Welcome to Week Ten of The 52 Week Remodel Your Reality Challenge! Last week I challenged you to take control of your mental energy. Your homework required you to do a brain dump; literally writing down every to-do, task, and project you had floating around in your head. This first step was designed to help you clear a bit of mental real estate. Over the next two weeks we’re going to tame that to-do list! We’ll get started today by putting some structure around your list.
One Thing To Think About
I’m convinced that all women will reach the end of their lives with a to-do list. You juggle so many roles and responsibilities in your daily life, how could you function without one? Used proactively, lists can be great tools for supporting you in tracking the actions you need to take. Used destructively, lists can create feelings of overwhelm, frustration, and defeat.
One Challenge To Take
Take a look at the list you created last week. Review each item on your list and ask yourself if the item in question really needs to be completed.
I’ve worked with many clients who took such satisfaction in crossing things off their list or who got such a charge from having a full list of things to do that they put items on their lists that really didn’t need to be addressed. Evaluate your inventory, and make sure that each task you’ve noted really needs to be handled. If it does, keep it on your list. If not, cross it off. (See – you’re already making progress!)
Once you’ve cleared any tasks that don’t need addressing, create structure using these two steps.
- Step One: Group related activities into categories. For example, all tasks that involve running errands could be organized into one category (errands), items that require phone calls and email responses another (communication), and so on.
- Step Two: Once you have your categories defined, separate them into either repetitive activities (grocery shopping or your weekly team conference call) or one-time activities (running to the hardware store or attending an event).
That’s it for the week. Next week we’ll talk about streamlining both types of activities. This week, enjoy the process of putting some structure to your tasks. You have taken the first step in taming your to-do list.
Kim
