127: How to Protect Your Priorities With a To-Do List Detox

How to Protect Your Priorities With a To-Do List Detox

It’s time for some real talk about our to-do lists…

You know I’m a big fan of to-do lists.

Our to-do lists keep us organized, give us structure to our days, and remind us of all the things we need to get done in order to reach our goals.

But, there’s a catch.

Too often, we find ourselves getting lost in our mile-long to-do lists! They start to get out of control, with an endless list of tasks we can barely keep up with.

What comes after? You feel chained to your to-do list, and you’re stressed, overwhelmed, and exhausted.

This week I’m breaking down the real reasons why our to-do lists get the best of us and why we’re setting ourselves up for failure, and I’ll show you how to break free from the never-ending cycle of to-dos.

How long is your to-do list?

Recently, a member of our community reached out to me to say they were trying one of the strategies I recommend– writing down everything on their mental to-do list on paper.

This strategy works great to quiet down that distracting mental chatter while you’re working, by the way. It clears space in your brain to be able to focus on the task at hand. Plus, you can always come back to this list later on, when you’ve got the time, without worrying about forgetting anything.

But back to our story: after reaching about a hundred items on her list, she eventually gave up. That to-do list was truly a mile-long.

Let’s think about the stuff we actually put on our to-do lists:

tasks and projects we need to either start or finish,
some paperwork,
emails to get to,
client calls to return,
and a bunch of other tasks that are just busy work.

Yes, busy work can creep into our lists and turn our to-do lists into mile long monsters that drain our time, energy, and focus. .

When we start to fill our schedules with busy work tasks– the tasks that make us think we’re being productive when they’re really just burning our time and energy– our schedules become insanely packed to the point that you start moving things around frantically trying to fit in a million things you realistically just can’t do in one day.

Or maybe, on the rare occasion, you do get them all done, but then you’re too drained and burnt out you feel like you could sleep for a whole week but it’s only Tuesday and your kid has dance practice tonight.

It’s a losing, never ending battle! You fill your to-do list to the brim everyday, get some tasks done, add a few more, stay up late to cross some more off.

You know what isn’t never-ending though? Your time, energy, and motivation. Your brain has limits, and working within those limits is the key to your productivity.

Why do our to-do lists get so overwhelming?

So why do we pick this battle with ourselves every day?

The real reasons behind our out-of-control to-do lists come full circle back to the mental habits we’ve learned and practiced for years including perfectionism, setting super high standards for ourselves, feeling like a failure when we’re not working all the time, and worrying about dropping the ball somewhere down the line and proving to ourselves and everyone else that we’re really just a walking disaster.

As a recovering perfectionist myself, I get that feeling about needing everything to be just perfect.

Your inner perfectionist creates and maintains this personal mission to have impossibly high and unrealistic expectations for yourself.

It tells you that you should be uncomfortable if you’re not busy all the time because you could be doing so much more.

And somewhere in there, you have this constant fear of failure that drives you to worry about making mistakes because somehow you’ll prove yourself unworthy to your own biggest critic.

But here’s the thing… Perfectionism is setting yourself up to fail.

We set these crazy high expectations for ourselves that are humanly impossible (like checking 400 things off the to-do list every day), and then we feel like a giant failure when we inevitably don’t get it all done. And failure is the worst! Your brain does not like this feeling– because it hates feeling uncomfortable.

Remember - our brains love to be comfortable. Because being comfortable is easy. It uses less resources like energy and time (even if you KNOW that comfort zone is holding you back).

Our brains put up all these barriers and habits that keep us stuck so your brain can go right on feeling comfortable.

But the problem is trying to stay comfortable with the mental habit of perfectionism, is a losing battle. Because expecting yourself to be perfect, to do it all, to check a million things off your to-do list every day at work while also making michelin star meals and keeping your home so clean it’s ready for a pinterest op every day isn’t possible.

And when we inevitably can’t do it all, because let’s be real here– our inner perfectionist is so good at being unrealistic– we beat ourselves up, lose motivation and energy, and we end up procrastinating and avoiding the tasks we need to do because why would we start if we’re just going to mess up anyway?

That, my friends, is the cycle of perfectionism and procrastination running away with your productivity.

A quick strategy to detox your to-do list!

But there’s gotta be a way out of this. And you’re right! It’s time to do a to-do list detox. I’ll walk you through it.

Take out your to-do list. Yes, that mile-long monster that’s been eating at you all day.

Now, pick 3 key priorities for today. Just three! That’s all you’re going to do with your time today.

Focus on those three priorities until they’re done and crossed off the list.

Pick the tasks that will make the most impact on your goals– usually these aren’t the easy tasks or the busy work tasks.

Here’s a hint: they’re probably the ones you’ve been procrastinating forever on. The ones that seem challenging so you’ve been avoiding them because your inner perfectionist is in your way.

You’ll find that when you start going from doing busy work to productive work, a lot of those million other things on your to-do list might become redundant anyway!.

Bonus episode resources

This episode is brought to you by my free workbook - Your Daily Productivity Checklist. Ever wished you had more time in your day? This free workbook will walk you through the steps I use to set up my day to maximize productivity so you can get more done in your day (without feeling totally overwhelmed or staying up all night to squeeze it all in!) Download your copy of Your Daily Productivity checklist at https://www.drnicolebyers.com/checklist

Key takeaways

Do your to-do lists keep getting bigger while your time, energy, and motivation seem to be running out? Perfectionism and all the other things it comes with– like setting crazy high standards for yourself, worrying about failing, and procrastinating– might be burning you out. It’s time for a to-do list detox to get your time and schedule back on track and in your control.

Show Highlights

[02:02] - Writing down everything you need to do is a great strategy but lists get long.

[02:37] - To-do lists are filled with a lot of different things.

[03:39] - To-do lists have no limit, but your time and energy do.

[04:35] - The inner perfectionist tells us we should feel uncomfortable if we’re not busy.

[05:03] - Setting impossible standards sets us up for failure.

[06:10] - When we can’t do it all, we beat ourselves up and lose motivation.

[06:45] - Do a to-do list detox!

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