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The "Short Things" To-Do List
February 05, 2007
I had a stellar week last week in terms of getting things done. It felt like everytime I felt an idea coming on, before I knew it, it was a done deal. I bought domains, put up bare-bones sites waiting for content, got started with one of my email lists, checked out software I was interested in, downloaded demos and actually used them, read tons of reports, tweaked templates, wrote more content, added more content and blogged and blogged some more.
Then over the weekend, everything seemed to die down. I have time to work on things, since the offline stuff has slowed down, and will likely be slower for the next few months. Yet I was back to twiddling my thumbs, thinking about lots of things but at the end of the day, just not having much to show for my time.
I finally figured out what I was doing different.
Early last week, I got on an organizing streak. I downloaded free time management software - Essential PIM - and found the "notes" section of the software to be very helpful.
The software also has a to-do list section on it, and I tried it out for a while, but I just don't seem to do well with electronic to-do lists.
Then one day, I pulled open a notebook, and jotted down a list of extremely small things that I had to do. Nothing on the list was particularly onerous or urgent, and most could be done given five to fifteen minutes of time.
It was a great list. I found that when I sat down at my computer, feeling kind of listless and bored and not knowing what I felt like doing, it was easy to pick something from the list - anything, since they were all very small actions - and do it. And here was the magical part: once I started doing the small thing, when it was finished, I either moved easily onto another small thing, or I ended up working on a larger project.
These small actions were the perfect way to get myself working.
On Friday, though, I cleaned off my desk. I stacked that to-do notebook to the side, out of sight.
And over the weekend, I really didn't do very much at all, aside from procrastinate by twiddling around with my Squidoo lens.
So today, I've pulled out that notebook, and I'm off to a great start again.
It definitely works for me.
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Posted by BJ at 03:10 PM in Taking Action | Permalink
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Comments
I added a white board to my wall recently and love it for keeping track of ideas that hit me while working and my to do lists.
Posted by: 45n5 | Feb 5, 2007 5:31:31 PM
I love the whiteboard idea! I actually did that for a while last year, and I'm glad you reminded me of it. I stopped using it but I think it was because I moved it to a non-prominent place. I really should pull it out, tack it somewhere really visible, and give it a try again. Thanks!
Posted by: BJ | Feb 6, 2007 8:31:31 PM
