I'm a pacing queen. Not of hallways and offices, but of miles on my feet at a steady, predictable clip that can stretch for hours. I'm a believer in watches, and chrono settings, and perfectly spaced intervals of pathway.

Then one day my watch croaked about 3 minutes into a 2-hour run.

Time management is great, and it can be a critical tool to keep us from getting lost in tweets or stuck listening to someone ramble on for 20 minutes in a meeting. And there's a whole industry built up around helping us block out critical task time, organize for efficiency, and even take breaks. Workshifting's own Heather Rast has talked about testing Pomodoro to try to get her to-do list under control.

There are even apps to guide us through brainstorming "exercises."

As a workshifter, we spend a lot of time creating systems to keep ourselves focused and on track. They're safety nets, barriers against the chaos of an unstructured life. I've written about it too. But innovation doesn't happen in 25-minute chunks. Sometimes we need to stop doing stuff and just concept, create, go with the flow, and see what happens.

The day my watch croaked I just kept running. It was exhilarating, and I came home brimming with energy and new ideas to test out.

Can you work without a net?

Photo Credit: prescottspies