110 Clear Your Mind with the 4D Principle（时间管理英文版）

In our last lesson, we learned about working from the bottom up and how doing this will create more time for you later.

大家可能不一定太清楚地知道：什么是自下而上？其实就是从重要紧急到重要不紧急。

The bottom-up means working on important and urgent problems first before working on important non-urgent problems before working on non-important matters.

那我今天首先来举一个例子：

Let me give you an example to help you visualize what this means.

假设你是北京首都机场管制塔上的指挥官，你首先会关心什么呢？

Suppose that you are the air traffic control commander at Beijing Capital International Airport and you are responsible for directing flight traffic.  You are responsible for making sure that airplanes fly at the right times and in the right directions..  In your position, what do you think is your most important goal?

我相信，你一定会首先关心，对你来说最紧急最重要的事情，是跑道上的飞机，以及天空中即将要下降的飞机。一个即将下降，一个即将起飞，这是你首先要管控，如果你不管控这部分，机场就会出很大的乱子。

You’re absolutely right… your first and primary concern is to ensure that the airplanes leaving the runway into the air and others landing onto the runway do not crash into each other.  This is your primary concern. If fail this primary goal, people will die.  This is your most important and urgent goal.

同样，你的生活中也有很多近期的紧急事件。那什么是近期呢？近到今天。当然，期限也会因为每一个人的掌控能力不一样，有所不同。

There are also secondary urgent matters. Then, what is secondary? It means that the matter is important but not the most important thing.

一个塔台的指挥官，是通过系统、团队对机场进行管控。当他获得了对跑道和天空飞机的管控，并知晓一切就绪时，他就会扩大视角。

As commander of the control tower, you control a complex multi-layered system.  On the top and most important layer, the planes must depart and land in the right order safely. 

他就开始管控在机场停机坪上的正在准备推出跑道的飞机：是不是一切正常......

First, you will want to focus on the airplanes departing the runway and lifting into the sky.  This is most important because the planes descending from the sky cannot land unless there are open runways and parking spaces.  If planes haven’t departed first, this space will not be available.

同时，还有天上未来几十分钟要降落的飞机情况，这是他管控的第二层。

By focusing on the immediately urgent and most important first, can you see departing planes will create the space that arriving planes need to land on?  If you reversed the order and focused on the opportunity that was urgent but not important, then you would have created less space not more as landing planes would need to find what little available space they could.

如果跑道、停机坪以及天上更远的飞机都能够获得掌控，那他就会考虑得更远的：一个小时、两个小时之后......

Also, as air control commander, you cannot focus on planes leaving and arriving 2 hours from now if you must attend to traffic congestion and confusion that is currently taking place on the runway.  But, if you free up this space by taking care of the important matters first – that is the departing planes and then landing the arriving planes and you do this in an efficient matter, you will create time for yourself – time that can used to plan for future planes to arrive and depart efficiently.

管控的面逐步在扩大。

Your ability to control the activities of the airport greatly increase if you work in an organized and logical fashion focusing on what is important and what is right in front of you first.

他要知道未来机场上空的天气，以及周边高速公路的堵车情况......

As this clears, you can begin to focus on other secondary matters that are still very important.  This is what Stephen Covery refers to as the non-urgent but important matters – and according to Covey it is most important.

他还要看到世界各地飞来北京飞机状况，会怎么样？会引发暴增吗？

However, as you are focusing on this non-urgent important matter, you still have planes landing and departing that you must be aware of.  It’s in this way that your focus cannot remain too long on a single task – you must be efficient and able to get things done quickly and effectively or else you will never be able to move forward.  

那人生也是这样，你必须首先管控当天对你来说是最紧急最重要的事务。

In your life, just like in the airport, you must first identify and control urgent and important matters.

当你把这些消灭掉，然后你才有机会去做重要不紧急的。

Only after you eliminate these important urgent matters will you be capable of completing this essential important but non-urgent matters.  Can you see it?

所以，我们为了能够让自己活在《高效能人士7个习惯》提及的：做第二象限---重要不紧急的事，那我们首先要去处理重要并紧急的事情。

So, in order to live in the second quadrant--- those important but non-urgent matters mentioned in The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, we need first to deal with important and urgent matters in front of us.

当然还有紧急不重要的事，我们可以丢弃不做或者通过委托。这个大的架构我们要先建立。

What do you do with urgent but unimportant matters? These are the 80% that Peter Drucker told us we should delegate or simply remove them.  If they are unimportant they do no need to be completed.

不能说，我们要关注重要不紧急，就把重要紧急的丢掉。这不可能，你也做不到。

It is impossible for you to skip important and urgent matters and instead focus on the important non-urgent matters.  You cannot let plans land unless you first let planes depart into the sky and make the space available for the other planes to land.  In the same way, you cannot focus on those important non-urgent matters until you make the energy and the space available for you to work on them first.

所以说，我们要遵奉的是，从跑道再到高空顺序，即自下而上的原则。

So work from the bottom up – from the runways to the sky, from the important and urgent to the important and non-urgent.

现在的焦点是，要想办法如何去解决掉重要紧急的事务。

Let’s focus on what methods we can use to focus on these important and unimportant urgent matters. How can we eliminate these quickly?

现在，来谈一谈如何做眼下重要紧急的事务以及紧急不重要的事务，如何快速把它们消灭掉？

有4个方案：

There are four possibilities:

• 你完成它；

1. Do it yourself;

• 你委托别人完成；

2. Delegate it to others;

• 你推迟它、搁置以后再说；

3. Delay and do it later;

• 你删除它。

4. Delete it.

这就是4D原则，第一个“D”是Do（做），第二个“D”是Delegate（委托），第三个"D"是Delay（推迟），第四个“D”是Delete（删除）。

This is 4D principle. Do.  Delegate.  Delay.  Delete. 

眼下对你来说哪些是相对比较重要的，你就要去执行；重要性不够的，你可以委托他人完成；

The order is important.  First do what is most important and urgent yourself.  If something is important but not urgent, consider delegating them to others.

相对不重要不紧急的你就推迟，搁置以后再说；

For tasks that are unimportant and non-urgent, delay these.

真的是不重要的，你就删除掉。

And if something is really unimportant, delay these.

这其实是对事情进行分类处理。

So you have your gameplan.  Do.  Delegate.  Delay.  Delete.  The question becomes, which tasks get which D?  Which are your important urgent matters and which are not important?

你如何能够快速地对事情进行分类呢，你就要结合我们之前课程所讲到的：

To do so, you must integrate everything we’ve learned so far.

你要把大脑里的所有事务，都收集到你的收件箱当中，这个收件箱指的是什么呢？

First collect all of your tasks and assemble in one place – a place called your inbox.

这个收件箱，指的是纸笔或者手机的app，无论是安卓、苹果都有大量的这样的app，我们后续的课程会做一些推荐：例如日历、omnifocus、todo、doit.im等等。

The Inbox is a central location where you collect all of the tasks no matter how important or unimportant or how urgent or not urgent.

It can be on paper using paper or pen.  It can be on an Android or iPhone app.  It can be on your computer.  

最简单的，那今天你可以先试试看：你把大脑里的所有事务用一张纸写下来。

The simplest form is of course paper.

当你能够把它们写下来，你才有机会去分类，然后按照4D原则处理。

如果你不能把它们写下来，留在你的大脑里，可能有很多是更远期的事情，有的可能是你过去的事情，有的可能是你的点子......

Only after you have written all of your tasks down, can you begin classify them according to 4D principle. If you can’t write all of them down in one place at one time, you won’t be able to determine which is truly most important and urgent......

当你不能把它们写下来并作出分类，就无法挑选，也不可能完成眼下的这些紧急或者重要的事。

你也就更没有可能关注未来那些重要不紧急的事务。

And only after you have included all of the tasks can you properly select critical few items that deserve special attention to planning – these important non-urgent tasks.

所以，我们今天的总结是两个关键：

So, in summary, there are two important conclusions from today’s lesson:

• 要把所有大脑里的内容收集下来；

1. Assemble all of the tasks and responsibilities in your brain into one place, your inbox;

• 在简单分类之后，用4D原则处理：执行、推迟、委托、删除。

2. Classify them as one of the 4Ds: Do, Delegate, Delay and Delete.