The great secret about goals and visions is not the future they describe but the change in the present they engender.

— David Allen

There is a light at the end of the tunnel, but the way out is through.

— David Allen

Use your mind to think about things, rather than think of them. You want to be adding value as you think about projects and people, not simply reminding yourself they exist.

— David Allen

When we truly need to do is often what we most feel like avoiding.

— David Allen

When you start to make things happen, you really begin to believe that you can make things happen. And that makes things happen.

— David Allen

Whereas purpose provides the juice and the direction, principles define the parameters of action and the criteria for excellence of behavior.

— David Allen

You don't actually do a project; you can only do action steps related to it. When enough of the right action steps have been taken, some situation will have been created that matches your initial picture of the outcome closely enough that you can call it "done.

— David Allen

Your Brain is for having ideas not storing them.

— David Allen

Your life and work are made up of outcomes and actions. When your operational behavior is grooved to organize everything that comes your way, at all levels, based upon those dynamics, a deep alignment occurs, and wondrous things emerge. You become highly productive. You make things up, and you make them happen.

— David Allen

Your mind is for having ideas, not holding them.

— David Allen