How many hours a week do you dedicate to work? To your personal life? To your passion? While many of us work to live, some of us find work in an area of passion… allowing us to put our energy behind both. If we’re not careful, this transitions into us living to work. Relationships get tarnished, our mental health breaks down, and we burnout.

It doesn’t have to be this way.

In Getting Things Done, you layout your priorities and goals using six levels of focus, ranging from day to day tasks all the way up to lifetime goals. By laying out this roadmap, you are able to setup milestones to work towards that keep you balanced and focused.

Horizons of Focus:

Ground: Actions you need to complete
10,000: Projects you need to work on
20,000: Areas of focus, such as what your job responsibilities are, family obligations, etc. This becomes the filter to decide which projects you keep, and which you remove
30,000: One to two year goals
40,000: Three to five year goals
50,000: Purpose and principles. This is how people will describe you at your wake.

The Horizons of Focus in combination with the other parts of GTD allow you to stay in the moment: whether you are working on tasks, or relaxing on the beach with your family.

How do you keep your work from bleeding into your personal or family life?