Preface

This book is a bit of a fractal – within itself is a reflection of everything that it is. It’s gone through several iterations in my head, but it always manages to defy being put to paper,  or, in this case, on screen.

It started in the summer of 2008 when I read 37 Signal’s Getting Real. That book was about agile web development, but what I immediately saw was the ideas in the book applied to much more than programming – it contained the seeds of a general framework for how to think about doing anything.

At the time, though, I simply wasn’t ready to express the book the way it needed to be expressed. I was still thinking that Big Ideas needed to be expressed in a Big Way; I was thinking in terms of a 500-page book explaining what The Agile Way was about. That style of thinking didn’t fit, though, so the book didn’t happen.

However, the seeds were still planted, and they grew in fertile soil on my blog. I started to see that a lot of the ideas I was talking were actually just the continual growthsof those seeds, but my posts were the application of the ideas. In other words, I’ve been showing the limbs and leaves of this book for years; I just wasn’t able to figure out how to share show the trunk and roots.

As my understanding grew, though, I recognized that, just as the trunk and roots of a tree has a different structure than the leaves and limbs, the way I needed to express the core of the ideas needed to have a different structure. Thus, it became clear to me that I didn’t need to explain everything as much as I just needed to show it. There’s plenty of time to talk about application in the years to come.

The chief challenge of this book has been figuring out how to share it. It’s evolved from interactions between the people I’ve been learning from and sharing with, so every time I’ve tried to sit and write it all at once, it has lost its spirit. This is not just writer’s block – I write almost every day; it’s also not Resistance, as we have our battles every day, too.

My final resolution, then, is to share the book in the same way that it’s grown: a piece at a time in the light of social interactions.

The Whole Is Greater Than The Sum of Its Parts

My goal is to write each chapter so that it can stand on its own, yet each chapter also supports the section that it’s in. Each section can also stand on its own, yet each section supports the rest of the book.

Since each component of the book can stand on its own, there’s no reason, in principle, that you have to read the book from front to back. You can skip around, and it might be the best way for you to read the book.

The keyholes are an important part of the book inasmuch as they enable you to see what’s coming, but they serve another function, too: they give you the rough takeaway from each chapter. In that way, they can serve as both a prelude and a post-reading summary.

This structure is different, but it’s yet another way that this book is a fractal of itself. The meaningful ideas, people, and events in our life are interconnected in a multitude of ways, and this book reflects that.

How This Book Is (Semi)-Organized

While I’m writing this book, there will be 7 substantive sections, including this one. When the book is finished, there will be 2 additional sections: acknowledgements and an afterword. I know who I need to thank now, but I’m sure other people will show up and help unexpectedly. And afterwords come after the book is done, so I’ll leave that open for now, too.

The first section of the book is Not the Agile Way. This section is a review of some of the pitfalls and insufficiencies of the productivity, personal development, lifestyle design, and creativity literature. They’re not exhaustive critiques for two reasons: 1) a critique of that vast of the literature has such a large scope that I could spend the next few years just writing that section, and 2) I’d rather advance synthetically different way than just break down the works of others.

After that cursory review, we’ll dive right into Thinking The Agile Way. This section lays out the general principles of meaningful action and will come up in other chapters throughout the book. In that sense, it’s the core of the framework, but it doesn’t have to be read for the other parts of the book to have some grip.

The third section, Living the Agile Way, is about applying the framework to the big picture of our lives. To live a flourishing life, we need to balance growth and stasis, change and permanence, and control and acceptance.

Living an agile life requires the use of everyday creativity that’s innate to us all, so the next section is Creating the Agile Way. It addresses the very tight relationship between creating and being created – we often create ourselves through creation of ideas, things, relationships, opportunities, and, sometimes, other people.

To create something or ourselves, though, requires action, so that’s where the next section, Doing Things The Agile Way comes in. The main point of meaningful action, though, is not the mere doing of things, but the doing of things that bring about meaningful outcomes.

As much as we might hope that one way of doing things would be perfect, the Agile Way carries with it the reality of life – namely, that even the good things can come with challenges. This framework poses some challenges precisely because it espouses fluidness, compassion, intuition, and open possibilities. As much as we may like the simplicity of a clear answer, this life – and this book – has very few clear, simple solutions to anything. The last section of this book, The Challenges of The Agile Way, give the lay of the land for what the challenges are.

A Quick Note On Style

I mentioned above that I’ll be doing a lot of showing instead of a lot of explaining. My sincere goal is that each chapter will give you something to think about that creates a running loop throughout your days. This is a how-to think manifesto, not a how-to do book.

The expression of the ideas will include a lot of simple stories and metaphors instead of exhaustive discussion of the ideas. When it becomes clear that I need to explain or have a more detailed discussion about some of the ideas, I’ll write a post on the blog or find a way to give that particular topic the space and coverage it needs.

Each chapter will also be relatively brief. They’ll be brief because I won’t be explaining a lot, but they’ll also be brief so you can grab that particular key idea quickly so you can get back to meaningful action.

If you get lost at anytime, remember that handy Back button in your browser. If you need to reorient yourself, then the sidebar will get you back where you want to be. There’s also a sign-up form if you’d like in case you’d like me to send you notices of when there’s new content available.

I hope you enjoy the book, and I appreciate your encouragement and feedback. This book is as we are – a work in progress. Thank you!