I want to share my tips on achieving your to-do list. We should all have to do less because it keeps you focused, but we probably all have different types of to-do lists. Some people:
- have to-do lists as long as the arm.
- have to-do lists where they just tick off the ones that are really easy to do and ignore the ones that are difficult.
- when you write your to-do list. Write the actual words “Write to-do lists” so when they’re finished writing the to-do list. This gives you something to cross off something immediately.
That’s really good if you procrastinate, you find it difficult to start doing something. If you’ve done that first bit, it becomes much, much easier.
Organising Your To-Do List
Organised people have to do lists that in order of A, B, C.
- A being an absolute priority.
- B as soon as I’ve got time I need to do that thing.
- C is everything else.
If that’s the list that you have, then immediately I’d say get rid of C. You only need the things that are a priority now, or when moving the priority, or when you’ve got time, you can then do those things. That’s going to save at least a third of the time.
The other thing when you’re making to-do lists, you have to follow best practices. Do to-do lists daily. You don’t want a great big long list that doesn’t focus on things you’re meant to be doing on that day.
Have a daily to-do list, make it realistic. Don’t make something like huge that you’re never going on to achieve. What can you actually achieve on that day, and then put time next to everything?
If you need to break bigger tasks down into smaller time slots, then do that. When you’ve got a spare 15 minutes in your diary, you can look at the to-do list and tackle those things.
Closing thoughts
My last thing on to-do lists would be at the end of everyday review what went well, what went badly, and then redo your to-do list for the next day again. This is will set you up for success on the next day.
