Endless to-do lists exist everywhere.\u00a0 Even when you get caught up on your current tasks, more to-dos are bound to come your way.\u00a0 There\u2019s no escaping them, whether you write them down or keep them in your head.\u00a0 Living our life, there is always more to do.\u00a0 Finding a way to organize your to-do list can be just as individual as anything else \u2013 discovering how to make it work for you is most important.\u00a0 Part of making things work for you is to make the most of your current state.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s not uncommon that some of us are most successful with completing certain types of tasks.\u00a0 What do those tasks have in common?\u00a0 What makes them easier to handle?\u00a0 What\u2019s similar between tasks you tend to avoid?\u00a0 What leads you to feeling successful with your to-do list?\u00a0 What\u2019s the biggest challenge with your list?<\/p>\n
Our current state can have a dramatic impact on how we move through or avoid our tasks.\u00a0 Too often we wait until our feelings to lead us to our to-do list, \u201cNow I feel ready to work on my list.\u201d\u00a0 Yet what happens when you are always too tired, too sick, too overwhelmed?<\/p>\n
I challenge you to consider your tasks in a different way \u2013 match the tasks with what you are capable of right now.\u00a0 Although there any number of ways to break tasks into categories, for this particular approach consider these two factors \u2013 the physical and mental requirements \u2013 for each task on your list.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s more likely that you get the physical tasks accomplished when you feel like you have enough energy to tackle it.\u00a0 Yet, when you are struggling with consistent fatigue or pain issues, those active tasks might be put off.\u00a0 This makes sense.\u00a0 Although if you begin to consider your tasks according to how physical they are, you can also begin to figure out how to make the most of your energy when it\u2019s available \u2013 you\u2019ll know which tasks to make a priority.<\/p>\n
Likewise when you have little to no energy, you probably have tasks that are less physically strenuous.\u00a0 If you\u2019ve identified which tasks those are, you can tackle those.\u00a0 And be sure to consider if there are ways to make some tasks less physically demanding \u2013 like the drawer you can pull out completely and put it next to you on the couch.<\/p>\n
The second category can be just as important as the physical requirements per task.\u00a0 Our mental state and completing tasks has the potential to backfire \u2013 think about organizing something when you are practically brain-dead with exhaustion (which hopefully you wouldn\u2019t do anyway).\u00a0\u00a0 There are tasks that we can complete almost automatically \u2013 you don\u2019t need to be completely focused to get your dishes done.\u00a0 Other tasks need more attention \u2013 we have to think and make decisions.<\/p>\n
Both of these 2 categories are both really a spectrum \u2013 it\u2019s generally not as simple as sedentary versus active \u2013 it\u2019s a scale where you move between the two extremes.\u00a0 I generally think of tasks as falling on one side or the other though \u2013 for simplicities sake.\u00a0 I apply the same rules to the mental category too \u2013 complex versus simple (often thinking of them as intellectual vs. mindless).\u00a0 Yet, even by putting tasks into these extremes brings awareness about what each task will need of my attention whether they easily fit into those extremes.\u00a0 Then you also can alternate among the different categories to maintain or even increase your progress through your to-do list.<\/p>\n
Therefore if you can match up the tasks on your list to your current state, mentally and physically, you can probably get a lot more crossed off your list.\u00a0 By pairing up your tasks with your current abilities, you will also prevent the need for a long recovery \u2013 physically or emotionally \u2013 from accidentally overextending yourself.\u00a0 \u00a0Considering your to-do list with these factors in mind offers you the opportunity to make the most of your time and energy to get things accomplished in a sensible way.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Each task on our to-do list has more needs than simply to be done \u2013 it requires some level of physical and mental attention from us. By matching our tasks with our capabilities from one moment to the next means taking strides through our to-do list.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[10,8,18,5,9,20,7,22,15,4],"class_list":["post-1485","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-timemanagement","tag-behavior","tag-discipline","tag-goals","tag-household","tag-motivation","tag-paperwork","tag-procrastination","tag-productivity","tag-resources","tag-routines"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7p82c-nX","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1485","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1485"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1485\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1489,"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1485\/revisions\/1489"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1485"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1485"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1485"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}