90 Days of ILP

There's been a lot of hype in the blogosphere lately for David Allen's Getting Things Done productivity system, which is based entirely around the concept of the inbox. More than just the email inbox, however, the concept refers to all methods of data collection one uses in their life. Yet while Allen's system attempts to synthesize all the tasks we've set before ourselves each day--from taking out the trash to finishing up the business plan--putting them into a single stream of workflow, what I've always disliked is that there's nothing to be said about some of the more subtle "tasks" we have to do each day, namely, processing our emotions.

So here's my idea: create an inbox for the emotions. Each time you find yourself in or recovering from an emotionally stimulating experience, write or note to yourself every emotion through which your mind passed. Rather than suffer the exhausting fog of affective confusion, turn each of these emotions into an object, like a new message in your email inbox. After you've collected all the emotional "messages" related to that event/task, run through them one by one. Feel into them. Think about them. Explore them, honor them, and then neutralize them by crossing them off or erasing them. [See example above for a sample list, divided into three days consisting of one emotionally-stimulating event per day].

Like any inbox, don't let emotions linger unanswered. Issues that remain in your inbox for years will become shadows, and only a super-sophisticated search function will be able to uproot. Better to keep your inbox empty, and deal with new emotions as they come in.

Your thoughts?