For years, I have kept a robust task list within OmniFocus, following Getting Things Done principles. I took it for granted that this was just something I needed, that it was just a part of life that I would have a large list of tasks that needed doing. I built up my system for task management, deconstructed it at times, rebuilt it, carried hundreds of tasks with me, spent multiple hours reviewing them weekly, but never did I consider that perhaps this way of doing things was not truly helping me get anything done and may have been holding me back.
As I reflect on how much effort I have put into maintaining and reviewing these lists, and the packrat nature of keeping every single task that may cause an “open loop,” it seems to me that the vast majority of the tasks on my list have been extraneous, and the small minority that were important rarely needed a task list to keep track of them. The projects and tasks with meaning were things I already knew I needed to get done, things that my intuition drove me toward and life took care of putting in front of me. The important projects and tasks were woven throughout my day to day– I was having meetings about them, actively thinking about them, getting emails about them, talking about them, and they were pulling at my mind. The rest, well, I think they are more weights around my neck, pulling me under. Each was small individually, but heavy in the aggregate.
I thought that having a large list of tasks, especially ones that were organized by context, would allow me to always have my choice of things to do that would fit the current context, time available, and the energy I had, allowing for near effortless task completion. Yet, if I am being honest, I almost never referred to these lists, and if I did, it required a near-Herculean effort just to get myself to do the tasks that were supposedly “in the right context,” rather than what was naturally pulling at me. In addition, these tasks that stayed with me for so long were basically handcuffs sent from my past self to the present, pulling me back toward old, outdated commitments and interests. They drowned out new and engaging actions and opportunities, even if these were also added to this list. There was a heaviness that dragged me down. I felt that I must stay attached to my list, that I needed to work my way through it. No way could I just do something outside of it if my interest and curiosity wanted to, but I could add it to the list as an act of interpassivity. More and more, interests, curiosities, things that would engage me with my day were buried, the list numbing me to the fact that I was never going to get to them, but making some part of me feel like, since it was part of the system, it had the potential to get done, and maybe that was enough. Except it wasn’t. Over the years, as I have been singed by the flames of burnout, there was no salve available to me. I felt a deep boredom suffusing my days.
So, I have decided to set myself adrift. I push off from the shores of strict task management and let myself sail on to distant, perhaps stranger ports. I will let myself float through my days, being more willing to indulge my curiosity, allowing myself to be pulled by the desires of the unconscious, driven by intuition toward the things that are important enough to work on.
I am not so naïve as to think that I will not have things that need to get done, nor even that I will keep no list at all. I will simply have a higher threshold to place tasks onto an enduring list and a lower threshold to simply let things fall away and be forgotten. I will have more trust that the important will bob to the surface again, life keeping those things within my view.
In addition, I will use a few tools and keep a few things in mind.
The Calendar
Keeping track of items that are due has been a piece of my task list that has been consistently useful. I have done a good job of not using arbitrary due dates and I will continue to do that. Arbitrary due dates create arbitrary pressure, and I have no interest in that. I will consider something to have a due date if, and only if, not completing that task or action at the specified date and time will mean that it can no longer be completed and that, in not completing it, consequences will occur. For now, I will use my calendar for these. If something is due, it is going on the calendar.
A Simple To Do List
I have begun to simplify back to plain text. There is something so satisfying and pretty in the simplicity of plain text and a nice plain text editor. For my task list, I am going to give TaskPaper a try. I really enjoy the look of it and its ease of use. I’ll let that be enough for me for now.
Placeholders
In addition to simple tools, I am going to consider tasks a bit differently. Instead of putting every possible task that comes across my mind onto an ever-growing list, I will try considering tasks more as placeholders. I want to use them in a way that allows me to quickly reload in my mind what I was doing prior so that I can jump back into my work or project without having to spend a lot of time trying to figure out where I was at. I think this will naturally decrease the amount of tasks on the list as this will only be pertinent to certain tasks that align with those projects that resonate with my life now. Not everything in my life fits neatly into this, but I will still keep my threshold high for adding one-off tasks and all the detritus that collects on me day-to-day.
Onward
I honestly have no idea where this is going to take me. I don’t know if it is even a good idea or feasible in the way I have laid out, but I am game to try. Shakeups are a good thing, especially when a deep-set boredom has settled in and burnout is nipping at my heels. During the last week or so that I have begun this system, there is a lightness and openness that I have not felt for a long time. Maybe it is just the glow of something new, but I am ok exploring this further.
For now, it’s onward to distant ports.