Hey-o, dear readers! This is the introduction to a four-part (five if you count this) series to answer the question posed by my friend Felicia in response to a call for blog topics: "A "getting it all done"-sort of thing?"
"Getting it all done" covers a lot of topics: time management, task management, resource management and prioritization, among others. But underneath it all is the more nebulous, "woo"-ish topic I want to talk about today: the thoughts and feelings that we bring to our to-do list.
Usually, when we think of the things on that list, we think of it in terms of "I've got to..." or "I have to..." The way I see it, there are two problems with that. First, we phrase it as a demand rather than a desire. There's a world of difference in the energy we bring to stuff we "have to" do versus stuff we "want to" do.
The second problem is that we tend to leave off the other half of the "I have to" sentence, the half that begins with "or" and describes the consequences of our not completing something. That tends to make everything a "have-to" of equal priority and makes it harder to figure out what to put our attention to first.
Both of these problems mean that thinking in terms of "have to" basically removes our sense of choice in the matter. And it tends to heighten our stress. Someday, I'd love to commission research to study the effect of using the phrase "I have to..."; I truly believe that hearing it, saying it or even thinking it triggers the release of stress hormones in many people.
So my introductory bit of advice to all of you is that you begin to approach your to-do list from a new perspective. First, look on it as a list of things you want to do or choose to do. (Even if you don't at first.) Second, don't just take each item on your list as a given; think about what might happen if it doesn't get done. You might find that the consequences aren't all that bad.
I also want to say that as you read through this series, you might find that you experience some emotional resistance to the ideas. In response to that, let me share one of my favorite scenes from an early episode of The Simpsons. Bart was visited by the devil and told he was destined for hell at the rate he was going. Bart asked if there was anything he could do to prevent such a fate, and the devil responded knowingly, "Oh, sure. Plenty of things. But you probably wouldn't like any of them."
Changing your approach to getting things done probably won't be much fun at first; you very well might not like it. But just making a few adjustments in how you view your tasks and to-dos can keep you out of the hell of an endless list of "have to"s.
How do you approach the tasks in your life? Do you think "have to"? (And does that affect your stress level?) Let me know in the comments!
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