Rock The Kanban: In Defense of Owning Your Cliffhangers
A bunch of years ago, I was walking through Washington Square Park and came across a group of Tibetan monks creating sand art on the sidewalk. Being the strategic, action-oriented, future-focused thinker that I am, my initial thought was BUT IT WILL BLOW AWAY!
Little did I know, that was the point.
Tibetan sand mandalas are painstakingly intricate, time intensive creations that monks “paint” in order to honor and remind us about the ephemerality of…everything, especially the things we create.
I am a big proponent of getting closure on big tasks, projects, or issues in order to increase energy for what’s next. Reflecting on your accomplishments and learnings at the end of the year is one way to do that. Deliberately getting closure on unfinished things that are holding you back is another.
There is a ton of psychology and neuroscience behind this, but I like to use story metaphors to illustrate how this works (which also has a ton of psychology and neuroscience behind it). If life is a story and your brain wants you to be the hero, do what smart storymakers do: work with arcs, loops, chapters, episodes, and seasons.
Close out, calm down, build energy, GO.
But there are times when closure on all the things isn’t possible. Nor is it worth the energy.
So…at the beginning of each year, in honor of those very smart monks, I purge my plans, goals, and accompanying to do list.*
Even if I'm in the middle of Very Important Tasks.
When I’m ready, I create a new one from scratch. But only when I’m ready.
(*I keep mine in Trello or post-its on a wall as a Kanban board and in a years-long OKR email thread with my good friend, Christina Wodtke, but you might have another format you prefer.)
If all the things I’ve been dreaming of doing or am in the middle of are important or exciting enough, they’ll re-appear on the new Kanban board when they need to.
Or not.
In which case, that’s energy I get back to do the things that really matter.
You might think that dropping All The Things would feel like a cliffhanger—a story that will nag you and your closure-seeking because it is incomplete. If you let your story own you, it will nag you which will ultimately suck your energy and hold you back.
This is how I used to feel when I watched David Lynch films when I was younger before 7 years of film school taught me how to watch movies. I found them extremely frustrating because I never quite figured out WTF was going on.
One day, my good friend, Andy, told me that the beauty of Lynch’s unresolved plot threads was just that: the lack of resolution. It forces you to chill and accept that not everything can be neatly wrapped up in even the most compelling stories. And that’s OK.
It took me time and practice, but I eventually learned to love the ambiguity and lack of closure in art film. Like sand art…and reveled in their beauty and let them float away in the wind.
Trashing your to do list every year (or more frequently if that’s your thing!) is much the same.
It's cathartic. It's beautiful. It feels damn good to start fresh.
Do this.
You’re welcome.
Happy New Year.
