The To Do List

Tasks that weigh on your mind are like little alarm bells constantly going off. They pop up on your mind when you are in the middle of doing something else and make you feel guilty for not tackling them. I get into bed at night and think " I MUST get onto that to do list" and then life promptly gets in the way. 

 

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Some of the jobs on my To Do list are actually important and are time specific, like getting Button's thank you cards out. Some fall more into the category of well that would be nice to do and would make your life easier, like weed out the newborn clothing which Buttons no longer fits, clean them and store them away for Baby No 3. Other tasks are more of the wish list variety and are likely to be on the To Do list the longest, like organising our digital photos and ordering some to be actually printed instead of just hanging out on our phones and computers. 

Every weekend Action Dad and I negotiate what needs to get down while there are two of us available with two little girls who need us, and what we want to do so that we actually spend some time having fun together.  On Saturday morning, the weekend seems to stretch out and is filled with time to get things done and play and relax and enjoy ourselves. On Sunday night, once the kids are asleep I look back and think how did two days just disappear? Why does bloody Monday stretch on for days, yet Saturday and Sunday are gone in seconds? It's like some mystical time bending magical trick. 

Gretchen Rubin writes about this in her books "The Happiness Project" and "Happier at Home". She recommends taking the jobs on your To Do list and breaking them down into two categories. Number 1- if a job takes less than 5 minutes, then you do it immediately and stop dragging it out. Things like replacing the screw on the handle to the pantry so that it stops falling off. Or picking up the small purple bead under the coffee couch that I can see every time I sit down to feed Buttons. The second category is for the larger jobs on your To Do list. Rubin's recommends setting a timer and spending a set amount of time on a particular job until it is actually completed. Her example, funnily enough is also organising digital photos- she sat down for 15 mins every day and uploaded and deleted and organised photos for a few weeks until the job was completed and could be crossed off the To Do list.  

 

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Sometimes I think I spend so long procrastinating and stressing over how many things I need to do, that it immobilises me and I spiral further into my To Do list where nothing is getting done. I find myself overwhelmed and end up sitting on the couch, drinking hot blackcurrant and watching crappy tv ( have you seen Dance Moms????? How bad is that show, that it is actually all kinds of fabulous!)  I think because I am so organised with the regular, routine stuff in my life that I find it hard to do the one off jobs that populate the List. 

Update! Apparently writing this post was exactly what I needed to do to shame myself into action- Button's Thank you cards are written, addressed and posted. Yay!!! Tick!