Wednesday, May 11, 2011

The power of details

I'm a big fan of to-do lists. Lists in general, really. There's something soothing about the notion that the hurly-burly of daily life can be distilled down on a sheet of creamy white paper into its controlled, black lined essence. It's pure fallacy, of course, but it's a nice idea.

Today I decided to try something suggested in one of the blogs I read and write a detailed to-do list. Not just, "Work, Banking, Knit" but a long, drawn out and detailed diagram of the actions required to fulfill those tasks. Mine, today, reads:
Article
Article
Article
Article
Article
Plan weekly money dist.
water
water
Plan VO prep steps
Blog Update
(Cross-throughs added to show that I've marked them all off! Yay!)

Granted, I did not split each article down into "Research, Write", but I figured two steps could be consolidated into one. Yes, I put water on my to-do list; I'm getting terribly dehydrated in this heat (we're up to the mid 80s Farenheit) and if I don't make it an obligation of some sort I'm likely to just skip it. I could have made my list even more extensive (and I think I will for tomorrow, although I'm a bit limited by the size of my paper--a small, 1.5" x 3" notebook) by listing out the leisure activities I want to do today (ie, get some knitting done on Mater Gloriosa's shawl).

The possibilities are endless.

I always forget how good I feel when I do the tasks I set for myself for the day instead of goofing off. Maybe if I use the extended to-do type list every day, that feeling will come to be normal and the only productivity related feeling I'll generate is the slight discomfort of not getting stuff done.

That would be when I really feel like a grown up.

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