As you probably know, I’m a big proponent of having a Master List of your tasks to help you stay focused and know clearly what’s on your plate. You may also know that I typically recommend that your Master List include both your personal and professional tasks. I often say that it needs to encompass all of your life, not just the work stuff or just the urgent stuff.
If you volunteer for your synagogue, then those tasks would appear on your list. If you are active in the PTA at your kids’ school, then those tasks would have space on your list. If you are helping a friend with a medical issue manage through a rough patch, then those tasks would also appear on your list. It’s the space where all your active commitments are tracked and reviewed.
However, one of the FAQs I get whenever I speak about the Master List is: Does EVERYTHING really need to go on the list? Doing laundry, dishes, brushing my teeth, taking out the trash?
So, I wanted to spend some time today exploring my answer to this question by talking about the three types of actions we all do, and help you create a system that can support you in getting them done.
The Three Types of Actions
My simple answer to the common question about do I include dishes, laundry, etc on my task list is… no, however, it’s a personal choice to determine what works best for you.
I say “no” because it’s easy for these basic, background activities to become clutter on our lists distracting us from the core, important tasks that require our attention and energy. However, these are activities that “need” to get done, so allow me to explain more about the three types of actions. Hopefully, understanding these three types will help you decide what works best for you.
Habits
The first type of action are our daily and weekly habits. These are the frequent, repetitive actions that we do consistently either every day, each week, or several times throughout the week.
Some examples might include:
- Doing the dishes
- Cooking meals
- Brushing & flossing our teeth
- Taking a shower
- Doing laundry
- Taking out the trash
- Exercise
- Watering house plants
- Picking up around the house
- Paying bills
- Grocery shopping
- Etc… you get the idea
These are activities that we all learn to do starting in childhood and adolescence, and they are basic parts of maintaining our lives. What’s different about these actions are the fact that they are so frequent. Many of them we do on a daily or weekly basis almost without thought. Others are habits that we’re actively working to build. (Maybe you’ve finally decided that the dentist has a point, and flossing more regularly is a habit that you’re ready to create?)
If we were to add all of these common daily or weekly habits on our Master List, that’s a sure road to overwhelm. We rarely recognize how much of our energy and time is already committed to these daily actions… and in some ways that’s a good thing. I think if we had to track every minute action of our day we’d all want to just crawl back in bed and give up. These mundane activities take a good block of our valuable time, and many of them can’t be delegated.
There’s the famous phrase “No one can do your push-ups for you,” which is also true about flossing your teeth and taking showers. (Well, I suppose you could hire someone to floss your teeth for you, but that would just be awkward and wouldn’t really save any time *wink*)
So, how do you manage and track these activities? If you’ve got them well-established, then you might not need to track them at all. They typically just happen on a rhythm and cadence that works for you and your life.
However, if you are working to build or shift new habits, then I would definitely recommend using a habit tracker. That could simply mean printing out a blank calendar and writing the new habit on the top, then checking off each day that you complete the habit. Or, if you’re tracking multiple habits then you might like a printable worksheet like this one [Insert Link to Habit Tracking Worksheet] I sometimes use with clients.
There are also a ton of great habit tracking apps out there. I’ve recommended ones like Habit List, Habit Bull, and Chorma in the past. One of the more playful ones that my husband and I are testing now is call Habitica, which turns completing your daily and weekly habits into a role-playing game (RPG) where you can level-up, earn various in and out of game rewards, and team up with others to go on quests, all driven by completing your daily and weekly habits.
Repeating Tasks
Slightly different from habits are what I call Repeating Tasks. These are actions that happen more than once, but less frequently than every week.
Some examples might include:
- Dropping off the rent check
- Reconciling bank accounts
- Replacing water filters
- Getting your car oil changed
- Putting up/down the storm windows at home
- Buying & sending birthday cards
- Refilling prescriptions
- etc…
Some of these actions happen once a month, some might be every few months, others are once a year at certain seasonal times. In general, I do include these actions on my Master List. Typically they aren’t frequent enough for me to count on remembering them at convenient times, and many of these actions are therefore at risk of falling through the cracks in the system if they aren’t included on the Master List.
Therefore, if you use a digital tool for your Master List it’s great to set these tasks up to repeat on the appropriate frequency. Then, you can “set it and forget it” until the next occasion arises.
If you are paper-based, then you might want to either:
- Create a triggers list that includes these activities that you review during your weekly check-in to remind you about when they’re next due.
- Include them on your calendar (which I’m typically not a fan of except for these type of actions).
- Add the next occasion to the appropriate Later section of your Master List after you complete each new one.
One-off Tasks/ Projects
These are the meat and potatoes of your Master List. These are the actions that you can check-off complete and move on down the road.
Some examples might include:
- Draft blog post on XYZ for June 7th
- Call Dr. to schedule follow-up appt
- Pick up hose at hardware store
- Edit copy for website About Me page
- Send proposal to ABC client
- etc.
These are the activities that move your important projects and commitments forward, and they are the typical core of anyone’s to-do list. The collection of all of these actions are your Master List, and it’s usually from this Master List that you choose your 4 tasks for today (Your Inspired Action Commitment and 3 Bonuses).
That means that, in general, your habits are not part of your Today list of 4 tasks. However, everyone’s circumstances are different. There are times in our lives when just getting out of bed and taking a shower feels like a huge accomplishment. I have a client who had a new baby a few months ago and getting a shower and a workout into his day at first were the major accomplishments.
So, that’s why you have to set expectations and craft the system to work for you. Hopefully, thinking about all those actions in this context of the three buckets of type can help you make intentional choices about what you choose to include (or not) on your Master List.
Next Action
If you haven’t yet created a Master List, then you’ll want to check out the Start Your Master List eGuide by clicking the link below.
If you have created your Master List, then you might want to glance over it and recognize whether you’ve been including habits on your list… is it working for you? Would it be better for you to handle those differently?
You have this one life… how do you want to live intentionally and make it work for you?
Image used under License Agreement: ©iqoncept / Stockfresh
