Summary

The author shares strategies for managing a "To Do" list effectively while working from home, particularly when facing unmotivated periods or health challenges.

Abstract

The article outlines five personal strategies the author employs to manage and complete daily tasks while working remotely. The author emphasizes the challenges of time management and the tendency to overestimate what can be achieved in a day, leading to a cycle of unfinished tasks and increased stress. To counter this, the author suggests using Post-It Notes for daily tasks, limiting the list to what's achievable that day, and focusing on one note at a time. Google Calendar is recommended for scheduling appointments. The author also advocates for completing each task before moving to the next, using room transitions to accomplish small organizing tasks, and rewarding oneself upon task completion to maintain motivation. These methods are presented as a way to manage time without becoming overwhelmed, ultimately improving productivity and quality of life.

Opinions

The author believes that long to-do lists contribute to feelings of failure and being overwhelmed.
They find that breaking down tasks into manageable portions, such as using Post-It Notes, helps in achieving success and reducing stress.
The author values the use of Google Calendar for keeping track of appointments and important dates.
They express that completing tasks in sequence, without multitasking, is more effective for productivity.
The author suggests that small rewards for task completion serve as motivation and acknowledges that even small steps contribute to overall progress.
They admit that while their methods may not lead to a perfectly organized life, they significantly improve productivity and self-confidence.

5 Ways I Get My “To Do” List Done

When I’m totally unmotivated

Photo by Emma Matthews Digital Content Production on Unsplash

Working from home has its challenges.

When you make the transition from the traditional to the remote, it’s like getting a raise — only the raise is an increase in time. Your commute time is reduced to minutes. Or seconds, depending on where in the house your workspace is located. Your lunch hour is more flexible. Your workday may shift or consist of fewer hours than before.

This raise in time is great, but one of the challenges I found when I went from an office to my couch in 2013 was that my time management sucked.

I was more efficient with my actual work, but the extra time that I now had to be productive in other ways was wasted. I’d be too ambitious at the beginning of each day, making elaborate To-Do lists and trying to do all the laundry and setting lofty goals that I couldn’t possibly meet by the end of the day. In spite of my intentions, I’d end up with a series of half-finished tasks, a lot of hours spent watching Netflix or scrolling through social media, and a To-Do list in the recycle bin.

This got worse as I started selling things on various online selling platforms. I’d often find myself starting to get a sold item ready for shipment, only to start looking for the mailing tape, finding it in the kitchen, noticing that the dishwasher needed unloading, starting to put things away, then seeing that the mail was picked up while I had been looking for the tape.

Like my laundry, my To-Do lists were started and never finished.

That wouldn’t include the unchecked emails and voice messages and unopened boxes of inventory that I’d forgotten I’d ordered.

My methods were failing to do anything but motivate me to run away from home. Or at least run away from my ever-growing mountain of problems.

After banging my head against the proverbial wall for some time, I decided to make a new set of parameters for my work-from-home life. The old set was driving me nuts. I was constantly overwhelmed by setting my sights too high when it came to getting things done.

One of my issues, besides anxiety and bipolar disorder, is an immune deficiency that causes inflammation even if I’m not currently sick. There are days when I can barely get out of bed, and there are other days when I feel pretty good. When I’m feeling bad, I can hardly get to one thing on my list. When I’m feeling good, I tend to cram everything possible in my day, but then I still end up distracted and overwhelmed because it’s not possible to do it all.

So I’ve had to get creative.

Because my long To-Do lists were doing nothing but causing me to feel like a failure, I stopped making them. And then I came up with a few ways that would guarantee at least some success in my life when it came to finishing tasks:

1. My To-Do list is on Post-It Notes.

Even if I have to put a master list somewhere to remember everything, I decide what is ‘do-able’ that day and put it on a Post-It Note. I don’t usually write more than 3 tasks on one Post-It. If I have several of these sticky notes, I only have one of them in my field of vision, and it stays there until those tasks are done.

2. Google Calendar is my friend.

When it comes to appointments, I use Google Calendar instead of (and sometimes in addition to) Post-It Notes. I need that extra layer of assurance that I know about an upcoming Zoom meeting or a doctor's appointment.

3. Each task I have on my shortlist must be done before I move to the next one.

So if the Post-It in front of me says that I have 3 things to ship and a dishwasher to unload, I get the shipping out of the way before I put the first clean dish in the cabinet. And if I find that I’ve got time to move on to another Post-It Note, great!

4. Every time I go from one room to another, I take something with me that needs to be put away.

It can literally be anything. If I’m on the couch and need to go in the kitchen to get some water, I take my empty coffee mug with me and either refill it or put it in the dishwasher. If I’m going from the bathroom to the utility room, I look for something small — an empty toilet paper roll that needs recycling, a pen on my bedside table, a napkin on the counter — and take it with me to put it where it needs to go. These micro-tasks add up when it comes to organization and helps declutter my world.

5. I reward myself when a task is done.

Everybody needs a payoff, but payoffs don’t always have to be cake or money. They can be small: a short break so I can read or scroll through Instagram, are little payoffs that I promise myself when I get done with a task or one of my shortlists. If the package I had ordered from Sephora — which always has fun little extras and samples —shows up with the daily mail, I won’t open it until I’ve opened the bills and put the junk mail in the recycling bin. Sometimes I will save the package to open once everything on my Post-It Note has been taken care of. I’ll put a light at the end of the tunnel, even if it’s a short tunnel, that can keep me motivated just a little longer.

A spoonful of sugar does help the medicine go down, but I’d rather get the sugar at the end.

I wish I could be better with my time without having to cut lists into bite-sized pieces and bribe myself, but these methods have been the only way I can get stuff done around here without losing my mind. I still have piles of things and unchecked emails and will probably never completely catch up on the laundry or have a place for everything in my house, but I’m that much closer when I finish each of my little tasks on my sticky note.

Because at the end of the day, those small steps I’ve taken add up to progress and make me more productive, which in turn decreases my stress level and increases my self-confidence. And all of that improves my quality of life.

Maybe my methods can help the quality of your own, too.