108. Three Things You’re Overcomplicating About Getting Things Done (That Should Be Simple)
Episode 108
Humans love to complicate things, because this means that we get to spend more time thinking, planning and preparing… instead of actually DOING the work.
In this episode of the Learn and Work Smarter podcast, I reveal the three areas that we tend to WAY overcomplicate more than anything else. And when we do, we prevent ourselves from taking action on what matters.
What You Learn:
Why endless analysis and emotional processing keep you stuck, and a simple framework for making decisions and moving forward
The truth about task management: why simple systems beat elaborate apps, and what most people actually need to track their work
Three specific ways people overcomplicate execution and why waiting for perfect circumstances is just procrastination in disguise
How to know when you have "just enough" information to take action instead of continuing to research and plan
Why complexity doesn't equal effectiveness, and the simple approach that gets things done better than anything else
🔗 Resources + Episodes Mentioned
⭐SchoolHabits University: (SchoolHabitsUniversity.com)
⭐The College Note-Taking Power System (CollegeNoteTakingSystem.com)
⭐Assignment Management Power System (AssignmentManagementSystem.com)
Episode 54 - Why Action Is the Only Strategy You’ll Ever Need
Episode 49 - How to make better decisions
Episode 96 - Bad productivity advice
❤️ Connect:
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The following transcript was autogenerated and may contain some interesting and silly errors. But in the name of efficiency and productivity, I choose not to spend my time fixing them 😉
108 3 Things You're Overcomplicating About Getting Things Done (That Should Be Simple)
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[00:00:00] Hello, hello. Welcome to the Learn and Work Smarter podcast. This is episode 108, and whether this is your first episode or you've been here since day one, I appreciate you being here. We just passed my we, it's just me, my two year anniversary of the show on January 4th, so I just think that's really cool.
Anyway, if you've been listening to this podcast for a while, I don't know, maybe since day one, two years ago, you know that I talk about action a lot. In fact, in episode 54, I make the case that action is the closest thing that we have to magic.
Every accomplishment, every achievement, every goal that you've ever reached required just one singular thing, and that's taking action. That is just the truth. But in my private practice, I see something happen a lot. Students, professionals, they know action matters. They want to take action. They're trying to be productive and to get things done and to start studying when they need to and to get going on their [00:01:00] project and send the email, but they're getting snagged or stuck somewhere along the way in this weird kind of purgatory place that looks and feels like preparation and planning.
But doesn't have any action. They may think they're being strategic, they may think they're being thorough, responsible even, but really they're just overcomplicating things. They're adding layers of complexity where simplicity would serve them so much better. And that complexity disguised as planning and organization and you know, I don't know, other productivity words, becomes the very thing that keeps them from moving forward.
I have personally fallen into this trap. I have seen so many clients fall into it, and I'll bet that each and every one of you listening or watching has been in some form in the same situation too. So today we're gonna talk about three specific things that people tend to overcomplicate. Things that end up preventing us from taking action on this stuff that we wanna take action on.
The work, the essay, [00:02:00] the job, the project, the goal, whatever it is that we're setting out to do. The three areas that we tend to overcomplicate, the most are decision making, task management, and doing the work itself. Again, that's decision making, task management, and doing the work itself.
All three of these are areas where we think that more, you know, complexity equals better results, but the opposite is actually true because simple always wins. That's another thing I say on this show a lot. Keep it simple. And today I'm gonna show you exactly how. Remember, everything that we talk about today can be found in the show notes at Learnandworksmarter.com/podcast/108.
If you're watching this on YouTube, you can find everything in the description box and while you're there, but sure to subscribe and say hi in the comments. I would love that so much. Also, if we're not connected on Instagram, you can find me over there at SchoolHabits. Okay, lots to cover. So let's begin.
[00:03:00] So, as I said, I'm gonna cover three common areas that people tend to overcomplicate in terms of getting things done. I'm gonna go through each one, covering what over complication tends to look like. This is gonna be like in school and work, right? And like how we, you know, tend to make a mess of things that should otherwise be simple. And then I'll give some examples for school and work context so that you can really see what I'm talking about, maybe see yourself in some of these situations. And then I'm gonna reveal what simplicity in these three areas might look like.
Let's start with decision making as number one, because this is often the first place where things get complicated pretty quickly because we tend to [00:04:00] over insert emotions and that will always complicate things quickly. So in episode 49. I walk you through some practical strategies for making better decisions.
I give you legitimate frameworks, like doing a risk assessment, making a pros and cons list using the Eisenhower Matrix, a decision tree, you know, prioritization, gathering just enough information to make informed choices about, you know, whatever decision you're facing. Okay. Those are solid tools. I'll leave that link in the description box.
They absolutely work. But what I see happen a lot is that people overcomplicate decisions in one of two ways. The first way is turning decision making into some elaborate analytical project. Let me give you an example. Let's say that you're a student and you need to decide whether to take an AP course or a regular course next semester.
I think I actually use this example in my How to Make Better decisions, uh, episode, but I think it's practical and relevant. This is a real decision with real consequences, so I think it makes sense. You know, if you're facing this [00:05:00] kind of decision to think it all the way through. But a student who's overcomplicating this is gonna research the AP course, then research the regular course and then ask everybody they know about it and make a pros and cons list, and then redo the pros and cons list 'cause they thought of something new or somebody you know, gave them an angle they hadn't thought of before.
And then they're gonna create a decision tree mapping out every possible outcome. Maybe ask three more people for their opinion, and then go back and revise the decision tree based on those opinions. And then spend two hours Googling how to know if I should take an AP class, and then maybe make another pros and cons list that's more detailed than the first one.
And at the end of all of that, which looks like being thorough and responsible, they still haven't decided anything. They're exhausted. They're probably even more confused and uncertain than they were before. And the decision feels bigger and harder than it did when they started. Okay, that's number one.
The second way people tend to overcomplicate decisions, and this one's just as common and probably a little harder to avoid is they overthink and they over feel it. They don't necessarily make spreadsheets or decision trees [00:06:00] and pros and cons lists. Instead, they think in circles. They talk about the decision constantly to the friends, to the family, to roommates, their coworkers.
They might decide one thing on Monday and then change their mind on Tuesday. They feel confident about their choice and then doubt themselves like an hour later, they replay the same mental conversation over and over again, examining their feelings from every single possible angle. And mind you, this is all, again, in the name of like doing good and thorough research and planning.
That's the dangerous part here. Hey, we think we're doing something good. Let me give you a professional example of this. Let's say that you're trying or deciding whether to apply for a promotion at your company. It would mean more responsibility, more visibility, potentially more money, but also more pressure, and longer hours, right?
This is a fairly high risk decision that deserves some thought and consideration. Now, somebody overcomplicating this decision through overthinking and over feeling. It's gonna spend weeks going back and [00:07:00] forth. One day they're convinced that it's the right move, and then they start mentally drafting their application and the next day they're terrified and they decide to stay put in the current job that they have, and then they talk to a colleague who just encourages them to just like go for it.
So now they're back to yes, but then they have a single stressful day at work and they swing right back to no, like a total drop in confidence. They're analyzing their feelings constantly. Am I ambitious enough for this? Am I, am I ready? Like, what if I fail? Or what if I succeed and I can't handle it? They keep waiting to feel certain, to feel ready, to feel like the answer is obvious and hint, it rarely is, and maybe weeks go by, the application deadline passes and the decision gets made for them by default, like the the door closed, decision made.
No promotion. Now, in both of these scenarios, whether you're overcomplicating through excessive analysis or excessive emotional processing, the result is the same. You haven't made a decision. You're in the same place as [00:08:00] when you started, and all of that extra thinking, whether it's, you know, analytical or emotional leads to literally nowhere, now you're just more tired and stressed out.
Most of us have been in a similar situation, so I get it. I've been in this situation too. But what's the simple version? How do we uncomplicate decision making? Because honestly, it doesn't have to be that hard. It doesn't have to be that complicated.
In episode 49, I advise gathering just enough information, not too much, not too little, but just enough. And I give some strategies for how to know like where that just enough sweet spot is. And once you have a solid understanding of the stakes and the consequences, you've got what you need and you can make a choice and move on.
If it helps you think it through maybe a, you know, a little bit harder or higher stakes decisions, maybe make a pros and cons list. Maybe make a single decision tree, set a timer, bang it out, maybe alone or with someone who gets the decision [00:09:00] that you're contemplating. You could also do a risk assessment thinking maybe short term versus long term consequences.
Consider who else is impacted. This is, again, all stuff that I teach you in episode 49, but you use these decision making frameworks and tools to be thoughtful and thorough, and you make your decision and then you move on. If the decision is truly complex with multiple variables, okay, use the decision tree or the Eisenhower Matrix, but you use it once.
You walk through it, you make your decision, and then you put your blinders on. You don't keep redoing the analysis or reexamining your feelings, hoping for a different answer or more confidence to magically appear. Listen, if you're an overthinker hi or an over feeler, hello, come back to me right now and hear this.
It is important. Your feelings about a decision are going to keep changing. You are gonna feel confident one day and doubt for the next day, even if it's the right, I'm air quoting decision. That is normal. That is completely normal. That is not some [00:10:00] indicator that you need to keep thinking about things and that you're headed in the wrong decision and that you made the wrong choice.
That is just how feelings work. They're volatile. They change. You don't need to feel certain, you don't need to feel ready. You just need to make the call and proceed with the actions that come after it. Okay? So in sum, the simple approach to decision making is this, gather the information you need. Use one tool to help you think it through if necessary, and then decide, right?
And unless you're a doctor who's making life or death decisions with a patient, like on an operating table, this is sufficient. Because if you think about it, it's not like this is forcing you to make hasty decisions at all because everything leading up to the moment that you're making a decision was informing you one way or another.
Your living your experience up to the point where you needed to make a decision was the research. That was the planning. That was the thinking it through, like you already did that you don't need more. So, for example, going back to my [00:11:00] example of a working professional, considering going for promotion, using the simplified framework for making a decision isn't, you know, putting a gun to your head saying, choose now.
Because in reality you've probably been thinking about some professional change for months now, maybe even longer, you've probably been daydreaming about what could be different about your current job. Maybe you've been feeling bored over the last quarter or longer, right? So you've already done so much thinking about it.
And now it's just time to make the choice. Maybe not with absolute certainty, but when does that ever really happen? Just decide and move on. Because here's what I know after 20 years of working with students and professionals. People who make decisions and move forward to the action taking part, almost always end up in a better position than the people who agonize endlessly trying to make the perfect choice or waiting to feel 100% confident.
Action beats over analysis every single time. All right, let's move on to the second area where people overcomplicate things, and that is task management. Task management [00:12:00] is simply the system you use to keep track of what needs to get done. That's it. You need a way to capture tasks from multiple sources, see what's on your plate, and track their status.
Done, not done in progress. Simple, right? And if you overcomplicate this, you can't take action, which say it with me now is the closest thing we have to magic. But what I see constantly, and I mean constantly, is people turning task management into this elaborate, complex production that requires more effort to maintain than it does just to do the actual work. A student might decide that they need to get organized. Cool. That's an awesome, ambitious goal, and I encourage that.
But maybe they are spending three hours researching the best productivity apps. They're downloading five different ones. They're watching YouTube tutorials on how to use each one. They're creating accounts and setting up tags and labels and color coding systems. They're inputting all of their assignments with due dates and priority levels and estimated time to complete.
They create different views, maybe a calendar view, a list view. A kanban board view. They spend an entire evening perfecting the system, but then the next day they don't use it. [00:13:00] Or they use it for like two days and then it falls apart because maintaining all of that takes way too much energy.
Or in a professional context, someone might decide they need a better task management system. So they sign up for three different project management tools to see which one they like best. They watch webinars about productivity systems. They read articles about GTD and getting things done. David Allen and time blocking, and maybe the second brain system, not a fan of.
I can talk about that at some point. They create elaborate folder structures and tag hierarchies. They color code everything by project type, urgency level, energy required. They're setting up automated reminders and recurring tasks and dependencies between tasks. Holy smokes, I have seen some systems. And lemme tell you, those kinds of systems do not last.
Maintaining this system becomes a part-time job in itself. People who think that this is the kind of system that they need for task management, spend an hour every morning updating their system instead of doing the work the system is there to support. This is over complication. It's exhausting and we don't want it.
It's unnecessary, but it's [00:14:00] disguised as productivity and you know, elitism. But here's what most people actually need for task management. Wait for ready. A notebook. I am dead. Series A notebook and a pen. That is it. Write down what you need to do. Cross it off when it's done. If it's not done by the end of the day, move it to tomorrow's list.
That's task management. Now, I get it. If you're managing complex projects at a higher level, like you're maybe a project manager overseeing multiple teams and deliverables, and yeah, you might need more robust tools, go for it. But for basic task management, for keeping track of your own work as a student or as a professional.
A notebook is usually just fine, and if you want something digital, that's cool. Okay,
but you don't need 17 features. You need a place to input tasks and a way to track their status. That is it. In fact, I created the assignment management power system specifically because I saw students drowning in over complicated systems. My power system is simple. It's an effective way to track assignments and tasks without all of the nonsense that you don't need.
That is [00:15:00] linked below for $47. That's it. I won't. I want this to be accessible to everybody and it teaches you exactly what you need. Nothing more, nothing less. Because the truth is that the best task management system is the one that you use with the one without least friction.
And the simpler it is, the more likely you are to use it consistently. The students and professionals I work with who are the most productive and the most, um, successful at reaching their goals that they're setting for themselves are not using fancy tools. They're using simple systems they can maintain without even thinking about it.
So strip it back. What is the simplest version of task management that would work for you? Start there. A list, a notebook, a basic digital tool. If you wanna use like the notes app or even a Google doc, I've seen plenty of students just use a Google Doc. Right? Just the features that you need. That's it.
Okay. We are moving on to the third area where people overcomplicate things, and I'm gonna make the case that this is the most important one. This is the big one. This is the whole point of this [00:16:00] entire episode actually doing the work. Everything that we talked about today comes together right here because you can make a decision and you can have a task management system, but if you overcomplicate the actual execution, the sitting down and the doing the thing, none of the other stuff matters.
In my experience, we tend to overcomplicate work three different ways. The first way we overcomplicate doing the work is by overcomplicating the conditions. We tell ourselves that we need the perfect environment before we can start. We need our desk to be clean, to have our coffee a certain way, the timing to be perfect, the lighting to be perfect, our mood to be exactly on point and our energy to be a 10 outta 10, A student might say, well, I can't study now because my room's too messy, or I'm gonna start my essay. I don't know, once I organize my notes, or I need to be in the library to focus, so I'll wait till tomorrow when I have time to get there. A professional might say, I can't work on this report until I clean out my inbox, or I need a full morning with no interruptions to really dive into this project.
Listen, I get it. Sometimes our [00:17:00] environment does matter. In fact, it does. Sometimes we do work better in certain conditions. But waiting for perfect conditions is just another form of procrastination. In episode 96, all about bad productivity advice that many of us follow, I talk about how you don't need big chunks of time or perfect conditions at all to get work done.
That is just a complete myth. You can make massive progress on anything in, I dunno, 25 focused minutes. You can write a solid paragraph in a messy room. You can draft an email on your phone while you're waiting for a meeting to start. Again, perfect conditions are a myth, and waiting for them is just another way that we overcomplicate the thing instead of doing the work.
And then the second way that I see people overcomplicate doing the work is by overcomplicating the process. This is the planning trap, and I covered this in episode 96 as well, the Bad productivity Advice episode. We plan and we plan and we plan some more, but sometimes we never actually start doing the [00:18:00] thing. We tell ourselves we're being productive because we're planning, we're making outlines.
We're color coding our notes, we're creating elaborate systems for how we're gonna approach the work. But there is no such thing as productivity without action. Planning is not action. Organization is not action. Thinking about the work is not action.
And sometimes, actually most of the time we don't even know where to start with our plan. We don't know what the right approach is until we've actually started doing the thing, especially if the thing we're doing is new to us. So what happens? We sit there trying to plan the perfect approach, but we can't figure out the perfect approach because we haven't done it yet.
And so we're just stuck in that waiting period. That sort of like, I'm not ready quite yet, but in any moment I'm gonna be ready and I'll start then. I see this with students all the time. They'll spend two hours trying to plan how to write their essay. Should they make an outline? Maybe should they do their research first?
Should they get more research than they already have? And in those two hours, they they could have just started writing and figured out what wasn't working as they went.
Maybe they realize that they need more research or they already have enough research [00:19:00] once they start writing the paragraph. But you have to start writing the paragraph to know that. Or professionals who spend days mapping out a project with every single detail perfectly articulated, when really they just need to start working on the first deliverable and maybe let the rest reveal itself as they go.
That's a strategy too. Sometimes you just have to plan a few steps at a time and then dive in and do the thing. And as you're doing the thing, the path reveals itself. It really can be as simple. It's just jumping in somewhere. Even with no elaborate plan, start at the wrong spot if you have to, because if you hadn't started at that wrong spot, right, you wouldn't have known it was the wrong spot and it's starting at that wrong spot that reveals where you actually need to be.
Okay. The third way that people overcomplicate doing the work is by overcomplicating the outcome. We think it has to be perfect before we start, or we think it has to be perfect before we can move forward. Let's say that you've already started or we think that if it's not going to be amazing, there's no point in doing it at all.
I guess some, you know, flavor of this would be [00:20:00] perfectionism. A student might start writing an essay, maybe write two paragraphs, decide those two paragraphs aren't good enough, delete them and start over, and then write three more paragraphs and decide those aren't good enough either, and then start over again.
And they do this five times before they've completed a, a complete draft. Or maybe no draft at all because they kept deleting the whole darn thing. Yes, I see this all the time. Or professional, might draft an email, rewrite it four times, second guess the tone, rewrite it again, and never send it 'cause they're not sure it's exactly perfect.
This is overcomplicating the outcome. And it prevents us from making any real progress. Just write the email, review it, right? If you need to, maybe send it to yourself to get a different angle on on it. That's what I do. And then send the thing and move on. Do the thing. Scared and imperfect. That is so much better than not doing the thing and still feeling scared at just the idea of it.
And I'm not saying that do the thing, you know, scared is easy. It is terrifying. But you [00:21:00] have to take the action, right? You might be scared either way, scared and not do it. Scared and do it. Which one's gonna take you closer to your goals? Doing something scared. Taking the action has to be at the center of everything we do.
Your first draft doesn't have to be good. Your first attempt doesn't have to be perfect. You can always revise it later on. You can always improve things later on, but you can't revise what doesn't exist. Can you? You hear that we can't revise what doesn't exist, so we have to create something. We have to start the draft, start the essay, write the email, pick up the phone, start making the flashcards.
Whatever it is, we have to start.
So here's what a simple version of doing the work looks like. And before I proceed, no, I'm not saying that your work is easy or simple or you know that what you're learning is a piece of cake and you should learn it already, like not my point. My point is that yes, your work is probably hard enough, but you're making it harder by overcomplicating it with a lot of feelings and a lot of drama.
You don't need perfect conditions. You need to sit down and start [00:22:00] in your messy room with your imperfect setup without being in a super duper mood with high energy levels and everyone's permission. Just start. You don't need a perfect plan or perfect anything. You need to put your fingers on the keyboard or pick up the textbook or write the email and make it happen.
That is it. The simple approach to doing the work is this. Ready? Just do it. That's how you do the work. You do it, you start imperfectly. You work in less than ideal conditions. You make a mess, but you get it done because here we go again. Action is the closest thing we have to magic, and you can't take action if you're waiting for everything to be perfect first.
All right. I know we covered a lot. So let's bring this all together and do a recap so that you can get some reinforcement of the concepts we talked about today. Repetition is key to learning, right? So today we talked about three areas where people overcomplicate things, areas that when they're over complicated, prevent us from taking action and doing the work.
First is decision making. We [00:23:00] overcomplicating it by turning simple decisions into something way bigger than they need to be by overthinking and over feeling until we're paralyzed and we make no decision at all. Most decisions aren't that complicated. Just gather enough information, use a tool if you need to think it through, decide and move on.
Remember your lived experience up to the point of needing to make a decision is you doing the research and building your knowledge library. And two, your feelings are just gonna keep changing, leading up to the decision, and even after you make the decision. That's just how feelings work. They go all over the place All of the time. Second task management. We overcomplicate it by creating fancy systems with 17 features and color coded tags and dependencies that require energy and time and thinking. And after like a day, we don't use them 'cause they're frankly annoying. And it's true that a simple task management tool can just be a notebook.
A place to capture tasks and track their status from incomplete to complete. It's not a fancy tool [00:24:00] that's gonna magically get your work done for you. It's the system that you use that supports the work that you do. Again, my assignment management power system teaches you exactly this system. It's nothing more.
It is nothing less. You can learn it in a weekend and start using it on a Monday. The link is in the description box and in the show notes. And then third, we overcomplicate doing the work. We overcomplicate it by waiting for perfect conditions and motivation and energy. And by planning and planning and planning.
The simplest way to do the work is to sit down and do the work. It might be hard and uncomfortable. It might be boring and seemingly irrelevant, or whatever adjective you want to describe it, but sit down and do it anyway. The absolute only way to do the thing is to do the thing. now, what I want you to take away from this episode is that complexity is not the same as effectiveness. More steps and more planning, more analysis, more, you know, envisioning perfect conditions. None of that actually makes you more productive or gets what you're studying into your head or gets the project done. Only taking [00:25:00] action can do that.
So if you're feeling stuck right now, if you're overwhelmed by some decision you need to make or things on your to-do list or work you need to do, ask yourself, where am I overcomplicating this? What would this simple version look like? Or my favorite framing question that I heard from somewhere, I didn't make it up, it was I heard it years ago, was what would this look like if this were easy?
And then do that. Thank you so much for your time. Keep showing up. Keep doing the hard work, keep asking the hard questions, and never stop learning.
