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- [00:00]
A
Foreign. David Allen here and I'm delighted to be in conversation with Dr. Julie Flagg. If any of you were lucky enough to be in the GTD summit in 2019 in Amsterdam, Julie, I think got a standing ovation. She was one of the most popular speakers during, in that whole event for various reasons. But and the reason I'm talking with Julie is because she just retired from a very intense practice, medical practice. And so, Julie, I'm going to toss this over to you. What would you like people to know about anybody listening to this? About who you are, how you got to where you are, what you're doing? I don't know. That's probably a long longer story than you need to go into, but
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B
give
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A
it a shot, Julie. Dr. Julie Flagg. Here she is, folks.
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B
David, first of all, it's wonderful to be with you. We go back a really long time. We'll get into that later on. But briefly, I am a 75 year old retired OBGYN and I am about to approach my one year anniversary. And so I took retirement very seriously. And as I said, I plan to be as exuberant and not intense, but purposeful in my retirement as I have been with my previous ventures, which includes my career in medicine and even going all the way back to second grade, that I plan to go into retirement full throttle and to make the most of this one precious life that I have. Having done that, I am probably one of your most devoted GTDers since 2000 when I first came across your book and you sent me. We met in Boston and then you sent me Karen Ross and we worked for two, three day sessions and basically my life was transformed. I don't think I could have continued with my medical career. I was so overwhelmed after 15 years in practice. So I am a devoted gtder and I wondered what would happen to my GTD system. It was very, very compact and very paper oriented. They had incredible files and incredible systems. And I wondered what would happen when I hung up my white coat. And so I have modified my system somewhat. But when we spoke I said I, I felt like I needed GTD now more than ever. And I would confirm that that's the truth, that it was just as important for me to be somebody that made a difference in my own life and made a difference in other people's lives. But it was going to be in a totally new way. A lot of people said I could never give up my career in medicine and we kind of had a plan B if I had to redo my retirement and go Right back to work. In fact, my office at my personal office at my office building was left totally intact because there was a chance that I would just have to come back, that I couldn't exist without medicine. And in fact, almost right away I fell happily into retirement. And then some other things happened. My mother, who was 102 at the time and in extraordinary health, died two months later after the multiple retirement parties and bashes and everything else. And so that was a really big deal. One of my goals in retirement was to become the daughter my mother always wanted me to be and to be much more attentive to her. And I couldn't. And instead we were dealing with her service and all of the estate stuff. And so that that changed. And conCurrently with that, two other very important people had died in not exactly rapid succession, but I kind of thought of those three people as the three legs to my stool. People that I would call very frequently and who would know me and I would know them. And all of a sudden they were gone. So that was a big, a big adjustment. But you know, we work through keeping track of lists and projects and things started to settle. So that would be my longer than 2 minute intro. So now a year later, I am happy and things have changed. What would you like to ask me at this point now that I've given you that long winded intro?
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A
Yeah, that was great though, Julie. I very much appreciate that. One of the reasons for me, you know, poking at you to have this conversation is, you know, I was having dinner with a, a neighbor of mine here in Amsterdam not long ago, a few days ago, and he said, david, I started your book. I got halfway through and then I stopped. I said, why? He said, well, I'm, I'm retired and my life is so simple now. I didn't really need all that complexity. So I thought, Julie, there's probably a range of people's responses to retiring. Some people, it's like so easy. They like falling off a log. I'm retired now. I can go do all the things I wanted to do when I was retired. And that's cool and easy. And my life is not very complex. And some people, it's a tough road to hold in terms of how do I now manage my life. That doesn't, it's not sort of dictated by such an intense career that I've had for, for so long. So you can, I imagine that you have met people across that whole spectrum.
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B
Yes. So my, sort of, my, probably my biggest instructor in life was my dad, who was unencumbered with a high school degree, but he ended up being an enormously successful contractor. He did a lot of things very, very well. And he was one of those rare birds that I think was a natural GT deer. And so when I read your book and met you, I said, dad would have, he just was that kind of person. But as he got older, he said retirement was the most difficult thing I ever did. Now this was a man who went from no high school into the air force during the second world War, then came out, started his company, got into nuclear stuff, cogeneration, recycling, crazy, crazy things. And, and then. But he also learned tennis, he rode horses, he played, you know, he swam every day. And I was struck when he said it was the hardest thing that he ever did. And I thought, you know, I think it's going to be easy. And, but I wasn't sure. And my dad, when he dropped a little bomb like that, I learned to take notice. And I think that it's not plain sailing, but that's why having the projects, having things that I absolutely had to get done, taking care of my mom's estate, doing the memorial service, making it as good as I could make it, doing my best, really getting into e biking and the kinds of things that I was interested in, the state of Connecticut and road safety and everything, all those things. I knew that I needed projects and I knew that I needed next actions. I also needed to adapt my system now that I didn't have a stupid white coat. So I had to figure out how to have the lists and really have a clear sense of next actions and still do the things like the two minute rule that was so important, the weekly review on Sundays still is embedded in. And you know, I will, I think I'll go to my grave with, with those things in, in place. But I've done different things. Before I went into medicine, I was a horsewoman. I lived in England. And then at a certain point I was injured and then at a certain point I stopped being a horsewoman. And it was very, very abrupt. And I wondered if it was going to be as abrupt as that was and that it felt just as natural to go from being a serious, serious horsewoman to being a pre med student and setting up my goals. And yes, it was. And I think my going from a career in medicine was as abrupt as my leaving the horse world behind and. But because of my systems in place, it absolutely works. And I'm kind of a disorganized person. So like even today is kind of a complex day My brother is visiting. This zoom talk is happening. Then I have to go to the bank. Then I'm having lunch in New Haven. I'm getting. Trying a new recipe, so I'm stopping off at the Asian food market. I'm having dinner with brother and his daughter, who she's just started her own restaurant, and I have to take some cookbooks to her. So all of that is on my. My list right here, which is in my back pocket. And the checks that I have to sign are here. And when I go to the bank, I'll go there. So this is completely intact. And because I'm so disorganized, it never would have happened. Everything will be done, but it never would have happened without the basic discipline of the. The system that you and Karen and I developed in 2000 and 2001 and refined over the years, going through Omnifocus and Evernote and then coming back to this, which is in my back pocket.
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A
Okay, but I have to. I have to ask you. Did you or your dad ever unpack why retirement was so hard for him?
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B
Say that one more time, David.
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A
Did you and or your dad ever unpack and figure out why retirement was so hard for him? Why would. Why do you think that he thought that.
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B
What was so hard for him? Retirement? Well, he was a charming man, and he was a real people man, and he, like, he spent the first hour of every day saying good morning to people. And he didn't just say good morning. He'd say, did you get that front tire fixed on your car? You need a haircut. You look lovely. How's your son? Did he get over that pneumonia? He would know all that stuff, and he'd go, the shop looks great. His. His company had a very formal office, but then it had a giant. Giant workshop where a lot of the prefabrication happened. So he would oversee that. So he. That was his day. He would start off in the. He'd park behind the shop, and then he'd walk through the shop to his office. And he just was a people person. He loved the people that he hired. He always said, hire people that are much nicer than you are and a whole lot smarter and have a lot of knowledge, because I sure as hell don't have it. So he had these fabulous people that he was around, and then he always had lunch with somebody that he basically adored. So it may be the guy that was running the lighting manufacturing company or, you know, the police officer that took care of his mother, you know, the. Or the priest or the. You Know, the buddy that he was going to go sailing with. So everything was, he was very people oriented and that sense of purpose and regimentation was no longer there. And he would do these amazing jobs. You know, he'd do cogeneration and he'd do the Sunkist prune factory. And that was very exciting to him.
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A
And suddenly that all that energy disappeared or dissipated. Right, right.
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B
He had three secretaries. And I remembered them when I was doing his eulogy and they sat together and these were like three amazing women that basically ran the company, you know, that kept him on, you know, but, you know, they were just these amazing. And one of them is still alive and we still talk to her, you know. You know, she, they taught us how to write. You know, they were, you know, one of them was a Shakespeare scholar. You know, they were just brilliant, brilliant women. And so he missed that.
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A
Yeah. So how did, how did he get over it or did he.
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B
Well, he, he, he played tennis, he rode horses. He didn't really do a good thing that it was really hard for him. He, he remarried to a woman that had a serious drinking problem. And so their social life had become constricted on. And he also had had a bad accident that was a traumatic brain that made an even more successful businessman. I don't know how that happened, but that's when the company took a huge leap up and then the company was sold. So he was 60 at that time, which in our family is actually still young. And so he had another 20, 25 years that he, that were not filled with, you know, coming up with new ideas and, you know, reading the Wall Street. He used to read the Wall Street Journal with a pen and ruler and, and then his secretary would file them away. He'd have these ideas and he'd share them with people, you know, that, that, that, that, you know, he spent after an hour saying good morning to people. He'd spend, you know, another hour doing something, and then he'd take an hour and read the Wall Street Journal with a red pen. You know, that kind of structure was gone from his life and that kind of like, oh my God, you know, the space program, the solar, the wind, all those things just fascinated him way ahead, you know, 20 years before everybody else. And, and so he, it didn't quite. But I think he, you know, it's like when you, when you and I talked and you said, don't, don't flunk retirement. And I think that that's what dad was saying to me too. You know, really, it's, it's like, you know, more than a quarter of your life. So are you going to just do nothing or are you going to make something of it? So, you know, that's what I'm sort of figuring out now. But it reminds me, the other person that sort of is was Randy Fullhart, who is one of the people in GTD that I met in person in San Francisco. And you know, he talked about, he talked in San Francisco, a brilliant talk. And then he talked in Amsterdam, another brilliant talk. But he talked about the areas of focus. So that was the other thing that I wanted that I find. You know, before when I was working, I was next actions projects, next actions projects, two minute rule, next actions projects. But now I find like its area of focus and I find that, you know, trying to keep up with the political things that are happening, but also to really. My wife is a, an incredible underwater hydrographer. So she deals with things like the Francis Scott Key Bridge and the tunnel that's going under the Hudson that Trump has stopped dealing with all these major projects, some that are going forward, some that are stopped, and the impact on what's happening in the infrastructure of this country. So my relationship with Nancy, when I was a practicing physician was pretty simple. I would work all day, I'd ride my bike into work, I'd ride my bike back, usually arriving home well after dark, I'd eat something quickly. I'd fall asleep on the ant antigravity chair. And then I'd wake up and I'd go to bed and I'd leave the next morning between 4 or 5, hop on my bike and go back to work. So I was very easy for Nancy. Now I'm at home and she's. It's, it's shocking. Let's just say we've had some remarkable conversations, David. And when we're in Amsterdam next week, you and I are going to have a little chat. So my relationship with Nancy is my most important priority. And I recognize that my, it's just, it's really different. And now like I have, you know, an office. She works at home, and now I have an office at home. And so one of the things that I've done is really develop the office and the files and getting all the systems going. And so that is interesting. But going back to what Randy said, it's those areas of focus. His mother ultimately aged and died and that became a major area of focus for him and his family. And it's really a big deal. And so those areas of focus are really important, you know, in medicine. I could make almost any damn thing happen in trying to get our little town in Chester to be safer for pedestrians. And cycling is a whole lot more difficult and complicated and slower. But I'm very, very interested in cycling. E cycling. I find that. I mean, I find it as important as in our family. We're almost all deaf, so we all start wearing hearing aids when we're in our 20s and 30s. And, you know, I find, like, the E bike gave. I rode my bike my whole life, but by the time I was 65, my knees were shot, and they said they had to be replaced. And I said, I don't have time to replace them. And then Nancy said, let's try an E bike. I don't think I'll ever need them to be replaced. But I feel the same way about E bikes that I do to my hearing aids. When I realized I just couldn't hear, and I was still a young woman, and I was, you know, an undergrad, and I couldn't hear, and then they gave me hearing aids, and I was like, oh, my God. I. This is great. The same thing is, like, when I was a little girl and they gave me glasses. It's like, whoa.
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A
Yeah. Stereo vision and Dolby sound. Yeah, I know.
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B
Exactly, exactly. So. So I. So the E bike has been important, but those other things, you know, cooking healthy meals and things like that and entertaining, and then, happily, by moving, you know, being with Nancy all the time, not when I was on call, I stayed at my apartment at work, but now I'm here all the time at home. So. But Nancy, she works by herself, but every morning she has breakfast with a group of unusual people in our tiny town in Connecticut. And so I just hopped onto that. So I sort of had kind of a spontaneous social network away from work. And I think the only thing that I miss. And every once in a while, I'll run into a colleague at work, from work, at a restaurant, and I'll miss that kind of running into somebody like, oh, my God, you should have seen the case I saw yesterday. Or, you know, would you come to the. Or, I need your hand right now. I missed that a little bit, but it's. That's already becoming distant.
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A
And so what advice would you give people listening to this about retirement? And they may not. They may still be in the second grade. I don't know. But. So they may not be close to that age where they think that. Where that's becoming a reality. And then there are a number of people who've already passed that age. Or coming to that age or whatever. So if you had to be sort of generalize your advice to people about how to approach that segment in their life, what would it be? Sam.