Why Resist The List?

This week, I'd like to talk about my very strange relationship with the one of the most useful tools on the planet.  This tool is completely free to use (you do need a paper and pen, but really, those can be borrowed, if need be).  It's completely portable; it can fit in the palm of your hand, if you'd like.  And this tool has been shown to increase personally efficiency by about a billion-fold (approximately).  What am I talking about?  Friends, I speak of a good, old-fashioned To Do List. 

So, here's the strange part: even though I know that I will be able to accomplish a far greater number of tasks, organize my time more efficiently, and free up valuable cognitive function for focus on other things, I seem to resist the list!  Many people I know are in the same boat here.  Why do we resist the list??  It just doesn't make logical sense - we know how much writing a To Do List will serve us, we know it only takes a minute or two to complete, and yet, we resist, insisting instead on limiting ourselves in this way.  I had to fight myself for about three hours this morning before I broke down and made a list.  And you know what?  As soon as I wrote it, I felt instantly relieved, instantly more organized and competent.  So why in the world was it such a struggle? 

Perhaps we resist writing the To Do List because we feel it should be unnecessary - we shouldn't need to write stuff down; we've got these powerful brains; that should be enough, right? 

Well, that's true - however, picture your closet.  We all know how much easier it is to locate, say, a particular favorite shirt, when you can see it clearly, folded or hanging right in it's organized home, rather than at the bottom of a huge pile of unfolded clothes, completely obscuring the closet floor, as well as all the layers of clothing below the very top layer.  I'm not telling you to go organize your closet, although that might not be such a terrible idea either, but how much easier to organize your thoughts by writing a list.

I have the most terrific To Do notepad.  Somehow, it's way more approachable to write a To Do list on a pad that's been specifically designed with Listing in mind.  Mine actually has a column for each day of the week - the particularly ingenious aspect of this design is that it lends itself to To Do List modification - if some items escape you for a day, you can just move them over to the next day's list.  Plus, you get a sense of perspective as to what your objectives are for the week.  Also, let's say there's something you know you're going to have to do three days from now, you can write it in that day's column and you're freed from having to think about it until then!  So much easier!!

With all this effusive praise for To Do Lists, I do want to include a friendly suggestion as well: To Do lists work best when you use them fluidly, not rigidly.  It's never productive to get overly critical of yourself if your list/reach exceeds your grasp.  As long as you're moving forward, you're moving in the right direction. 

For those just getting started, I suggest writing some short-term lists, and also some long-term ones as well.  It can be very freeing to get those goals onto paper, so your brain can stop repeating them in hopes that you remember all the different components swimming around in there.

Also, boxes to be checked next to each item = a must.  It's just so very very satisfying to check them off.  In fact, if a large task can be broken down into smaller parts, it can be very rewarding to make a separate line, with check-box, for each component of the task, like if you're cleaning the bathroom, the floor, the sink, the counters, the mirror can all have their own lines, if you wish.  So much more satisfying to check off all those happy little boxes.

So, although this post is on the shorter side (homework comes first), I do feel that the topic has the potential to pack a pretty big 'pow'.  I'll leave you with a few related quotes from a really wise and amazing man named Brian Tracy, who once said, "Goals allow you to control the direction of change in your favor.", and, "Feeling listless?  Make a list!"

The Magical Equation Of Change, and How It's Transforming My World Today

Greetings, readers.  Today I write to you as a woman in some turmoil.  I am a couple weeks into taking online classes, and my brain hasn't been working the way it used to (I used to drive a Ferrari; I now seem to be rocking the Flintstones' car).  I can not remember the last time I got more than two hours of non-interrupted sleep - well, I can, but it was over six months ago (the night before the day I gave birth). 

 

The other bug in my bonnet: I am frustrated that, for the first time in my adult life, I want more money, but I don't have the option of "just working harder" (as when I worked sales jobs where I could earn a commission), or of finding a job with a higher salary, or asking for a raise.  As my friend Michele, who will be interviewed in a future blog entry, delving into her skills of fiscal wizardry, says, I have one client, who is extremely demanding, and I am on-call 24/7 - oh, and also, I signed an exclusivity contract stating that I can't work for anyone else, including bosses who would pay me in currency other than baby smiles and baby giggles (which are terrific and all, but the cashiers at Whole Foods seem to feel it's not an acceptable form of payment).

So, here I am.  These are the two issues which weigh heavily upon my mind and heart today.  I, readers, am standing at the fulcrum, or balance point, of the scales.  The scales I refer to represent components of the Magical Equation of Change, which reads as follows:

The pain of the present situation must out-weigh the fear of the unknown, for change to occur.

Powerful stuff, that equation.  And 100% true for humans; every one I've met anyway.

Until today, I have resisted feeding my daughter solid foods.  My mother, who is a neonatal intensive care nurse (who works with premature babies, and is a fountain of current, clinically-proven baby-related information) tells me research shows that: the longer the introduction of solid foods is delayed, the lower the chance baby will suffer allergies later in life.  Or more specifically, the longer babies ingest nothing but breast milk, the less likely they are to later suffer allergies.  So, I've been waiting and waiting.  Everybody else tells me that, as soon as their baby started eating solid foods, presto!, baby slept through the night.  Through the night??!  The whole night???  Wow.  So, this morning, after yet another night of what felt like one extremely long game of poke-mama-s eyeballs, played by my wide-awake daughter, I decided.  There is a reason that, when the airline safety spiel talks about oxygen masks, the point they emphasize is to put your own mask on first.  Because, if you don't, who's going to be coherent enough to put the childrens' masks on them?  Today, my daughter will taste her first solid foods.  I am giddy at the mere whiff of possibility of a sleep-filled night.

Next, the money issue.  Actually, there is an option I had overlooked.  Scholarships and grants.  Money is one of the main reasons I'm in school in the first place, but maybe I don't have to wait until I graduate to benefit from increased funds.  I don't know how long it's going to take; I don't know if my daughter is going to do her best impression of a car alarm the entire time we're waiting in line; I don't know if I will be successful - if it will be worth my while.  But I do know I have to try.  Monday, my daughter and I will be camping out in the line outside my community college's Financial Aid office, and if we have to spend the whole day there, then that's what will have to happen for me to attain more funds.

The pain of the current situation has tipped the balance, and now out-weighs any fear of the unknown: change is now ready to occur.

Which brings us to the other magical quality of change.  Once you achieve the first equation, once you have clearly identified measurable, attainable action steps for yourself, which you firmly intend to put into motion, the part of you that was in so much pain begins to relax.  Ahhhhhh........