The Tomorrow To Do List

Ironically it is not a person’s irresponsibility that prevents him from managing tasks. It is his untamed sense of responsibility. For example, you have your entire day planned out but something important comes up. Your sense of responsibility tells you that you must address the issue immediately. You remember many fancy, great-sounding, yet misapplied positive quotes like “Carpe diem” (“seize the day” in Latin), “There’s no time like the present” or “If it is to be it is up to me”! These quotes motivate you to move into action on the immediate albeit unplanned task, thus pushing you behind on your established plan. The result is that you appear unorganized or irresponsible, neither of which are true. Instead, you are lacking restraint on your sense of responsibility.

A Tomorrow To Do List will prevent you from opening up your email account to send an important message only to be derailed by an incoming message that needs your attention. The unexpected e-mail leads to a phone call with a business partner who reminds you that you need to fill out a report for the upcoming staff meeting. Mention of that report reminds you that you should really get going on your expense reports. Oh yeah, and how are you going to find the receipts you misplaced on your last trip? Two hours later (or worse, the entire day goes by), and you never even sent the original e-mail you had intended to send.

Here is the best way to stay on top of your tasks and therefore remain motivated to get through your day in a positive manner.

1. Begin each day with your Tomorrow To Do List (TTDL) at hand. When something that was not a part of your original plan comes up, write it on your TTDL. The act of cataloging it reduces stress and allows you to stay focused on your current plan.
2. As you go throughout your day, when things come up and add them to your list.
3. At the end of the day, add anything else that you need to accomplish the next day.

DON’T STOP THERE. Now that you have a list to plan from, you have to keep working the drill. This is where many time management errors are made, leaving the user of the list flailing throughout the day. So here is the continuation:

1. One of the main reasons why people who use to do lists fail to complete them is because they do not apply a specific time to each of the tasks. Anecdotally, you are five times more likely to accomplish your tasks if you have a specific time attached to each one.
2. Now, look at the items you have entered for your day. You probably have a mix of pebbles, sand, water, and big rocks. Look at the list of six plates and determine which ones are missing. Find a place to add them. Don’t stop until you have included each one of them.

Some of you may have been trained to use a “floating to do list.” The concept is that if you have items that you need to do but you don’t know when you will be able to do them, you can put them on this master list. This is a great mechanism for instilling a low level of motivation. If you are like 99.9% of the people in the world, this list could easily be called the “stuff I will never do but I will look at to feel guilty list.” Scrap the idea and replace it with the following: If you know you can’t do something tomorrow then don’t write it on your TTDL. Instead, put it on a TTDL that is realistic. Maybe you will not get to it until next Thursday. If that is the case, put it on next Wednesday’s TTDL. The fact that it is on Wednesday’s list is invaluable. Many victims of “oops I forgot” suffered their fate because they placed an item on a to-do list for a day in the future and never looked at it until they woke up that day. The lack of a heads-up can prevent them from keeping the commitment. Using the TTDL for future planning is great to provide an advanced reminder of what is to come.

Dave Durand, Perpetual Motivation (Crossroad, 2006) 

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dave Durand is the co-founder and CEO of the international media company Best Version Media. He is also an author, professional speaker, and radio personality. If you thought this post was valuable then please "like" it and share with others! You can find more from Dave on his Facebook profile right here.