may also work well for you.

The read/write preference is sometimes included as part of the visual learning style. However, learners who prefer the read/write style will learn best from text sources. If the read/write style describes you, try writing detailed notes when you need to listen to a lecture. Summarize pictures and diagrams in sentences. Make lists. Reread your notes repeatedly.

Kinesthetic learners learn best by doing something. If you’re a kinesthetic learner, find ways to apply and practice what you’re learning. For example, rather than reading a manual to learn new software, open the software, explore the menu, and create a practice document or file. Finding real-life examples, taking field trips, and making models are other good strategies, depending in part upon the topic you’re learning. If you write notes or draw pictures, be aware of how it feels as you do so.

You may have a strong preference for a single learning style, or you may have several styles that are comfortable for you (that is, you may be a multimodal learner). How can you tell? Reflect on your learning experience. Think back to times when you’ve found material especially easy or especially difficult to learn. How was that material presented to you? What strategies have you used successfully in the past? You can also find learning style assessments online. Fleming’s VARK website includes a questionnaire and other resources on learning styles.

By consciously using your preferred learning style when taking in new information, you’ll beat information overload by learning faster and more easily.

Beating Information Overload with Paper Tiger Online

As an information organizer, editor, and indexer, I’m always looking for new tools to help manage information. The recent release of Paper Tiger Online helped me reorganize my business files.

I’ve long used a paper-based numeric filing system for some files, so I already knew the advantages: multiple entry points to access files and the ability to set up folders in advance.

Paper Tiger Online offers these advantages, and others as well:

Searching and sorting. These are important features that will save you time. A paper-based system is limited to scanning the index, which often is not in alphabetical order. This is fine for small files, but becomes awkward and slow for large ones.
Keywords. Although some keywords can be used in a paper-based system, it’s easier to use more in Paper Tiger Online. This improves search results and makes it easier to find what you’re looking for.
Notes for additional information
Categories to group files
Ease of changing, updating, and reorganizing information
Ability to print indexes sorted by item number or by item name. These are handy for quick reference, and they can easily be reprinted when files are updated.
Access from anywhere with an Internet connection

My business files contain financial information, editing and indexing projects for clients, presentations on beating information overload, reports on getting organized for taxes and on beating information overload, other writing projects, other information specific to my Info Grooming business, and general business information. Here’s how I reorganized them with Paper Tiger Online:

One item for each client. The notes hold the titles of specific projects and the years they were completed. If I’m working on a project for the client, the item is also assigned the category Current Projects.
One item for each major information product (for example, Beat Information Overload the 5F Way)
One item for my articles published at Ezine Articles, one for other publications, and one for presentations. As my publications and presentations increase, I’ll add more items.
Items for financial information, including tax information, bank information and statements (one item for each account), annual income, and annual expenses. The latter are named Finances—2011—Income and Finances—2011—Expenses, so that they file together when sorted by name.
Other items specific to my business: activity reports, affiliate accounts, legal issues, plans and goals, service agreements, and web presence (for keeping track of web design decisions, keywords, statistics, etc.)
Items for general business information, including articles from magazines, printouts of web pages, etc.

The online video for Paper Tiger Online made it easy to get started, and setting up the files went quickly. It’s also been easy to make changes to fine-tune the system, such as changing item names and adding keywords.

I have many more ideas for using Paper Tiger Online:

Database for writing and product ideas. I currently use a spreadsheet for this, but Paper Tiger Online would provide more flexibility and make it possible to access this file from anywhere.
Conversion of my paper-based numeric systems to Paper Tiger Online. These include files for organizations that I belong to and for textile information (knitting, sewing, weaving, hand spinning, etc.).
Database for sewing and knitting patterns
Database for yarns and fibers in my “stash”
Database for favorite recipes and for recipes to try. The locations will be the cookbooks or other recipe sources, and keywords will include main ingredients, so I can find recipes that use specific ingredients.

These ideas are just the start. I look forward to exploring further uses for Paper Tiger Online.

Would an online filing system work for you? Add a comment, and let me know your opinion.

Beat Information Overload by Making the Most of Your Vision

Eighty percent of learning is visual. As information increases, so does the demand on our visual system. Vision problems make it harder and slower to process information and so contribute to information overload.

You can take some simple steps to make the most of your vision:

Use good lighting. As we get older, the lenses in our eyes become less transparent, and pupils tend to be smaller. So we need more light as we age.
The human visual system is designed to be most relaxed when looking at a distance. We’re designed to be hunter/gathers who gaze into the distance, not office workers who stare at a computer screen for hours and hours. It takes effort to focus up close. Follow the 20/20/20 rule—every 20 minutes, look 20 feet away for 20 seconds. That will give your eyes a break from focusing. Blink a few times as well. We tend to blink less often when looking at a computer screen, which can lead to dry eyes.
Get an eye exam once a year to be sure your prescription is correct and to catch any signs of disease early. Some eye diseases, such as chronic glaucoma, don’t manifest symptoms until far advanced, when vision loss has already occurred. Systemic problems such as diabetes and high blood pressure can also affect your eyes.
Tell your eye doctor about your normal working distance for near work. The standard distance is 16 inches (40 cm), but your distance may be different if you are short or tall, spend more time reading from a computer screen than reading print materials, or have a job that requires clear near vision at a specific distance. Your near prescription can be adjusted to your typical working distance.
Losing your place frequently while reading or words running together may indicate that your eyes don’t work together as well as they could. Eye exercises (vision therapy) may help. If your eye doctor doesn’t do vision therapy, ask for a referral to a behavioral optometrist. You can also find out more about vision therapy and locate an optometrist through the Optometric Extension Program Foundation and the College of Optometrists in Vision Development.

Making the most of your vision will help you beat information overload by processing visual information more quickly, easily, and comfortably.

An Ocean of Information: Surf, Swim, and Dive

Information is like the ocean. To avoid drowning in information, we need to learn when to surf the waves, when to swim, and when to dive deep.

Walking Among the Lilacs to Beat Information Overload

I took my own advice today and went for a morning walk in a local park to clear my mind. Lombard, Illinois is known as the Lilac Village, and Lilacia Park is its lilac showplace. Both lilacs and tulips are starting to bloom, and the daffodils are at their peak. It was a relaxing and spirit-satisfying start to a day filled with challenging meetings and projects.

Now I’m taking another short break before an evening meeting with a lengthy agenda. Clearing my mind will help me focus on the agenda and discussion and leave other projects until tomorrow.

Have you taken a break today to clear your mind? If not, take a few minutes to relax and refocus.

Beat Information Overload with Healthy Habits

Sound mind/sound body—you’ve heard it before, but it’s even truer today as we cope with more and more information. Although the human brain is only 2% of average body weight, it consumes about 20% of available energy and 20% of oxygen. A brain stressed by poor nutrition, lack of oxygen, or insufficient sleep can’t process information efficiently or effectively. You’ll feel foggy, stressed, and unproductive. Cultivate healthy habits for better concentration, mental clarity, and overall well-being.

Core healthy habits include

Good nutrition, with emphasis on whole foods. Minimize or eliminate sugars, artificial sweeteners, trans fats, and processed foods.
Exercise. A balanced exercise plan includes aerobic exercise to improve cardiovascular fitness, weight-bearing exercises to increase strength and build lean muscle, and stretching exercises to promote flexibility.
Sufficient sleep. Many time management program suggest getting up an hour earlier. This can be counterproductive if you’re already getting too little sleep. Look for other ways to save time than by shortchanging your need for sleep.

Need to make some changes? There’s plenty of advice and programs available in books, in videos, on TV, and on the Internet. No single program will be right for everyone, so you’ll need to experiment to find what works best for you. Some tips to get started:

Make one small change at a time. If you find yourself resisting a change, try an even smaller step. For example, if you haven’t exercised in a long time, try beginning by walking for five minutes, not running for thirty minutes (and check with your physician before starting). Or start upgrading your diet by substituting one healthy snack for your usual candy bar or doughnut.
Choosing among programs can push you into information overload if you let it. Review a few programs, and try the one that appeals to you the most. Then stick with it long enough to tell whether it’s working for you. Trying to mix-and-match programs can be confusing. But don’t hesitate to switch programs once it’s clear that one doesn’t work for you.
Don’t let preconceived ideas stop you from trying something new. Not a morning person? Try exercising first thing in the morning anyway. That was the key that helped me create a regular exercise habit after years of starting and then quitting. Now I look forward to lifting weights after a day at the computer.

Take these steps toward a sound body and a sound mind, and you’ll feel less stressed by information overload.