Instead of being kept in OmniFocus such project plans can be kept in OmniOutliner (as I do) or in another system. If you’re not fully committed to a task or if it is not fully clarified, it is not really a task, it is ‘stuff’ that clutters your system and distracts your thinking. The problem with all these ideas for future actions is that you don’t really mentally commit to executing them or even to thinking them carefully through. I used to think, “ok, to complete this project, I need to do this task and then I need to do that and then I need to do something else” and add all of this to OmniFocus. OmniFocus makes it deceptively easy to plan projects by adding subprojects and sequences of actions extending long into the future. I stopped using OmniFocus for project planning. I was relieved to hear that Merlin Mann also deleted 100 projects from his OmniFocus at one point (as he describes on MacPowerUsers). Only when ‘potential’ becomes ‘real’ do I start a new project in OmniFocus. For example, I transferred the list of potential future publications from OmniFocus to NVAlt. As difficult as it was, I decided that I am not a superhero and removed or at least put on hold two-thirds of these projects. At the worst point I had over 150 projects recorded in OmniFocus. Uncertain projects. David Allen says that a knowledge worker has up to 60 open projects (a project is a sequence of two or more actions).It took me almost half a year to get it functional again through removing the following: I almost came to this point with OmniFocus, but I liked it so much that I decided to try getting back on track. Eventually your task management system will become useless and abandoned. Once you suspect that it is ‘a black hole’ you will resist using it and start with old to-do lists or pieces of paper. The loss of trust is the worst that can ever happen to a task management system. Worst of all, I felt that instead of being a trusted system OF had become a black hole for dumping things that would never be done. I spent more time on adding folders, perspectives, and contexts but it did not really help. The lists of tasks generated by OF were frustrating and overwhelming. After getting OmniFocus, I kept adding all my ‘stuff’ there until it started to feel wrong. First, no software is fit for all purposes and second no software will make hard choices and difficult decisions for you.
But there is a trap in trying to keep all your stuff in one place. OmniFocus makes it deceptively easy to quickly add and organize tasks and projects.
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